

Microsoft Accuses Microsoft of Copyright Infringement - samspenc
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2045486/microsoft-accuses-microsoft-of-copyright-infringement-asks-google-to-scrub-search-links.html

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brokentone
While this incident is entertaining, as the article points out, more often it
is damaging to the "offender" of an errant takedown. DMCA takedowns are filed
under the condition of perjury, I don't understand how a. you can meet the
review standard for perjury in an automated fashion or b. how there isn't any
punishment for those who file errant DMCA takedowns especially in an automated
fashion.

~~~
dragonwriter
Punishment for filing false DMCA takedown notice would either require: 1) An
civil action for damages by the harmed party, or 2) A criminal prosecution for
perjury.

I'm guessing that the vast majority of people harmed by false DMCA takedown
notices either do _nothing_ or, if they act at all, file a counternotice with
the content host and leave it at that.

The problem may not be the absence of available sanctions, but the fact that
people don't seek to apply the available sanctions.

~~~
comex
The EFF has tried to do so, but had trouble proving damages:

[http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/10/after-five-
years-...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/10/after-five-years-
dancing-baby-youtube-takedown-lawsuit-nears-a-climax/)

~~~
dragonwriter
That article does not indicate that they had trouble proving damages, it said
that they were restricted in the damages they could ask for, and that the
difficult issue was proving difficult was proving "subjective bad faith".

That seems to also accurately reflect the most recent action in the case, the
order denying both parties motions for summary judgement in January [1][2].

[1] [https://www.eff.org/node/73102](https://www.eff.org/node/73102) [2]
[https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/01/lenz-v-universal-
baby-...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/01/lenz-v-universal-baby-may-be-
dancing-trial-0)

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grecy
I've said it before and I'll say it again.

If an entity issues a DCMA take down notice that turns out to be erroneous,
they should be charged a fine. That find should grow exponentially for each
URL impacted by that erroneous take down (i.e. when they knock out 100 domains
while trying to take out one)

~~~
jychang
Not sure about that. I feel like someone who spams 100 takedown notices, and
only 1 of them is legit, should be treated differently from someone who
legitimately sent out 1000 takedown notices, and 900 were legit.

~~~
harrytuttle
Err, no.

In the UK we have a thing called Northampton bulk court. This is an automated
court which is used to issue fines and summonses locally. people can actually
integrate with it with their billing systems.

I've had three summonses for things that weren't valid/legitimate. Each one of
these costs me literally a day to sort out.

The cost of each of these "misses" costs someone time and money. They should
be fined for each invalid claim.

~~~
bobbles
An alternative would be to have an 'administrative fee' charged on a per-
notice basis. Then you can refund the fee if the claim is found to be valid.

~~~
harrytuttle
There is a fee per claim. They just pay it.

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foresterh
Am I reading this right? The fifth result on the Google Transparency report[1]
(the live updated page) is a request from Cisco to take down Cisco urls:

[http://www.chillingeffects.org/notice.cgi?sID=1064850](http://www.chillingeffects.org/notice.cgi?sID=1064850)

[1][http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/](http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/)

~~~
brokentone
This is their learning portal. It appears as though something was posted that
shouldn't have been; I'm assuming that they cleared these internally, then
wanted Google to remove them from their index to remove the sensitive info
from the search previews and cached copies.

Related, this is interesting:
[http://cisco360.cisco.com/popup/](http://cisco360.cisco.com/popup/)

------
nsns
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autoimmunity](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autoimmunity)

This is simply an unusually explicit example of how the current copyright
system harms everyone, including its own advocators.

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JazCE
This is like the 3rd time this story has appeared on HN... it's all very
droll.

~~~
khawkins
As the article states, the number of DMCA requests has increased almost 1500%
over the past year.

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eloisius
We can only hope that Google kindly complies.

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ChrisAntaki
If Google had complied, could Microsoft have claimed that Google was censoring
results from Microsoft? If not publicly, behind closed doors perhaps.

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nicoEE
Funniest thing is that Microsoft sponsors the article!

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chris_wot
Google should sue for every inaccurate DMCA takedown it receives. Not
practical, but it would send a few firms broke, and stop the flood.

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khawkins
Why don't we just charge a meagre tax, perhaps $0.10, per DMCA request? This
would reduce spamming significantly, while any genuine requests would be more
than worth that sum.

~~~
fusiongyro
This is no better than fining abuses and in many ways worse.

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WalterSear
Is this the "serious fun so intense and delightful that [it] will blur the
line between reality and fantasy", that Ballmer promised us recently?

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awestley
Oh the irony... It would be funny if it wasn't so sad...

