Gets the smackdown, but court fails to mention how it Google can possible ever prevent illegally posted copyrighted content from appearing ever again.
The discussion over online video sharing has been taken to the next level in France, a country formerly known for its free thinking and egalitarian ways, but who has increasingly been front and center in the row over copyright infringement and piracy.
Seemingly fresh on the heels of its current efforts to ban people suspected of illegal file-sharing from the internet altogether, a French court has now ruled that a hosting provider must prevent future repostings of copyrighted content after having been informed and therefore already removed the initial posting.
The High Court of First Instance of Paris found that, with regard to the first instance, Google Inc. complied by removing a documentary called "Tranquility Bay" as requested by the copyright holder. However, the Court found that since the film later reappeared on Google Video after having already been warned the first time, it was thereby obligated to do everything necessary in order to prevent it from reappearing. Furthermore, since Google Inc. couldn’t prove that it had done anything to do so, it could not therefore benefit form the liability limitation provided by article 6-1-2 of the French Act of 21 June 2004 which governs such cases.
Google Inc. was thus found guilty of copyright infringement: and fined $25.000 euros ($37,000 USD) for the "violation of the patrimonial rights," and $5.000 euros ($7,000 USD) for the "violation of the moral rights" of the author.
In a blog posting, French Lawyer Brad Spitz points out the importance of the decision:
The crux of the decision is that once the hosting providers have been notified of illegal content, they are obliged to make sure that it does not reappear on their site. This places them in a difficult situation once they have been notified. Indeed, simply removing the notified content will not be enough to benefit from the liability limitation of Article 6-1-2 (the same limitation is provided for in the Directive 2000/31/EC of 8 June 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services and in the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)). Where the hosting provider is informed of the existence of an illegal content, it will either have to implement all necessary means to prevent a further user from putting the same content on line, or be able to prove that effective means were implemented in order to prevent such content being placed on the site. Hosting providers (such as Youtube and Dailymotion) will therefore have to develop technical means capable of searching specific content. Right owners might want to use the notification system for all their content in order to make sure the hosting providers will do the best they can to remove the litigious content as soon as it is put on line, and/or be held liable for copyright infringement if they fail to do so.
Further, the decision concerning the infringement of the moral rights of the author in the present judgement is note worthy. The Court ruled that the paternity right (the right of the author to be identified as such) was violated, as the identification elements of the documentary in question on the service Google Video did not contain any identification relating to the co-authors. Moreover, the Court ruled that Google Inc violated the author’s right of integrity (referred to under UK copyright law as the right to object to derogatory treatment), since the ‘streaming’ means used to broadcast the documentary only allow a very poor quality visualisation.
It has yet to be seen how Google will be able to filter respostings of copyrighted content, but something tells me it’ll have an easier time trying to turn lead into gold.
The decision also once again raises the importance of net neutrality. Sure the United States likes to meddle with foreign-hosted websites, the once mighty TorrentSpy comes to mind, but what about when other countries try to regulate US-hosted sites? We could use a taste of our own medicine every now and then, yet I just hope it finally works and we come to our senses and realize the fallacy of trying to regulate companies in other countries simply because your country’s citizens are able to view their site.
Looking for more stuff to watch or download?
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uTorrent – A Beginner’s guide to BitTorrent downloading
News Tip? Comment? Suggestion? jared@zeropaid.com
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