There’s been some coverage about the Copyright office’s website crashing from all the last minute comments on the topic of DMCA reforms. Here’s an interesting article that calls those stories into question.
As any bully can tell you, if you want them to be afraid, you have to remind them occasionally of the last beating. This is what Google just did through its surrogates who would very much like everyone to believe they “crashed” the regulations.gov website that hosted the webforms for public comments on the Copyright Office’s public consultation on the effectiveness of the DMCA “notice and shakedown”. And how do we know this? A statement from the Office of Management and Budget in the White House that runs the site?
No, we know it from what is apparently a Google-funded surrogate’s press release reported as news by the Torrent Freak blog that once again is trying to whip up a frenzy over something that’s not there.
Make no mistake: There’s been no official confirmation from the Google White House that anything happened in the way of an attack on regulations.gov…
View original post 472 more words
The eBook Evangelist 
Shrug. The folks I heard about it from have been beating the drum for quite some time (as part of their “Where’s the Fair Use” #WTFU campaign) that automated DMCA takedown notices were placing an unfair burden on small podcasters and video makers who use clips in their work (as they are legally entitled to do by fair use). I have little doubt if they’d heard about the DMCA safe harbor request for comment sooner, they would have mobilized a lot sooner. Apparently the government simply didn’t do a good enough job of getting the word out.
My day job (music industry) includes doing DMCA takedowns. Both sides tend to have strong opinions and I think that there is a lot of nuance that gets overlooked on both sides. Both sides have valid points, too.
I agree that the government didn’t do a good job getting the word out. Given the role of lobbyists in the process, it makes one wonder if they really wanted to. But lying about crashing a server? If true, that a big one…