Arguing the Case for Fair-Use by Example?

bobej1977 asks: "Happened to be perusing my local newspaper website and came across a link to one of those corny news websites, a la Dave Barry. Included were a couple of funny Fair-Use related stories. This got me thinking about how it's often easier to explain the idea of fair-use in terms of the absurdities that occur when people stop using their common sense. Anybody else have any interesting links/stories?" Read on for examples of what bobej means.

bobej1977's article examples:

"In December, Australia's TV Channel 7 reported that many schools across the country, at the behest of the Australasian Performing Rights Association, were discouraging parents from making keepsake movies of their kids' appearances in Christmas musicals, because recording the holiday songs might violate copyright law. [Seven Network Ltd. (Australia), 12-22-03]"

and

"In February 2004, according to a New York Times report, cuts from 'White Album' by the band Sonic Youth were being listed for downloading on Apple's iTunes online store, and included was 'Silence,' a 63-second cut consisting of no sound at all, for which fans were nonetheless expected to pay the regular iTunes price of 99 cents. (In a subsequent clarification, a Sonic Youth spokesman said 'Silence' would only be sold to purchasers who bought all of the album's cuts.) [New York Times, 2-9-04, 2-16-04]"

Are these decent examples of the absurd, that make a fair to strong case for fair-use? What examples might you have?

Old article, but good (several examples)

[jvmatthe]

There are some good examples of how crazy copyright law can get in this article by Jonathan Zittrain [legalaffairs.org]. My favorite is the bit about Teddy Ruxpin, the toy bear who moves in response to the sound on a tape put into the cassette player in his back. (Putting a tape of, say, Madonna in him and turning him on constitutes a performance of the work, or some such.) Also talks about TV sizes in bars, the "strangler" VHS comment, filesharing, and others. This was linked to in a previous Slashdot story [slashdot.org].

Here's one from a few year ago.

[MarkusQ]

So, you like to sing at camp [s-t.com]?

-- MarkusQ

Re:Here's one from a few year ago.

[Asprin]

OT: Why would you name a childrens' day camp Diablo? It's spanish for "devil", for crying out loud! That's freakin' creepy.

Why would you name a childrens' day camp Diablo?

[HughsOnFirst]

Probably because the name of the mountain it is on or near is "Mount Diablo" [ca.gov]

I nearly killed myself on a bike coming down it once. Went to boarding school at it's base.

From 3200 feet, you can see San Francisco and Nevada from the top in
clear weather, lots of fossils and a great place to hang glide

Re:Here's one from a few year ago.

[Brandybuck]

Favorite quote: 'Ascap, which is based in New York, defends the royalties. "Songwriters are small-business people who write songs to make a living," Mr. Lo Frumento says. "The royalties allow them to send their kids to Girl Scout camp, too." '

Reverse engineering

[scumbucket]

Wouldn't reverse engineering something like a device driver, assorted hardware, etc. be considered by some a violation for fair-use?

In other words...

[Big Sean O]

"I know obscenity use when I see it..." --Potter Stewart [michaelariens.com]
s/obscenity/fair use/

Phththpht

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it irony if in commenting on fair use you grotesquely butcher a famous quotation? I dunno.

The CORRECT quote is from Justice Potter Stewart (Supreme Court, Jacobellis v. Ohio):

It is possible to read the Court's opinion in Roth v. United States and Alberts v. California, 354 U.S. 476, in a variety of ways. In saying this, I imply no criticism of the Court, which in those cases was faced with the task of trying to define what may be indefinable. I have reached the conclusion, which I think is confirmed

Re:Phththpht

[Big Sean O]

Actually, misquoting protects me from potential attacks from the Stewart estate for appropriating his work...

Of course, since it's all SCOTUS stuff, there's no copyright, so let's just call me a lazy bastard... :-)

Illegal Art

[jeffy124]

there's an art show out there called "Illegal Art" that's chock full of art works that "test the limits" so-to-speak. An example would be that drawing of various Disney characters in curious positions. The html file of DeCSS source code laid out like the DVD logo is also part of the tour. I dont have time to dig it up now, but they have a website and there are occasional news articles in local papers when the show tours that locality.

Re:Illegal Art

[jeffy124]

ok, so i did a quick google and found it: http://www.illegal-art.org/ [illegal-art.org] -- I strongly recommend you temporarily disable your pop-up blockers, as you'll miss one of the exhibits on the homepage. (dont worry, it's nothing malicious, nor is it an advertisement or anything)

Re:Illegal Art

[Fnkmaster]

Incidentally, if you're interested in the much-talked-about DJ Danger Mouse "Grey Album" (the "illegal" mix album created using material from the Beatles' White Album and Jay-Z's Black Album), it's available on the Illegal Art site as well here [illegal-art.org].

Silence costs

[Twylite]

The second example of purchasing a silent track isn't as ridiculous as it sounds (pun intended). There are people who will intentionally pay for what they consider to be art, or at least to reward the creator(s) of what they consider to be art. A silent track certainly falls into this category.

What you failed to mention is that the track violates Copyright law. Here's a note about a related case [findlaw.com] concerning silence, plus a thread on SlashNOT [slashnot.com] that includes links to the CNN article. That is the part that is really sad.

