What kind of trouble can I get into if DMCA sends a notice? I got a lot of old songs, movies, and video series with me. A lot of these are no longer copyright, but am not sure about it. So my question is, if I publish these on a website, and some of these turn out to be copyrighted, then what kind of trouble can DMCA bring? Some of the movies and series are from those times when people only had black and white TV sets in USA. Thanks
You won't get into any legal trouble but the ISP can forcibly remove the content. As a rule once you've received a DMCA notice this happens within 10 days of said notice.
This may be old news, but didn't the DMCA used to chase copyright offenders in civil court? I recall there being tales of college kids who had downloaded and shared hundreds of movies being sued by the DMCA for large amounts of money. This was quite some time ago (ten years or more?) but they may still be doing it for egregious cases...
jrbiz That is also what I am worried about, further action even after removing the material... Most of the things I will publish are really old work, and I am not even sure if its still copyright material. I will of course remove it on complaint of copyright infringement . Is it worth to find a host that ignores DMCA and keeps my billing info private? DMCA complaint will come to me first, via a form on the website, and I will remove the content.
This is way above my pay grade, but I think that unless you are a high volume offender and remove the violation when requested, no legal actions are typically taken. However, you need to question as to why you would want to go through this in the first place. Why not focus on videos that you know are in the public domain and not have to worry about this issue?
They can do absolutely nothing if somebody else uploaded them to your site and you take them down quickly. So just upload them as if it was a 3rd party upload. If this wasn't the case youtube and facebook would all be bankrupt.
Harry H Thanks for the idea, but that won't solve my problem. I have contacted some more hosting providers, lets see what happens
On an old site I used to get letters on the daily and I’d remove the posts. I ended up getting someone to remove them for me when they popped up it happened so much. As long as you remove promptly you should be fine. But I’m not a lawyer.
Just an FYI, about ten years ago, I was involved with a large company that offered web design and hosting services for industrial companies. Our clients had provided graphics to us to use on their websites that they found on the Internet, many of which were owned by others. We did not know this. However, we and they started getting letters from companies like shutterstock and the letters specifically said that we owed them $X and taking down the photo would not be enough as they had screen captured our previous use of the pictures and would be taking us to court if we did not pay the usage fee plus penalties. Our clients paid the fees which were much cheaper than legal fees. Note that these were not videos or songs, they were stock commercial photo's and it was the copyright owners, themselves, that had lawyers come after our clients. My point is that the DMCA probably only looks at very large violators; actual copyright owners might go after anyone and everyone. I am sure that shutterstock had a windfall of money come in by getting an army of lawyers to find and pursue violators.
it is easy to avoid any fees, just say that photos were purchased by a former employee, and he is unreachable now.
jrbiz I understand your point. However, I am not in USA, so persuing me directly via a lawyer will be difficult in a case like this. But, I don't want to get involved in anything illegal, in USA or not does not matters. All of us guys are also into digital publishing. We won't want someone else to profit from our work and products, at least not without giving us our share of profit. So if I don't want it to happen to me, then I should also not be doing it to others. This is what I think. My problem is that I don't even know if these things are copyright or not. Most were downloaded freely from web over a period of 15 years... A lot of it is really really old content, most are 40-50 years old, some even more.
That is laughable. The company is ultimately legally responsible for the conduct of its employees during their tenure with the company. Makes zero difference if the employee has left. They do not sue the individual employee for situations like this. They go after the company.
There's a difference (obviously) between a user uploading a copyrighted video on YT or using copyrighted images on a forum and a person blatantly posting copyrighted materials on their own website. @JEET a simple answer will be: don't do it. Why would you want to lose your sleep over something like this? You should never toy with the idea of creating a website full of copyrighted material.