Re:Ad blocking is under attack
by jrochkind1 on Saturday August 12, 2017 @12:37PM
(#14998587)
> However, your reward for successfully armchair-lawyering that may be a full-on Federal lawsuit.
I assume Github has a whole bunch of non-armchair lawyers.
But this is indeed the problem with the whole system, it comes down to who can pay the legal bills.
It seems obvious to me that Easylist is neither "primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access", "has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent", nor "is marketed.. for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access."
But it could take a whole lot of legal fees to determine that in court, and as we saw in Oracle v Google, the courts don't always decide what seems obvious to us. For better or worse, any sane person or entity wants to stay out of court regardless of whether their lawyers think they have a great case. Unless they have a whole lot of money to burn.
At the least, I think Github should make it's policies clear about what it's doing. If they say a DMCA takedown notice must "Identify the copyrighted work you believe has been infringed" (as the law indeed says), they should not take action to complaints that don't do this. If they want to respond to other types of complaints, they should say so, and explain how. (And ask their lawyers how it effects their liability under DMCA, if at all).
Github appears to be trying for transparency with their docs and practices on DMCA, which is great and important and greatly appreciated. This is one area where it could be improved. Responding to DMCA takedown notices that are not in fact DMCA takedown notices and do not follow Github's own published instructions/requirements for DMCA takedown notices (cause they aren't DMCA takedown notices)... is not transparency. The DMCA regime has plusses and minuses; mis-educating people about the DMCA law doesn't help us evaluate what these may be in order to be engaged citizens.
I assume Github has a whole bunch of non-armchair lawyers.
But this is indeed the problem with the whole system, it comes down to who can pay the legal bills.
It seems obvious to me that Easylist is neither "primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access", "has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent", nor "is marketed.. for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access."
But it could take a whole lot of legal fees to determine that in court, and as we saw in Oracle v Google, the courts don't always decide what seems obvious to us. For better or worse, any sane person or entity wants to stay out of court regardless of whether their lawyers think they have a great case. Unless they have a whole lot of money to burn.
At the least, I think Github should make it's policies clear about what it's doing. If they say a DMCA takedown notice must "Identify the copyrighted work you believe has been infringed" (as the law indeed says), they should not take action to complaints that don't do this. If they want to respond to other types of complaints, they should say so, and explain how. (And ask their lawyers how it effects their liability under DMCA, if at all).
Github appears to be trying for transparency with their docs and practices on DMCA, which is great and important and greatly appreciated. This is one area where it could be improved. Responding to DMCA takedown notices that are not in fact DMCA takedown notices and do not follow Github's own published instructions/requirements for DMCA takedown notices (cause they aren't DMCA takedown notices)... is not transparency. The DMCA regime has plusses and minuses; mis-educating people about the DMCA law doesn't help us evaluate what these may be in order to be engaged citizens.