Re:Silence costs

[jc42]

...purchasing a silent track isn't as ridiculous as it sounds (pun intended).

Back in the 1970's, there was a '45' put out that was several minutes of silence. Many bars and restaurants reported that it was the most-played selection on their juke box. Lots of people were willing to put out a nickel or dime or whatever to prevent any music being played for a few minutes.

I wonder if that "recording" had a copyright notice?

Churches using copyrighted worship music.

[xanderwilson]

A few years back, before we even got into the big issue of online music sharing, I remember hearing about churches getting sued for using copyrighted music for worship and reprinting the lyrics for all of the congregation (or even putting the lyrics on a transparency for an overhead projector) without permission from the copyright holder or even a blanket license like the CCL.

A friend of mine and I were both musicians and worship leaders at the time and he was the one who told me about the issue. He said he'd probably sue to get reimbursed for copyright violations, even from a church. I still don't think I would, but then I never depended on my music for my livelihood.

Many years later this ethical/spiritual debate was brought into the online world when P2P filesharing service ZPoc [christdot.org] was shut down. I didn't know about this one myself until after the fact. I think it's an interesting area of the filesharing and fair use debates, since the issue of morality vs. legality is often brought up on both sides.

Alex.

Re:Churches using copyrighted worship music.

[Brandybuck]

Beyond the hymns, the Bible itself is copyrighted! At least most modern translations are. The King James version is in the public domain, but I'm not aware of any other common English translations that are. Reading scripture from the pulpit might be against the law if you don't use the right translation!

Here's how the process works. To create a English new translation you pull out the original texts along with your Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic dictionaries. Find the most accurate translation. Then look at the translations done in a couple dozen other modern versions, and make sure you didn't translate it the same way. Odd are you did. So use different phrasing or synonyms. Instead of "Blessed are the peacemakers", write "Those who keep the peace will be blessed". Never mind that this can subtly change the meaning of the verse.

Copyright is a temporal law, not a spiritual law. The rules and regulations of mankind should never take precedence over the law of God.

Re:Churches using copyrighted worship music.

[shylock0]

I wonder... These are derivitive work (translation) of a works in the public domain (the bible). IANAL (and my staff lawyer isn't in till next Wednesday) but I do know that different rules apply to works derived from works already in the public domain, particularly translations, which have a whole sub-set of IP rules. Anybody else weigh in?

Re:Churches using copyrighted worship music.

[joeljkp]

The copyright page of my church's standard NIV pew bibles have a notice that gives explicit permission to quote, reprint, copy, etc. a reasonable amount of the contents at the same time (no more than 50 pages at once or something). I believe it's from the International Bible Society [gospelcom.net].

Happy Birthday

[alan_dershowitz]

is STILL copyrighted. That's why every restaurant has their own goofy birthday song instead of the universally recognized happy birthday song.

If your kid has a birthday party and you hire a clown to come in and he sings Happy Birthday, the law was broken. What kind of bullshit is that?

Re:Happy Birthday

[brigc]

I think it's pathetic that a melody written in 1893 is still covered by copyright... barring additional changes in law, the song's now protected at least 2030!

The actual details behind Happy Birthday are kind of interesting... a good synopsis is available from the reference librarian's best friend, Snopes [snopes.com].

...brig

Re:Happy Birthday

[extra88]

If your kid has a birthday party and you hire a clown to come in and he sings Happy Birthday, the law was broken.

It's not illegal to sing "Happy Birthday," it's illegal to sing it publicly and not pay the requisite fee to ASCAP [ascap.com] or whichever organization handles the collecting of fees and distribution of royalties to composers.

Re:Happy Birthday

[kiwimate]

It's not illegal to sing "Happy Birthday," it's illegal to sing it publicly and not pay the requisite fee to ASCAP or whichever organization handles the collecting of fees and distribution of royalties to composers.

That would probably be the Harry Fox Agency [harryfox.com]. And, by the way, I would imagine a clown being hired professionally to sing "Happy Birthday" would come under this category (as distinct from the bunch of six year old friends singing around the lunch table).

So what does it mean?

[RobertB-DC]

Read on for examples of what bobej means.

So, what does "bobej" mean? I couldn't find any clarification on a Google search [google.com]. "jebob" returned a cute baby [weizmann.ac.il], but I don't think he's posting on Slashdot yet.

Inquiring minds want to know! And they have karma to burn!

Re:So what does it mean?

[bobej1977]

Bob E. J. I am forever cursed with a first and last name that are always already in-use in every user-base everywhere... Sigh...If only I could have been a Percival...

Silence? How'd they get the rights to that?

[jonadab]

I would have thought John Cage would sue them blind for selling a track of
nothing but silence and not paying him royalties.

Teaching of course

[Monkelectric]

I know of an Audio program at a college which makes heavy use of fair use. One of the excercises is pretty cool -- they buy dvds and soundtracks to movies, strip the audio, and the students assigment is to record the dialog, layer in the sound track, and do the foley and sweetening.

They also have a library of audio cds and dvds for music history courses. The professors used to be given a stack of cds to teach the class with (how can you teach a music history course without music, right?) but now they're