RIAA Says YouTube is Running a DMCA Protection Racket

In the latest broadside in the content takedown debate, RIAA chief Cary Sherman has suggested that Google-owned YouTube is short-changing the labels by operating a DMCA-protected protection racket. Unsurprisingly Google sees things quite differently, noting that the tools already exist to take down unauthorized content on a permanent basis.

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youtubefaceYouTube has grown into the world’s leading video and music service and has partnerships with thousands of artists and other publishers around the globe. While many are happy with the revenue they’re generating from the Google-owned platform, others are not.

According to various sources, Universal’s deal with YouTube has already expired and deals in place with the likes of Sony and Warner will time out later this year. As a result the major recording labels are in negotiations with YouTube and are demanding better rates than the ones they currently describe in disparaging terms.

So if the RIAA can negotiate decent deals with the likes of Apple Music and TIDAL, why does it continue to have problems with Google’s YouTube? To put it bluntly the labels believe that YouTube is gaming the system and unsurprisingly it all comes down to the safe harbor provisions of the DMCA.

While YouTube quickly responds to takedown notices sent by the labels, the RIAA says the platform is laden with unlicensed music uploaded users and as the law currently stands all it can do is keep taking it down. That’s something they do through gritted teeth.

In an interview with Recode, RIAA chief Cary Sherman was asked why following the Viacom case the labels don’t accept the current legal position. He pulls no punches.

“We accept the inevitability of death. It doesn’t mean we have to like it,” he says.

Describing the DMCA as “dysfunctional”, Sherman says that the Copyright Office’s consultation on the effectiveness of the DMCA is allowing stakeholders to have their say but in the meantime YouTube is bullying negotiations by utilizing the shield of safe harbor.

“When you compare what we get when we get to freely negotiate, with a company like Spotify, vs. what we get when we are under the burden of an expansively interpreted ‘safe harbor,’ when you’re negotiating with somebody like YouTube, you can see that you’re not getting the value across the platforms that you should,” Sherman says.

According to the RIAA chief the solution is for the current notice-and-takedown system to become notice-and-staydown, so that when one unlicensed copy of a song is removed from YouTube all other uploads of the same content are permanently barred from the system.

“If we had a system where once a song was taken down, you had a filtering system that prevented it from going back up, we wouldn’t have to be sending hundreds of millions of notices on the same content over and over again,” Sherman notes.

So the RIAA says its stuck between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand they want their properly licensed music on YouTube but in return they want all unlicensed copies of the same removed from YouTube on a permanent basis. Sherman says without that kind of agreement the one-sided negotiation process with the company goes something like this.

Look. This is all we [YouTube] can afford to pay you. We hope that you’ll find that reasonable. But that’s the best we can do. And if you don’t want to give us a license, okay. You know that your music is still going to be up on the service anyway. So send us notices, and we’ll take ’em down as fast we can, and we know they’ll keep coming back up.

“That’s not a real negotiation. That’s like saying, ‘That’s a real nice song you got there. Be a shame if anything happened to it’,” Sherman says.

In effect, Sherman accuses Google-owned YouTube of running a DMCA-protected protection racket, with music possibly being offered freely to the masses in the same manner that bars might get inexplicably fire-bombed in Chicago during the night. While Google hasn’t responded to Sherman’s comments directly, a submission it has made to the Copyright Office pours cold water on the flames.

“Some in the recording industry have suggested that the safe harbors somehow diminish the value of sound recordings, pointing to YouTube and blaming the DMCA for creating a so-called ‘value grab.’ This claim is not supported by the facts,” the company writes.

Noting that YouTube has had licensing agreements in place with the record labels for many years, Google says it is simply incorrect that it relies on the DMCA instead of licensing content. Furthermore, Google says that those who claim that royalty rates are too low because of the DMCA notice-and-takedown process are forgetting the tools already provided by YouTube.

“This claim…ignores Content ID, which has been in existence since 2008 and which record labels (and many other copyright owners) use every day to monetize their works on YouTube. Thanks to Content ID, record labels do not have to rely
solely on the DMCA’s notice-and-takedown process on YouTube — they can remove any or all user uploads of their works from the platform on an automated and ongoing basis,” Google writes.

“Indeed, since January 2014, over 98% of all YouTube copyright removal claims have come through Content ID. Although business partners can be expected to disagree from time to time about the price of a license, any claim that the DMCA safe harbors are responsible for a ‘value gap’ for music on YouTube is simply false.”

With this war of words set to rage on, RIAA chief Cary Sherman says that he hopes for a future in which the DMCA has been fixed and the balance of power shifts back to the labels.

“I think the record companies would like to be partners with YouTube. But it’s a little hard to call it a partnership when it’s so one-sided in terms of the negotiating leverage,” he says.

Notice-and-staydown certainly has the potential to push the point of leverage back into the labels’ favor, but there’s a long way to go yet. Content ID aside, it doesn’t look like Google wants to play ball either.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Yes, you can run desktop Linux apps in Windows 10 thanks to Ubuntu on Windows

Yes, you can run desktop Linux apps in Windows 10 thanks to Ubuntu on Windows

One of the most surprising new features coming to Windows 10 this summer is “Ubuntu on Windows,” which basically brings a complete Ubuntu Linux file system to Microsoft’s operating system and allows developers to run Bash and command-line apps. But what about desktop apps with a graphical user interface? Officially Windows 10 doesn’t support those. […]

Yes, you can run desktop Linux apps in Windows 10 thanks to Ubuntu on Windows is a post from: Liliputing

Yes, you can run desktop Linux apps in Windows 10 thanks to Ubuntu on Windows

One of the most surprising new features coming to Windows 10 this summer is “Ubuntu on Windows,” which basically brings a complete Ubuntu Linux file system to Microsoft’s operating system and allows developers to run Bash and command-line apps. But what about desktop apps with a graphical user interface? Officially Windows 10 doesn’t support those. […]

Yes, you can run desktop Linux apps in Windows 10 thanks to Ubuntu on Windows is a post from: Liliputing

Breakthrough Starshot announces plans to send ship to Alpha Centauri

Mini-spacecraft would be accelerated with laser-driven light sails.

