GEMA & S.978 Copyright law revisited (Making videos could become a felony crime?!?)

S.978 also covers TV, movies, audio, VIDEO GAMES, LET'S PLAY (LP) vids, VG tourneys, even if you're making a vlog and you've got the radio on WAY in the background! Yep, felony material if they have their way. This gotta stop, seriously.

GEMA : http://www.gema.de/

S.978

Official bill text : http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-s978/text

Sponsor
Senator Amy Klobuchar D-MN
Co-Sponsors
Sen. Chris Coons [D, DE]
Sen. John Cornyn [R, TX]

Official Summary

5/5/2009--Introduced.Amends the Internal Revenue Code to increase the limit on the deductibility of losses from the sale or exchange of capital assets for individual taxpayers to $10,000, adjusted for inflation after 2009 (50% of such amount for married individuals filing a separate tax return).

OpenCongress Summary

Makes unauthorized web streaming of copyrighted content a felony with a possible penalty of up to 5 years in prison. Illegal streaming of copyrighted content is defined in the bill as an offense that "consists of 10 or more public performances by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copyrighted works" and has a total economic value, either to the copyright holder or the infringer, of at least $2,500.


LINKS!

Opencongress bill info : http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-s978/show

TECHDIRT : http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110601/01515014500/senators-want-to-put-pe...

Legal perspective : http://shoryuken.com/2011/06/29/trolling-the-stream-by-ultradavid/

E-petition (not worth the paper it's written on, but if you're a slactivist, here you go) : http://act.demandprogress.org/sign/ten_strikes/?source=fb

And, more fun...
THE MONEY TRAIL! Wh's getting paid by the backers of this bill : http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-s978/money

Specific Organizations Supporting S.978

American Federation of Television and Radio Artists
Directors Guild of America
International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts of the United States
Screen Actors Guild
Motion Picture Association of America
Recording Industry Association of America
Independent Film and Television Alliance
National Association of Theatre Owners
Ultimate Fighting Championship
American Federation of Musicians
American Intellectual Property Law Association
NBC Universal
Viacom
Sony Pictures Entertainment
American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers
Association of American Publishers
Association of Independent Music Publishers
American Photographic Artists
AT&T
Broadcast Music, Inc.
Business Software Alliance
CBS Corporation
Church Music Publishers Association
Entertainment Software Association
Graphic Artists Guild
National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing
National Association of Broadcasters
National Collegiate Athletic Association
National Music Publishers' Association
National Basketball Association
News America Holdings
Newspaper Association of America
Picture Archive Council of America
Professional Photographers of America
Professional School Photographers Association
Reed Elsevier
PPL & VPL
SESAC
Software & Information Industry Association
Time Warner
Universal Music Group
Magazine Publishers of America
The Walt Disney Company
Writers Guild of America, West
U. S. Chamber of Commerce
International Brotherhood of Teamsters
Entertainment Merchants Association
Global Intellectual Property Center

Specific Organizations Opposing S.978

U.S.W.G.O.
Demand Progress
Electronic Frontier Foundation

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• S.
• 978
• politics
• bill
• GEMA
• WMG
• SAG
• youtube

[fireraven36]

this is making me nervous I mean I been doing LP about year so and to me I love doing LP for everyone it fun and enjoyable but now if the bill pass it over for good I don't want go to jail

[TygerWDR]

@fireraven36 I's still in committee right now, so there's still time to get people moving to kill the bill. Look in the links, and start calling / writing / contacting your reps in congress and the house. We've got an uphill fight, but it's winnable.

[MrExtremepaintballr]

WHAT IS UR PAINTBALL CHANNELLLLLL

[TygerWDR]

@MrExtremepaintballr webdogpaintball is the channel name for the paintball stuff. And there's WDRarchives for the old web dog shows.

[KelvinLowelllCampe]

BTW what ever happen to some of the copyright laws back in the day? like the Fair Use Policy this new laws gonna contridict it isnt it?

[TygerWDR]

@KelvinLowelllCampe MY UNDERSTANDING is that fair use laws are still applicable, and will remain so. The problem is how you read the law, or who's reading of the law is proven right. It's arguable that a "let's play" is transformative of a video game, but the government may see it differently. That's the real horror of this law, it'd be a FELONY, not a civil case. The US government would be stepping in and declaring what is, or is not, transformative of a work, unless you had an FCC license.

[ninetalescommander]

What makes me laugh is everyone is making a fuss over nothing and here's why

First off, Machinima themselves have addressed this matter and they have said unless the company is actually losing money (Which is probably impossible when it comes to video games as its good advertisment), nobody can do jack.

Secondly, if you go the wikipedia page for Bill S.978 and read reference 5, you'll see that Chris Coon's (1 of the creators of the bill) has stated that its not gonna effect Youtube at all.

[pyroboy08]

Were all screwed if this passes! Its nearly impossible to make a video without some kind of infringement. Just about everything in our world has some company's name stamped on it somewhere.

[Echofrost12]

DAMN YOU GOVERNMENT PRICKS! FIRST YOU TAKE OUR MONEY AND NOW YOU'RE TAKING AWAY VIDEO GAME RIGHTS! TIME FOR A REVOLUTION!

[yearofthe]

Video Game footage should be considered fair use if you record it by yourself and commentate over most of the footage. -.-

[petersupermann]

FUCK GEMA!

[MrMeistor]

Ich mache schlechte Videos aber ich möchte das meine schlechten Videos gute Hintergrundmusik haben da ich ein schlechter Musiker bin

[lakerskid2013]

They better not pass this as a law! If they pass this as a law does this mean that me recording myself and my brother count as copyright infringement? If so then I would have to delete a whole bunch of videos, about 1/4 of my videos are gaming which is not walkthroughs, trailers, none of that but just actually playing video games.

[zubscorp]

robert quime comes for you

[zjbx]

i hate our government.

[wrestlemaniac202]

So as a newly registered voter for the next election I can vote out my democratic congressman?