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[Ed. Charlie says:  This was a preamble to the 2011 posting of Chris Castle’s 2006 article “The DMCA Is Not An Alibi”.  Google recently published its 2011 “Transparency Report” which has a couple interesting facts regarding takedown notices it received.  Despite the $500,000,000 forfeiture by Google when it was caught in seven different sting operations profiting from the sale of controlled substances online, there is only one reference to takedown notices relating to drugs in the report–from South Korea.  “[A] request from the Korean Food and Drug Administration (KFDA) resulted in the removal of 441 ads that violated KFDA regulations.”  And the only country in the world where Google received a “content removal notice” that…

There has been considerable discussion about how the DMCA notice and takedown procedures are “broken.”  We don’t think that this is quite true—the procedures are manipulated, misunderstood and abused on a grand scale.  That doesn’t mean that the notice and takedown procedure is “broken” any more than the laws against burglary, theft and tax evasion are “broken.”  No statute can control unethical behavior by those who use the law as a flimsy excuse to get away with bad behavior.

Many Internet companies have interpreted the DMCA to permit bad behavior until the victim of the bad behavior notified the bad actor that they were behaving badly—each time they behaved badly.  This “catch me if you can” interpretation of the DMCA was not at all what the Congress had in mind.  We would go further and suggest that not only was it not what the Congress had in mind, it also wasn’t what…

Thanks to Music Tech Policy for alerting us to this post from The Association of Independent Music Publishers:

Apparently, some internet users interpret the DMCA “safe harbor,” which is designed to strike a balance between copyright and technology, as something quite different, a “license” to post anything you like, even if you know it is infringing, unless and until the copyright owner complains.

The distinction may seem small, but it may represent how the general public regards copyright on the internet.  Instead of avoiding infringement and respecting copyright, the concept of the “DMCA License” is that you don’t have to respect copyright.  Do what you like, and at the worst the copyright owner might force your ISP to remove the material.

There is no such thing as a “DMCA License” because under the DMCA, copyright owners are not in any way consenting to unauthorized use.  They are simply trying to…

[Congressional Bills 113th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office]
[H.R. 4079 Introduced in House (IH)] 113th CONGRESS 2d Session H. R. 4079 To amend title 17, United States Code, to ensure fairness in the establishment of certain rates and fees under sections 114 and 115 of such title, and for other purposes. _______________________________________________________________________ IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES February 25, 2014 Mr. Collins of Georgia (for himself and Mrs. Blackburn) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary _______________________________________________________________________ A BILL To amend title 17, United States Code, to ensure fairness in the establishment of certain rates and fees under sections 114 and 115 of such title, and for other purposes. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. This Act may be cited as the ``Songwriter Equity…