YouTube Piracy Filter?
We all know about YouTube and have benefited from the hours of entertaining video selection on the site. Of course with an upload network such as YouTube's, it is only natural that people would post copyrighted material on the site. The fight against piracy has been ongoing for almost a century now. I still remember the day when Napster was brought down over the piracy issue. And now, it seems that YouTube is facing some of the same problems. YouTube was ordered to remove 100,000 illegal videos and asked to put up more stringent filtering system against copyrighted material.
The problem with piracy is that in the internet age of today, it is near impossible to stop the spread and open access of these information. However, due to the pressure of large corporations - i.e. Disney, Time Warner, Sony, NBC, etc. - YouTube is putting up an effort to stop the uploading of copyrighted material. Of course, YouTube says they don't have the necessary technology and the major corporations say YouTube isn't using the available technology. So the question in this epic battle is will copyright technology be able to keep up with the ever growing network of file sharing?
5 comments:
I don't think it's a solution to create ever-tighter restrictions on the sharing of content. This is why we have incapable "solutions" such as Digital Rights Management (DRM).
The very nature of internet and digital content sharing necessitates a shift in the way we think about intellectual property rights. Of course, it seems like a daunting task. After all, we humans live in a tangible world where we have a concrete sense of what we own and what we don't, but when we enter the world of intellectual property, which can be copied merely by virtue of existing in the mind, we run up against problems. And with the ease of copying in the age of networked computers, as humans we really need to re-consider what it means for something to be "ours" and "owned."
Well the thing about youtube is they can avoid many of the legal aspects since they have a terms of service that puts the blame on the users who upload it. That being said, the regulation of the internet is being controlled by some people who know next to nothing about the internet (see: A series of tubes).
However, with the viral nature of the internet comes a double edged 2 handed broadsword. Anything you post can go anywhere, yet that
makes it hard to regulate. While the big companies that threaten lawsuits, what about the common person? "After all, originality is merely hiding your sources" -Benjamin Franklin
Whether or not YouTube can avoid the legal ramifications of illegal content, there is still a net "harm" to the institution of intellectual property (IP).
The procedures and protocols for protecting IP are incompatible with the internet, that is for sure. The problem stems from using mental models of physical possession and ownership and applying them to the world of "owning" something that came from the mind. It almost seems like an oxymoron - "intellectual property" - can you really own something that is, by inherent nature, to be copied? What I mean is, information has a "desire" to be copied. To restrict its natural inclination causes problems, as we see today.
But at the same time, it is human nature to be possessive of our creations, whether physical or intellectual. So I think that we have to go back to the drawing board and reconsider the fundamentals of intellectual property. It will be a difficult process, to be sure.
See Pierre de Vries' blog, http://DeepFreeze9.blogspot.com, for related information on "intangible problems" and how humans are grappling with them.
The real ironic thing is that people have a natural desire to show our own "intellectual property", yet mantain possession of it. Let's hope that the widespread copying doesn't stop people from publishing their thoughts, works and pieces for fear of it being stolen.
I think we're seeing that already -- and that ties into your concept of stagnation. Games, music, cinema -- they seem to be rehashes of old ideas. The large studios don't want to make any bets, and go with tried and true formulas, and the innovative, daring artists and writers fear the problem of piracy.
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