Posted by Bill Funk on 12/18/06 13:23

On Mon, 18 Dec 2006 13:31:32 +1300, "Colin B" <Colin B@cb.org> wrote:

>Because the copyright holders MUST be aware that large numbers of persons
>are publishing all or part of their work on internet, then they need to get
>together to devise ways of stopping this illegal behavior. If the copyright
>holders don't do this, it sends a message to the illegal uploaders that the
>copyright laws are toothless, or that nobody really cares about it. So,
>until the law is changed to make website owners jointly responsible along
>with the uploaders for publishing "illegal" material, then the copyright
>holders are going to lose out.

IMO, that points to the need to reconsider the whole idea of
"copyright".
There's no way, at present, for web presences like Youtube to check
each uploaded video for copyright infringement. The technology doesn't
allow this at a cost that the current funding can afford.
I'm not in any way saying that intellectual property shouldn't be
protected. But at the same time, as technology makes it so easy to
post a 320x120 (or whatever size these videos are) video of a football
game, the task of preventing it becomes unmanagable.
At what point, legally, does a business become a venue instead of a
publisher? (eBay is, legally, a venue, and not legally responsible for
auctions posted unlerss and until it is legally notified of an illegal
auction. Is Youtube a publisher or a venue?)
At what point does it stop being practical to chase down violations?
How much of a country's resources is a country supposed to put into
stopping the unstopable? Is the UN going to step in and force
countries to adopt a universal copyright law? If so, who enforces it?
Something to think about.
--
Bill Funk
replace "g" with "a"

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