Stephen Hawking and others at the Breakthrough Starshot announcement.

NEW YORK CITY—The top of the new World Trade Center building was buried inside the clouds, but everyone's focus was on the stars. Yuri Milner, the man whose investments have helped fund the Breakthrough Prizes and Breakthrough Initiatives, was here to announce his newest venture: Breakthrough Starshot, an effort to send hardware to the nearest stars quickly enough for many of us to live to see their arrival.

Present to back the project was physicist Stephen Hawking. "I believe what makes us unique is transcending our limits," Hawking told the audience. "Gravity pins us to the ground, but I just flew to America."

He went on to ask, "How do we transcend these limits? With our minds and our machines. The limit that confronts us now is the great void between us and the stars. But now we can transcend it."

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Deals of the Day (4-12-2016)

Deals of the Day (4-12-2016)

Go to HP.com and configure an HP Envy 13t notebook with a Core i7 processor, a 3200 x 1800 pixel display, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of storage and the price comes to $1150. But right now NeweggFlash is selling that configuration for $900. Or if you’re looking for a slightly cheaper option, Amazon has […]

Deals of the Day (4-12-2016) is a post from: Liliputing

Deals of the Day (4-12-2016)

Go to HP.com and configure an HP Envy 13t notebook with a Core i7 processor, a 3200 x 1800 pixel display, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of storage and the price comes to $1150. But right now NeweggFlash is selling that configuration for $900. Or if you’re looking for a slightly cheaper option, Amazon has […]

Deals of the Day (4-12-2016) is a post from: Liliputing

Unreal Engine: Epic eröffnet Niederlassung in Berlin

Das Entwicklerstudio Epic Games hat jetzt eine Niederlassung in Berlin. Die Mitarbeiter dort sollen sich um die Vermarktung der hauseigenen Spiele sowie um den Kundendienst in Europa kümmern. (Unreal Engine 4, Epic Games)

Das Entwicklerstudio Epic Games hat jetzt eine Niederlassung in Berlin. Die Mitarbeiter dort sollen sich um die Vermarktung der hauseigenen Spiele sowie um den Kundendienst in Europa kümmern. (Unreal Engine 4, Epic Games)

RIAA still hates the DMCA, even as streaming revenues soar

Record labels want more revenue from the free, ad-supported music on YouTube.

Music Player app. Does not do movies. Does not display cover art. Does not really do much besides play, pause, and track forward and back. (credit: Lee Hutchinson)

Things are looking up for music streaming in terms of revenue, but good numbers are little solace for the recording industry that isn't seeing the returns it wants on digital music. And the Recording Industry Association of America is still hoping for a change to the DMCA, which remains a major irritant.

According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s annual report, global revenue from recorded music grew 3.2 percent to $15 billion (£10.5 billion) in 2015. That's the biggest increase over the past two decades, which have seen mostly declining or negligible gains as consumers moved from costly physical formats like CDs to song downloads and then streaming.

That boost is due to a 45 percent increase in revenue from music streaming, which now makes up half of the world's digital music revenue. For the first time, digital music revenues surpassed the revenue from physical music sales of items such as CDs. Despite growing revenues, however, the music industry is still unhappy with the digital music landscape. The IFPI's Chief Executive Frances Moore mentions the "value-gap" between the amount of music consumed for free on "user-upload" sites such as YouTube and the money returned to music rights holders.

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Kernel: Oracle startet eigene Sammlung von Linux-Sicherheitspatches

Um Updates leichter einspielen zu können, will Oracle Zweige des Linux-Kernel pflegen, die ausschließlich Patches für Sicherheitslücken enthalten. Was gut klingt, ist aber eine kontroverse Idee, da die Auswirkungen von Kernel-Fehlern schwer zu beurteilen sind. (Linux-Kernel, Oracle)

Um Updates leichter einspielen zu können, will Oracle Zweige des Linux-Kernel pflegen, die ausschließlich Patches für Sicherheitslücken enthalten. Was gut klingt, ist aber eine kontroverse Idee, da die Auswirkungen von Kernel-Fehlern schwer zu beurteilen sind. (Linux-Kernel, Oracle)

Microsoft launches Signature Edition Type Cover for Surface Pro

Microsoft launches Signature Edition Type Cover for Surface Pro

Want a keyboard cover to go with your Microsoft Surface Pro tablet? Microsoft offers a Type Cover for $130 or a version with an integrated fingerprint scanner for $160. Want something a little more fashionable? Now Microsoft also offers a $160 Signature Type Cover covered in two-tone gray Alcantara fabric. The new cover doesn’t really […]

Microsoft launches Signature Edition Type Cover for Surface Pro is a post from: Liliputing

Microsoft launches Signature Edition Type Cover for Surface Pro

Want a keyboard cover to go with your Microsoft Surface Pro tablet? Microsoft offers a Type Cover for $130 or a version with an integrated fingerprint scanner for $160. Want something a little more fashionable? Now Microsoft also offers a $160 Signature Type Cover covered in two-tone gray Alcantara fabric. The new cover doesn’t really […]

Microsoft launches Signature Edition Type Cover for Surface Pro is a post from: Liliputing