News: Chicago Tribune movie critic Michael Phillips has an interesting suggestion: he says that some Hollywood movies are trying to emulate the home-made, user-generated look of YouTube videos. 28 Weeks Later, 93 United, Bloody Sunday, and the the upcoming The Bourne Ultimatum have it.
Analysis: Of course, the Blair Witch project had it, even before YouTube existed!
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movies | 
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This guy is incredible!
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This is the No.1 song in America , on Billboard’s Top 100. More Maroon 5 on YouTube
3 Comments | music, so who's on YouTube | Permalink
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Starts May 24. You need to make 3 videos. Winner gets some exposure, “gear,” and chance to make a commercial for Sierra Mist.
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News: Chad and Steve had an hour long interview at AP. Highlights are here. Duplicate copy w/ different photo here.
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News: Robert Scoble has one of the most read blogs on WordPress, which is pretty amazing because he only writes about tech stuff. He’s a former Microsoft guy who now works at PodTech.net. When Scoble talks, people in the tech world listen.
Yesterday, Scoble gave his strong approval of Google’s acquisition of YouTube. Scoble admits that he didn’t realize the business sense of the deal until now:
“By putting YouTube results into Google’s main engine Google ensures it will have better searches than Yahoo and Microsoft (who were, truth be told, getting damn close to matching Google’s quality). And it does it in a way that Yahoo and Microsoft will not be willing to match. * * * Microsoft still treats each team as something that must make money. Google doesn’t do that. They didn’t care one bit that YouTube didn’t have any revenues. They knew that there’s other ways to make money off of YouTube than to force YouTube to monetize on its own. * * * It also is even more worth putting up with billions of dollars of lawsuits.”
Analysis: YouTube, then, is another database for Google search–a database that no one else has. Brilliant. Just don’t let the YouTube community know that they are just another Google database. They wouldn’t like that description.
Leave a Comment » | business, deals, merger & acquisitions | Permalink
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I’ve been grading law school exams, so it’s a good time to grade myself (and take a slight diversion from YouTube). Back in February (see here), I made my predictions for the Top 5 Finalists on American Idol out of 24 contestants. It’s sort of an annual guessing game I play in trying to predict who will win Idol months before the winner is selected and usually after only seeing the contestants once. This year, from the final 24, I correctly predicted 4 of the eventual Top 6. That’s not bad.
But, unfortunately, the two that I didn’t pick were the last two women standing, Melinda Doolittle and Jordin Sparks. I admit I made a big mistake in not selecting Jordin (I selected the one-hit wonder Stephanie Edwards instead). I never quite understood the fascination, though, with Melinda, the media’s and the judges’ absolute favorite this year. Yesterday, Melinda was booted in what the media called a “shocker.” I was only shocked that she lasted this long.
Truthfully, this year of American Idol has been pretty forgettable. Some have called it the worst Idol ever. That’s probably true. The guy who has made it halfway interesting is Blake Lewis, who can “beat box” (for those of you who don’t know, it’s basically making sounds like a record scratching and other hip hop/house music noises) in the middle of his singing. Blake’s beat box version of Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love a Bad Name” (also here) was the most creative thing ever on Idol.
Blake Lewis also salvaged my predictions this year, since I had him in the Final 2. That keeps my string of predicting at least one of the final 2 contestants going, now for 5 years and running. I goofed up, though, in predicting the winner, since my girl (Lakisha Jones) is already out. I’m definitely slipping. Oh well.
4 Comments | american idol, blake lewis, lakisha jones, music, undiscovered | Permalink
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A friend of mine recently criticized YouTube for not doing more to discourage users from copyright infringement. He suggested, for example, that YouTube should allow other users to police each other for copyright infringement and send in complaints to YouTube (under the DMCA notice-and-takedown procedure, the copyright holder or agent must be the one complaining). Community policing is essentially what YouTube relies on for a whole host of inappropriate content to be flagged. Last week, members of Congress, Chad Hurley, and Mark Cuban had a similar debate (see below). Frankly, I thought the views on both sides were quite thoughtful (and far from the more combative accounts in the press).
What do you think about this or other ideas? This problem isn’t an easy one to solve (even putting aside the legal questions), so I’d love to hear your views.
