Author: john

A Strange Twist?

C-Net News is reporting on how video on the web is being used in a new program on Bravo. I’m not sure why they didn’t address VH1’s similar effort, but the article addresses at least half of the big story here: the expansion of user-created video on the web may give large media companies an easy, free source of content.

For TV producers, it’s simply a cheap way to develop a show. In the classic model of programming production, content producers would invest a lot of money upfront to create a pilot show and test it with audiences. By patrolling the Internet, TV producers can draw on material that’s already proved popular with online audiences and put it on TV with comparatively little investment.

While those of us who are already watching most of our video online won’t be interested in these shows, perhaps some tempted by the possibility of fame will give their work away.

And this is the twist:

Certainly Bravo and VH1 would be quick to file a lawsuit if any of their content was used without authorization…would they be tempted to use a “great” video if they couldn’t track down the owner? An amature video creator wanting to defend the rights to their work may be no match for the deep pockets of a media corporation.

But why steal or pay for someone’s content, when you can get it in a contest? VH1’s WebJunk program has a contest where:

You could win a Digital Entertainment Center with Intel VIIV technology and the Aquos liquid crystal TV from Sharp!

So, according to the contest rules, anyone who enters (meaning compensated winners and unlucky losers) gives away their rights to MTV and IFilm (see clause 14).

Copyright was created to grant authors protection for their work, so that they can make a living off their creativity. The chance for abuse of creators in this case is too great to ignore.

YouTube and NBC

It looks as though NBC has been exerting their copyright control over one of my favorite sites YouTube.com. What makes YouTube such a neat place is that it’s a collection of all sorts of video (copyrighted and not) from around the world. In some ways, it acts as a repository or a gateway to a wide variety of video cultures (for example, Japanese music videos and television shows). The Times article points out one of the site’s benefits to copyright owners:

Several online commentators noted that NBC’s response to YouTube, while legally justified, may have been short-sighted. The online popularity of “Lazy Sunday” has been credited with reviving interest in “Saturday Night Live” at a time when it is in need of some buzz.

…

“We got e-mails from college students, and a lot of them said it’s the ‘Lazy Sunday’ clip that turned them on to potentially watching ‘S.N.L.’ again,” she said.

It is something to consider: relaxing control over one’s copyright holdings may actually bring in more revenue from an increased fan-base. I would think that this is what the people who originally posted the “Lazy Sunday” video would have agreed to. It’s essentially a nod saying, “hey, go check this out.” Statements such as this aren’t intended to bring harm to the creator (even though it may prevent a few $2 iTunes downloads), rather it’s perhaps an easy form of review/comment/criticism (which understandably is not protected under fair use).

More non-transferability

This site is reporting that Microsoft recently changed their Windows licensing agreement (EULA) to stipulate that a change of motherboard is equivalent to purchasing a new computer, thus requiring the consumer to purchase an additional Windows license. First, it’s tough to tell if this is actually true (no second independent source here) Edit: this has been an existing policy for OEM and educational license; here’s the google cache for the retail EULA which does not have this limitation.

However, this still provides an excellent example of purchasing a physical copyrighted work, and being left unable to fully exercise what seems to be reasonable (a computer upgrade) because of licensing. Someone buys a cd with a program on it (albeit at a discounted price) and then is legally bound not to do what they might have had if it were a music cd (selling it, making a backup, etc.). What rights should one have when they purchase a physical work? …and should this be distinguished from buying a digital work.
Interestingly enough, this post brought me somewhere I’ve never been before: the Microsoft Windows homepage. It’s interesting that there’s very little in the line of marketing (no feature lists or things like one finds on the Apple OS X homepage). I guess when you have a near monopoly 🙂

Licensing and ownership

Along the same lines as the last post about fair use of something that one physically owns is the issue of licensing…

While (slowly) studing for prelims, I’ve been reading about The Future of the Book. Many of the issues considered here revolve around the question “what will we need physical books for, now that we have electronic media.” For one thing, books fit into this model of “you bought it, it’s yours,” where one owns a physical book and can reasonably do whatever they choose with it: from reading, to annotating, to ripping it up. However, electronic media are almost never bought, instead they are licensed–meaning you never really own what you paid for. For example, it’s conceivable that a publisher could include a licensing clause which prevented an owner from reselling their work, essentially circumventing the “first-sale doctrine” discussed earlier. Mark that one on the side against electronic media.

I would again argue that to create a resonable, or perhaps more accurately, logical copyright landscape, users need something they can conceivably own. This is the least that the law can do, if we are all expected to follow other restrictive digital copyright rules.