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defrogITEM: Remember the woman who was ordered by Universal Music Group to take down a YouTube video of her toddler dancing to Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy” because it was the same as stealing a Prince album from Wal-mart?
She fought back in court, arguing “fair use”. And won.
That’s good news because “fair use” is one of the traditional linchpins of copyright law. It’s what basically allows you to use copyrighted material for non-commercial purposes, be it a news story, a research paper or a parody. And the the music industry has made a point of arguing in its various copyright enforcement blitzes that in the Digital Age, there is no such thing as “fair use”. But then they’ve also argued in court that you don’t even have the right to back up yr CD collection on yr hard drive, even if the CDs are all legally paid for.
If UMG had won the argument that a 30-second Dancing Prince Baby video counted as copyright infringement, you’d never be able to upload a YouTube video again without checking to make sure that there’s no incidental music playing in the background – or forking over a fee to the record label.
It’s also worth noting that the music business (and Hollywood, for that matter) is interpreting the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) as being much more restrictive of fair use – and that the US govt is lobbying on their half to use the DMCA as the model for the global Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) – the same treaty being negotiated behind closed doors that would, among other things, require your Internet service provider to cut yr house off completely after two written warnings if UMG (for example) suspects anyone in yr family is infringing copyright in any way at all.
So right on, Dancing Prince Baby.
We can dance if we want to,
This is dF
She fought back in court, arguing “fair use”. And won.
That’s good news because “fair use” is one of the traditional linchpins of copyright law. It’s what basically allows you to use copyrighted material for non-commercial purposes, be it a news story, a research paper or a parody. And the the music industry has made a point of arguing in its various copyright enforcement blitzes that in the Digital Age, there is no such thing as “fair use”. But then they’ve also argued in court that you don’t even have the right to back up yr CD collection on yr hard drive, even if the CDs are all legally paid for.
If UMG had won the argument that a 30-second Dancing Prince Baby video counted as copyright infringement, you’d never be able to upload a YouTube video again without checking to make sure that there’s no incidental music playing in the background – or forking over a fee to the record label.
It’s also worth noting that the music business (and Hollywood, for that matter) is interpreting the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) as being much more restrictive of fair use – and that the US govt is lobbying on their half to use the DMCA as the model for the global Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) – the same treaty being negotiated behind closed doors that would, among other things, require your Internet service provider to cut yr house off completely after two written warnings if UMG (for example) suspects anyone in yr family is infringing copyright in any way at all.
So right on, Dancing Prince Baby.
We can dance if we want to,
This is dF
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no subject
on 2010-03-03 02:00 pm (UTC)