July 19, 2008

Fair Use LawSuit

A lawsuit by a woman who made a 30 second video of her toddler son dancing to a prince song has the potential to change some of the abuses the music industry has been committing within the digital copyright act.

"There must be some requirement that a copyright owner both consider fair uses and determine honestly whether they exist before sending their (takedown) notice," Lenz's lawyer, Corynne McSherry, said in court papers. She said the video, which focuses on the toddler and contains only a snippet of the song, couldn't have any conceivable impact on the market Universal's copyright was meant to protect.

Amusingly, I put up a 56 second video my daughter who was just starting to walk, and put it to music ‘I get around’ – a song which I have a legal MP3 for, having paid for it specifically so I could use it in the video.

I got a notice from youtube:

UMG has claimed some or all audio content in your video Minh Xuan Get's Around. This claim was made as part of the YouTube Content Identification program.

Your video is still live because UMG has authorized the use of this content on YouTube. As long as UMG has a claim on your video, they will receive public statistics about your video, such as number of views. Viewers may also see advertising on your video's page.

Claim Details:

Copyright owner: UMG
Content claimed: Some or all of the audio content
Policy: Allow this content to remain on YouTube.

Place advertisements on this video's watch page.

Hopefully, some sense will start to come to these things.

Comments:
Posted by Henry at 09:11 AM || Link to me || More Thoughts (0) || Track this post (0) || Category:: Freedom, Just Left On