2 Comments | copyright, DMCA safe harbor, legal | Permalink
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News: Another copyright lawsuit has been filed against YouTube, bringing the total number of suits to 4. The new case, filed in San Francisco, is:
No 4. David Grisman, a mandolin player who performed with the Grateful Dead, along with his partner Craig Miller and company Dawg Music. They are also seeking to certify a class action of musicians against YouTube. Getting a class certified (if the judge determines it meets the requirements of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23) would make the case a much bigger potential worry for YouTube, with much higher potential damages should YouTube lose. (More) If someone can find a copy of the complaint, please send me a comment below.
Analysis: It’s not time for YouTube to start sweating, but certainly the two class action possibilities raise the stakes. Because 3 of the 4 lawsuits are in different jurisdictions, it is certainly possible that different courts might interpret the DMCA safe harbor differently and the case could end up in the Supreme Court. That’s still a long way off, though. YouTube will likely try to file some motions to defeat the class action certification in the 2 cases.
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News: The ban applies in Iraq and apparently on all defense computer networks. The soldiers can still MySpace and YouTube and other banned social networking websites on private computers. “These actions were taken to enhance and increase network security and protect the use of the bandwidth,” said Col. Gary Keck, a Pentagon spokesman. Personal emails are still OK. (More)
1 Comment | government, military, war | Permalink
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News: Mashable blog exposes how you can game the YouTube system and manufacture a “most viewed” video by apparently simply opening up several windows on Firefox and automatically refreshing them. See the post. This sounds way too easy.
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Campaigning for his wife Hilary. But I’ll count this is as the highest (former) U.S. official to send a post via YouTube.
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News: Businessweek has an article today describing the whole notice-and-takedown process at YouTube. Viacom has a cadre of people searching for clips on YouTube that infringes Viacom’s copyrights, spending about $100,000 per month for the process. Viacom doesn’t like it (and that’s why they sued): ” Since November, Viacom says, it has reviewed 2 million clips and sent 200,000 takedown notices to the site, a 10% hit rate.”
YouTube has its own cadre of people, who work 24/7, to take down clips for which a copyright holder sends in a DMCA notice. The unit is called SQUAD, the Safety Quality User Advocacy Department.
Analysis: This is a battle over philosophies (and how the burden to search for infringing works should be allocated): Viacom wants pre-screening on the front-end by YouTube, placing most, if not all, of the burden on YouTube, while YouTube wants an automated process coupled with the DMCA notice-and-takedown process (supplemented by whatever filtering technology that develops)–which places some of the burden on the copyright holder to identify the works in a DMCA notice. What the DMCA requires is what the Viacom lawsuit is all about.
The stats by Viacom are interesting. I’d like to know what the so-called “hit rate” has been after it sent YouTube all the DMCA notices. YouTube says it has “hashing technology” that automatically blocks any copy of a clip that’s already been removed under a DMCA complaint. If that’s true, Viacom’s hit rate could have gone down by now.
1 Comment | copyright, DMCA notice, DMCA safe harbor | Permalink
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GwenOfficial It’s interesting to note that “Wind It Up” is a mash-up, that uses a song from “The Sound of Music” (“The Lonely Goatherd, written by Rogers and Hammerstein in 1959.) Although some critics panned Stefani’s song, I kinda like it. How can anyone not like yodeling?
(I would find it interesting to know if Stefani decided to get copyright permission or if she viewed it as fair use.) More about the song on Wikipedia.
Leave a Comment » | music, so who's on YouTube | Permalink
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Terra visits high school students and talks about how she connects with young teens. Her song “Jenny” was written in response to 8 high school girls who wrote Terra about thoughts of committing suicide.
The “Say It’s Possible” montage at 0:26 left in the video is fantastic! It might be my favorite version.
Leave a Comment » | discovered, music, terra naomi | Permalink
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Video compliments of the NBA.
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News: Joost is a website (still in beta) that provides “high-quality content” produced by big media (it has 150 channels already), served through a peer-to-peer network. At touts itself, Joost hopes to be “the world’s first broadcast-quality Internet television service.” This week, Joost announced $45 million in investments from 5 investors, “CBS, Global Expansion Index Ventures, Li Ka Shing Foundation, Sequoia Capital, and Viacom.” (more)
Analysis: Yes, it’s no surprise to see Viacom (which has sued YouTube) as an investor in Joost. I’ve started playing around with the beta version of Joost recently, and it has many things that look pretty slick. But it’s a totally different animal to me than YouTube. At least from what I’ve seen, Joost is basically getting your cable TV via the Internet. YouTube’s heavily driven by user-generated content. That’s why Joost is trying to distinguish itself as providing “high quality” content.
