Late last month, accusations emerged that BNN, a Canadian broadcaster, was actively censoring the copyright debate through copyright means. A spokesperson today contacted ZeroPaid to deny these allegations saying that the accusations are “inaccurate and falsely accusing BNN”.
A user uploaded several clips of the copyright debate that took place on BNN. BNN then found out about the clips being uploaded to YouTube and issued a complaint and had the clips taken down. That caused the user to post accusations on a blog that the network is actively trying to censor the copyright debate. Quite the accusations. Is it true? Rose Noonan, the Sales Coordinator of BNN told ZeroPaid, no.
“BNN is certainly not trying to censor or silence the Canadian copyright debate – or any other topic.” Noonan told ZeroPaid.
So, if it wasn’t censorship, then what was it?
“The removal of BNN clips took place because the clips were posted without permission.” Noonan explained. She continued, “This is the only reason. The material was produced by, and is owned by BNN – Business News Network.”
The blogger making these accusations said that there was evidence that suggested that the only clips that were being removed were copyright debate related.
“When it became evident that numerous unauthorized BNN clips were posted on Youtube, a request was made that they remove all of the clips. This process involves finding each individual URL and sending them to Youtube to request that they be taken down. Attempts were made to find all the clips, but if there are still some there, that is an indication that a few may have been overlooked. There was never any intention to target clips of any topic.” Noonan said.
“In total,” Noonan said, “over 193 BNN clips were removed from Youtube – less than 3% of these clips were related to copyright. They were clips covering numerous topics and certainly not limited to copyright issues or anything else.”
Now that we received the other side of the story, a more probable explanation can be made. In instances in the past regarding other copyright infringement notices on YouTube where multiple clips are taken down, it’s possible that for the side of copyright owners to merely see it as just taking down unauthorized material from multiple sources. Meanwhile, on the other side of the infringement notice, the incident is much more personal. The notice is directed at you, as a user, in particular and can give off the impression that this take down was directed at you specifically – and when it’s political in nature, it can be very easy to take that take down notice as merely a case of a big faceless corporation trying to remove important debates from the public because of certain viewpoints – even though in this case, that wasn’t the case.
This case for BNN is easily a political mine field given thepolitically sensitive nature of copyright. One of the major arguments in the copyright debate is, in fact, that copyright can be used as a tool for censoring free speech. How does a copyright holder try to take down copyrighted material when the subject of that video is copyright in the first place? Did the take down indirectly affect free speech? Technically speaking, yes, there is a grain of truth to be had here. Ultimately speaking, the larger accusation that BNN wants to cover up or censor any debate in particular isn’t necessarily true. The take downs related to copyright were a tiny part of a larger round of take downs by the network with no debate targeting in mind.
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I call BS!
Everything about the interview with Howard Knopf proved that this network and its dumb A$$ reporter are trying to mislead Canadians. Knopf’s arguments were legit and far stronger than the shrill yet the reporter kept disputing his points even though they were valid.
She would never make a copy of a purchase DVD if it was against the law. What a tard seriously if she was not paid American corporations they why would you be willing to give up a right you currently have?
Only paid people will fight to have personal rights removed.
This brainless chick and the shitty network were paid off and now they realized how stupid they looked and how it did not help their customer to screw consumers of their rights. So in a defense effort they get rid of all videos in hopes they can still get paid by corporate America! Screwing Canadians or fellow citizens means nothing when you whore your self for money.
I’m Bang on right BNN? Report that!
Perhaps it went something like this:
– We’re being criticized for removing those clips about the copyright debate. What do we do?
– How about we have -all- of our clips removed? That way they can’t say we’re just censoring one discussion.
- …. Brilliant!
Despite BNN’s claimed innocence, as the Canadian Coalition for Electronic Rights points out, BNN has STILL NOT taken down many of their other copyrighted clips from YouTube.
CCER has updated ‘BNN Trying To Silence The Canadian Copyright Debate?’:
“Business News Network has provided CCER with clear evidence that BNN is indeed targeting all YouTube content and not just that relating to the Canadian copyright debate”
The only thing that puts a smile on my face regarding the whole copyright thing is that no matter what laws all these greedy corporations are able to lobby and successfully pass, people will always pirate if they feel like what they are paying for is not worth the value.
I wish these corporations would learn something from the whole iTunes thing. When they offer their products at a price people are willing to pay for them, people wont pirate and acutally WILL pay for them. When its too expensive, they will choose not to pay for it, and there is a bigger incentive for them to get it for free instead.
These companies are just living in the past, and dont want to face the reality that there media is not worth what it was 1, 5, 10, etc years ago due to technologies like the personal computer, internet, p2p, etc. You cant reasonably expect people to want to pay $20 for a CD, when due to technology etc, the value of the CD to the consumer is only $5 for example. No matter how many laws thy try to pass to maintain a monopoly on thier product (which is basically what it is) people will always either not pay for it, or resort to the blackmarket. The cat is out the bag, and no matter what they do, there is no way to reverse it no matter how many laws they try to pass.
So to all these corporations I say this: Continue wasting millions of dollars lobbying politicians and lining your lawyers pockets trying to fight a war you already lost years ago. Its only your profits that you are wasting, your image that you are ruining, and ultimately your demise that you are enabling. Why should I buy your CD when you are just gonna use some of that money to lobby politicians to reduce my rights, and give you more power? You can try to raise your price of your products to absorb the legal costs, but that only makes it worse for you. At the end of the day, I still have my limewire and will get my media for free no matter how many unenforceable laws you pass, or until you can offer me your products at a price im willing to pay. My guess is that all these corporations will cease to exist in less than 10 years, with the artist choosing to skip the middle man and marketing their products directly to the consumers through the same technologies that put these corporations out of business. Funny how things works. RIP.