@mrjyn
July 26, 2009
YouTube, how much are you making off Jill and Kevin's wedding? | Technically Incorrect - CNET News
YouTube, how much are you making off Jill and Kevin's wedding? | Technically Incorrect - CNET NewsIt's lifted up those who have been dumped by their one-eyed lovers.
It's made married couples turn to each other and think: "Why in the blessed blazes did I marry you?"
One can even imagine it will inspire those who are about to embark on one of life's more treacherous paths to reassess their mode of transport.
Am I talking about the new health care bill? No, I'm talking about the latest and perhaps most inspirational video to have graced YouTube's library of life.
When Jill Peterson and Kevin Hines set their wedding date in St. Paul, Minn., they decided to create a special entrance in the church: a loosely choreographed dance to Chris Brown's "Forever."
Jill had been a dancer, you see. And, well, marching up the aisle to organ music is so 1939.
Kevin told NBC's "Today Show" that he had only posted the video because Jill's dad had nagged him to YouTube it so that more distant family members could enjoy the amusement. (I especially loved the portly chap in the shades who looks just like Turtle from "Entourage.")
Since last Sunday, almost 5 million people have watched the delightful wedding party dance. More than 2 million people laptopped it up between 10 p.m. PDT Friday and 10 a.m. PDT Saturday.
But here's the thing. Unlike, for example, the Susan Boyle YouTube video--various versions of which have been watched by more than 100 million people--the wedding dance actually has ads around it.
Well, one. In the box to the right of the video.
Friday night, I saw one for Veet, a superbly relevant wedding product. (Gentlemen, in case you are unfamiliar with Veet, it's an excellent repository of depilatory stuff.)
Saturday morning, the ad space encouraged me to go to the California State Fair (yes, complete with American Idol winner David Cook and a Beatles tribute band.)
As yet, there are none of the little yellow-and-white scrawling ads defacing this mesmerizing video. However, it would be truly instructive if YouTube could give us some sense of how much it is making from what might turn out to be the most-watched piece of film (any kind of film) of the week.
Google has been on an interestingly defensive offensive on the subject of YouTube's prospects for money-making.
Indeed, it has made much of a new ability to "buzz target" those videos that are gaining exponential viral momentum.
So it would be a gracious gift for Google to give us a running score of just how much it's making from Jill and Kevin's wedding.
You see, if I am ever lucky enough to get married, I would love to out Jill-and-Kevin Jill and Kevin. And I'm interested to know if I could make some money out of it myself.
'Psychic' Uri Geller sues over video clip on YouTube | News Blog - CNET News
'Psychic' Uri Geller sues over video clip on YouTube | News Blog - CNET News
May 9, 2007 3:23 PM PDT'Psychic' Uri Geller sues over video clip on YouTube
Early Wednesday we told you about a lawsuit that the Electronic Frontier Foundation filed against so-called psychic Uri Geller over allegedly misusing copyright law to silence critics on YouTube.
Now it turns out that there's a second lawsuit afoot, also filed this week. Geller's company, London-based Explorologist, filed a copyright lawsuit on Monday against a critic who is trying to debunk claims that the self-described psychic really is one.
Geller's company had sent YouTube a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice taking issue with the Randi video, and claiming under penalty of perjury that it owned the copyright to it. EFF, on the other hand, claims in its lawsuit that Geller owns at most a few seconds of it--something that would likely be protected under U.S. fair use precedent.
If EFF is right, Geller could face legal liability and be forced to cough up some cash. In an earlier case, EFF managed to extract $125,000 from Diebold for misusing the DMCA takedown process.
But Geller seems to be claiming that a few seconds of video used for criticism in a 14-minute video segment is not fair use. Explorologist's complaint, filed in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia, says that the clip was used "within a sequence of cinematographic images" that, in total, "infringed the plaintiff's copyright." The suit accuses Brian Sapient of being behind the Rational Response Squad, which debunks claims of the paranormal and supernatural.
EFF staff attorney Marcia Hofmann declined to comment on the Explorologist v. Sapient lawsuit for now. "We're not willing to comment until Mr. Sapient has been served with papers," Hofmann said on Wednesday afternoon.
The Skeptic's Dictionary says this of Geller: "He calls himself a psychic and has sued several people for millions of dollars for saying otherwise. His psychic powers were not sufficient to reveal to him, however, that he would lose all the lawsuits against his critics."
A press release from Geller's lawyer (reproduced below) says: "The bottom line is Sapient did not ask for permission to use the copyrighted video." It also says the video clip length was 10 seconds, not 3 seconds. (Our own calculation puts the length at about 5 or 6 seconds.)
But the real bottom line seems to be whether it's legally permissible for someone to use a few seconds of video to analyze potential trickery by Geller, who calls himself "the world's most investigated and celebrated paranormalist." Should a public figure like that be able to use copyright law to squelch critics, or is protecting copyright more important?
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