3 Comments | competition, joost | Permalink
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If you still don’t know, Blake Steck has a concise history of YouTube here.
Leave a Comment » | company history, YouTube | Permalink
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News: After receiving word that it would be criminally prosecuted in Thailand, YouTube finally caved in. It removed most of the video clips that allegedly made fun of the Thai king, which is a violation of Thai law. (Some of the videos may have already been removed by the poster.) In a letter sent by Google attorneys, YouTube said that 2 clips would remain on the site because “[t]hey appear to be political comments that are critical of both the government and the conduct of foreigners. Because they are political in nature, and not intended insults of His Majesty, we do not see a basis for blocking these videos.” (more)
Analysis: I was surprised YouTube hadn’t complied with the Thai government’s request from the start, since YouTube did so for an earlier request by the Turkish government (see here). Other countries may have more restrictive speech laws than we, so YouTube (like other websites) is put in the position of “censoring” speech in order to operate within those other countries’ laws. That’s the challenge of running a site on the Internet.
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So who’s on YouTube: Congress is. This is historic, and hilarious. Rep. Ed Markey shot the video above and then did the interview of Chad Hurley below. If you are a YouTube junkie like me, these are the two best videos I have seen in 2007. (Chad Hurley testified, as did Mark Cuban. I hope to have more analysis later. Rep. Mike Ferguson, a Republican New Jersey, did apparently attack Chad about copyright infringement.)
2 Comments | government, so who's on YouTube, YouTube | Permalink
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I’m starting a new feature today called, “So who’s on YouTube?” I’m trying to get a handle on the diversity of posters who make and share videos on YouTube. This is just a start, and I’d love to hear your recommendations. I’ll be revising and filling this in over the next few months.
1. Users (you and me)
a. Oldest: geriatric1927
b. Youngest: [please help?]
c. Most famous: lonelygirl15
d. Wannabe artists, actors, musicians, comedians, + film directors
e. Family videos
f. Vloggers
2. Big Media
a. TV networks + TV shows: CBS, NBC, Showtime, PBS, Charlie Rose
b. Movie studios
c. Music labels
d. Advertisers
e. Magazines: Forbes
3. Sports
a. NBA
b. NHL
d. Soccer: ACMilan, USSoccer, FCBarcelona
4. Political Leaders of Countries and Elected Officials
a. Tony Blair
b. German Chancellor Angela Merkel
5. Politicians
a. Presidential candidates, 2008
b. 2006 elections
6. Military
7. Law Enforcement
8. Religious leaders
9. United Nations: UNICEF
10. Nonprofits: Heritage Foundation
11. Superheroes
a. Spiderman
Leave a Comment » | so who's on YouTube, YouTube | Permalink
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Regular readers of this blog know that I’m generally in favor of businesses being able to work out deals instead of suing each other. In YouTube’s case, I was happy to see it avoid lawsuits while it secured partnership deals with Sony, Universal Music, CBS, BBC, NBC, NBA, NHL, and others.
Now that YouTube faces 3 copyright lawsuits (Tur, Viacom, Engligh Premier League/Bourne), I am growing less optimistic that a business deal can resolve these disputes. A settlement won’t prevent someone else from suing, and, now that the door’s been opened, other copycat lawsuits may follow. (Ironically, copyright lawyers can freely copy the factual allegations in the earlier filed court pleadings.) Sure, Google’s got a lot of money, but I don’t think it wants to keep scuttling back to court over every unauthorized clip that surfaces on YouTube that someone complains about. Google is probably not one that caves in easily. When you are worth over $150 billion, you don’t have to. These cases could have been disastrous for YouTube, if Google hadn’t acquired it last October. Now they may just be the cost of doing business in this new online video market.
And even if YouTube could settle with one of the plaintiffs, there’s no guarantee that the another one of the plaintiffs wouldn’t just hold out and try to win either on principle (maybe Robert Tur?) or for the hopes of winning big bucks (the proposed class action by Engligh Premier League).
So will YouTube settle? It’s very unlikely, now.
