Several significant copyright milestones were reached earlier this year. The first key development was that Congressional hearings began on reforming US copyright law. The reforms addressed problems with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which allows copyright owners to demand the ‘take down’ of their content from websites and search engines.
The second was that Google received its one hundred millionth takedown notice. And more recently, a federal judge ruled that the DMCA doesn’t protect mega-ISP Cox Communications, based on a continued refusal to remove repeat infringers from its subscriber rolls.
The underlying issue is the sheer volume of infringing material on the internet. The number of infringing files online are overwhelming and has ultimately led copyright owners to rely on technology, particularly “web-bots,” that scan the internet for infringing activity. Additionally, infringing material typically gets taken down in response to a DMCA demand, but commonly reappears on the same site, sometimes a matter of hours after it is removed.
The time and cost to defend one’s copyright on the internet is significant. Many believe that the fix for this is that “take down” needs to be converted to “take down and stay down.” This simply means that once a DMCA notice is filed, all files with that ID will be taken down, across all websites, and new postings that match the same ID will be blocked.
‘Take down and stay down’ would exclude the problem of repeated notice for the same files on the same website. With this reform in place, the amount of DMCA notices filed will go down, which means Google will require less resources to process them. Additionally, small independent businesses will not have to set aside resources or time to send out notices for the same content over and over again.
Many believe that ‘Stay down’ should be added to the current section 512 DMCA takedown notification as a way to return control to the creators. A petition is currently circulating to help put this new reform in place.
The petition can be found on takedownstaydown.org.
Great idea. 100% impractical. Whoever decided this was even technically possible needs to go retake Computing 101. Then after they fail out of that course they can go back to the drawing board and come up with something that is actually realistic in the 21st century.
Whenever some tech nerd claims it is ‘technically impossible’ to do something to deal with piracy, nine times out of ten it really means one of the following:
a) it would be technically possible to deal with 90%+ of the problem, but not absolutely watertight – which is like saying you can never stop 100% of cars from being stolen, so you shouldn’t bother with car locks.
or
b) it would be technically possible, but it would require major changes in how the internet works, and that would be too disruptive. Because of course ‘disruption’ is fine for every industry except the internet.
Very well put, David.
Every piece of content has a hash. Takedown and staydown is totally doable.
Google will fight it because they get rich off of piracy and they’re trying to keep their stockholders happy.
And every hash is easily changed. You could create a million different files all with different hashes all of the exact same song.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard tech say they give up, they can’t solve a programming challenge. We are not going to let people with an agenda stop us.
Thanksgiving is a day of giving. Give something back to creators. The right to decide what happens to their work.
You seem to think you are pretty smart. Why don’t you tell me then how this will be done?
Thank you for bringing this!
I hope everybody’s going to sign!
Absolutely ludicrous. Anyone who signs this is an idiot. It’s pixie dust.
Feel free to call me an idiot, then.
I won’t call you one. I’ll just think of you as one.
Not true, although this is the go to argument that is already being put out there by Google. Here’s the way it works and thank-you for brining it up.
First. Google. They already are using and promoting content id software for block infringing content on YouTube. Although Fred Von Lohmann, Google’s Legal Director for Copyright, denied its’ efficacy on other websites at the recent Congressional Listening Tour stop at UCLA on November 10th. Interesting comment from someone in an industry that prides itself on innovation, disruption and solving all of man kinds problems. Unless it doesn’t serve them.
Anonymous, here’s where I’ll take you into the 21st century. Piracy is so rampant and out of control, we don’t need software that can actually tag and identify EVERY infringing file. We simply need software that can effectively identify a percentage of unauthorized reposting of copyrighted material and demonstrate, as with the recent Cox Communication rulings.
We need to establish a threshold of takedown and staydown violations with legal consequences that empower authorities to force ISPs to block these sites or lose their licenses. We need a clear evidentiary path to begin legal proceedings against these sites.
The legal process needs to be streamlined so that infringing sites can be blocked immediately in this country so that creators aren’t financially penalized by an appeals process that allows these websites to continue operating for years.
screw piracy, we live in a society where people say they cant afford to pay $10 for a record but are willing to cash out more than a $300 on a new smartphone and around $60 a month on a phone plan. The whole “I’m broke and I’m 14 so I cant afford to buy things” excuse is not acceptable. Get a part time job, although its not even the kids. This generation has become lazy and non efficient. It’s even more pathetic that people think that it’s okay to steal the musicians work and call themselves fans. I think majority of these people, if not all, fail to grasp that if you keep stealing from your favorite musicians, you’ll eventually cause a lack of new music being created in the future. Don’t be a bum, cash out the little amount of money it costs to keep your favorite artist from living a suitable lifestyle (i.e., a roof over their head).