12-08-2018, 11:09 AM
Internet companies such as YouTube have made billions by building a content platform that users have loaded with stolen content and copyright violations. They managed to achieve this by relying on a U.S. law that places the burden of defending copyright and requesting the removal of illegal content solely on individual copyright owners, who can't possibly police the endless stream of content being uploaded every minute.
This law is what has allowed many Internet companies to operate with impunity for many years. But now that the EU is proposing a law that shifts the burden to where it belongs, on the companies hosting the content, serving it up, and profiting from it, YouTube wants to cry foul and scare content creators into being its unpaid political lobbyists.
I am unsympathetic and unimpressed. These companies have been glorified crime syndicates for over 20 years, and while we have all benefitted from their impunity, it is unfair to copyright owners and costs them a fortune.
YouTube's scare tactics are a clever attempt to claim that all "small" Internet companies will be unable to operate, and it will no longer be able to support individual content creators. But these are outright lies. Small businesses are exempt from the proposed law, YouTube already has filtering technology it will be able to use to help ensure compliance, and YouTube's businesss model is so dependent on content creators to generate revenue that the company will have to absorb the burden and costs.
It won't be easy, but it has the resources and means to do this, and while it will pass some of the costs on to users, the company has operated all along with the full understanding that laws in certain jurisdictions could change and dramatically affect its operations and business model. In business, this is what we call risks and threats. Your job is to manage, mitigate and prepare for them. But when you build your platform with such reliance on a single law and a sweeping disregard for copyright, you've assumed an extremely high-risk position. Tough luck.
This law is what has allowed many Internet companies to operate with impunity for many years. But now that the EU is proposing a law that shifts the burden to where it belongs, on the companies hosting the content, serving it up, and profiting from it, YouTube wants to cry foul and scare content creators into being its unpaid political lobbyists.
I am unsympathetic and unimpressed. These companies have been glorified crime syndicates for over 20 years, and while we have all benefitted from their impunity, it is unfair to copyright owners and costs them a fortune.
YouTube's scare tactics are a clever attempt to claim that all "small" Internet companies will be unable to operate, and it will no longer be able to support individual content creators. But these are outright lies. Small businesses are exempt from the proposed law, YouTube already has filtering technology it will be able to use to help ensure compliance, and YouTube's businesss model is so dependent on content creators to generate revenue that the company will have to absorb the burden and costs.
It won't be easy, but it has the resources and means to do this, and while it will pass some of the costs on to users, the company has operated all along with the full understanding that laws in certain jurisdictions could change and dramatically affect its operations and business model. In business, this is what we call risks and threats. Your job is to manage, mitigate and prepare for them. But when you build your platform with such reliance on a single law and a sweeping disregard for copyright, you've assumed an extremely high-risk position. Tough luck.