Leave a Comment » | business, copyright, DMCA safe harbor, legal | Permalink
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News: James Wolcott in Vanity Fair this month suggests it may: ” YouTube, the free video-sharing bulletin board founded in 2005 by three former PayPal employees, is where it all happens. Mouse clicks and video clips, they go together like a nervous twitch. Where the presidential epic entails reams of psychological interpretation, novelistic scene setting, and historical placement, YouTube puts politics literally at one’s fingertips in the active present, making it a narrative any mutant can join.”
But Wolcott doesn’t think it’s all good. “More creative involvement in the democratic process—how can this not be healthy? “Citizen journalists” and “citizen ad-makers,” united in idealistic purpose—what’s not to like? Yet inwardly I groan. Speaking for Me-self, the last thing I need is more crap to watch, no matter how ingenious or buzz-worthy it may be.”
Leave a Comment » | elections, political campaign, politics, presidential campaign, youtube president | Permalink
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2 Comments | Esmee Denters, music, talent trolling, undiscovered | Permalink
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News: So now there are 3 copyright lawsuits filed against YouTube:
(1) Robert Tur’s suit in California for the Reginald Denny beating video (with a request by Viacom + NBC Universal to file an amici brief).
( 2) Viacom’s suit in New York (for Daily Show, Colbert Report, Sponge Bob, South Park, MTV clips, etc.)
(3) English Football Ass’n Premier League (soccer division) and Bourne Co. (U.S. music publisher) suit, with a request to certify a class action, in New York.
Analysis: There’s a possibility that (2) + (3) could be consolidated before the same judge. All 3 will test the DMCA safe harbor provision, Section 512. YouTube does have some respectable arguments on its side that it falls within the DMCA safe harbor (these will be tested in court), but things could get potentially more complicated as it attempts to institute a revenue sharing system with select YouTube director/partners whose videos apparently will be synched with advertising on the side of YouTube’s website. As Adario Strange suggests on Wired’s blog, and Mark Sullivan on PC World’s blog, things may get dicier for YouTube if ad revenues are being generated from any infringing content posted by YouTube’s new director/partners.
EFF’s Fred von Lohmann identified this lurking issue a while back:
“Here’s where things might get a bit sticky for YouTube. Some have argued that this may restrict the kinds of advertising business models that YouTube (and other video hosting services) might want to pursue, as ads tied too closely to an infringing video could be viewed as creating a “financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity.”
“Some pages on the site already feature advertising, and all signs are that YouTube will want to rely on advertising to fuel at least part of its growth. So far, YouTube has charted a cautious course, putting ads only on search results pages, rather than on the clip pages themselves.
“YouTube will have to walk a careful line as it stumbles toward a business model. Losing the protection of the DMCA safe harbor could expose it to lawsuits that could be extremely expensive, no matter how they ultimately come out.”
Fred’s exactly right here. So far, YouTube seems to be trying to walk that careful line because it has selected only a few directors/partners from its users. If those select few are creating content of their own (as they presumably are), then that growth of user-generated content will bolster YouTube’s position and show further how its business is built on encouraging legitimate content. So this move of revenue sharing can be a plus for YouTube in defending itself from the lawsuits, but it can also be a negative if the director/partners are not abiding by their terms of use and engage in copyright infringement.
Leave a Comment » | copyright, DMCA safe harbor | Permalink
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The U.S. military has launched the Multi-National Force channel on YouTube. Here’s a description of it on YouTube:
What you will see on this channel in the coming months:
- Combat action
- Interesting, eye-catching footage
- Interaction between Coalition troops and the Iraqi populace.
- Teamwork between Coalition and Iraqi troops in the fight against terror.
What we will NOT post on this channel:
- Profanity
- Sexual content
- Overly graphic, disturbing or offensive material
- Footage that mocks Coalition Forces, Iraqi Security Forces or the citizens of Iraq.
3 Comments | war | Permalink
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You can see more videos from Prime Minister Blair on his YouTube channel, DowningSt. I’m still waiting for Pres. Bush’s channel on YouTube.
Leave a Comment » | government | Permalink
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Go here for details. Here are the list of approved movies you can spoof, some which give you the copyrighted clips to play around with and mash up. You have until May 21st, so get started!
Leave a Comment » | ads, contests, Web 2.0 | Permalink
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Win $57,000 if you make the best commercial, determined by voters. You have until August 6. So far, there are only 132 entries, so you have a decent chance. More here.
You’ll be seeing more of these kinds of contests in the future. I wonder what advertising firms think.
Leave a Comment » | ads, contests, Web 2.0 | Permalink
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