Music Industry Wants To Put 'Red Lights' In Google For Sites It Says Support Infringement
from the entitlement-much? dept
The recording industry’s massive sense of entitlement continues to spread. The latest is that PRS for Music, the organization that once sought license fees for playing music to horses in a stable, has suggested that Google start putting “traffic lights” in its search results, with red lights being used to indicate sites that the industry accuses of supporting copyright infringement. You can see what they think it should look like here:
The whole system is modeled on Google’s current practice of warning people about potential security problems with sites. Of course, that involves something that can be much more easily confirmed. In the meantime, I imagine that Google — who spends a ridiculous amount of time and effort to test any UI changes to its search results — is probably horrified by that graphic above.
Filed Under: copyright, search engines, traffic lights, uk
Companies: ifpi
Comments on “Music Industry Wants To Put 'Red Lights' In Google For Sites It Says Support Infringement”
I think they should do it. That way we know which sites they don’t want us to go to so we can get to those same sites faster.
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That was what i was thinking. Maybe they would do rating. SO the really good stuff would have multiple red lights.
Piratebay 4 reds
torrentsearch 3 red
EMI 4 green
50cent blog 2 reds
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[insert red light district joke here]
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Agreed. The real problem with this idea is that it doesn’t go far enough.
Google should use something like awareness ribbons to flag sites. That way, almost every site will have some sort of colored symbol attached to it, and you’d need a cheat sheet to be able to see what each color means.
Even better is that some colors will mean several different things.
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Yeah. It sucks when you’re looking for an mp3 and you end up at someone’s playlist or one of those fake sites that doesn’t have anything to download.
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Right, same this as “parental advisory – explicit lyrics”. Thanks for the pointers.
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I’ll just quote from ArsTechnica
http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/07/stop-red-site-copyright-group-proposes-traffic-light-search-ticks.ars
Please note the last paragraph.
“Finally, we expressed some skepticism about the overall effectiveness of the idea. The PRS proposal posits the existence of a “Moral Majority” for whom Traffic Lights will work. The system will perform the crucial role of “establishing a distinction between good and bad in the minds of users, which we hope will be enough to deter 90 percent of users from accessing problem sites.”
No doubt the right light tick would scare some consumers away. But what about rebellious types, we asked, who might see a red tick as a badge of honor?
“Oh yes,” Hooper agreed. “I think there will be people that deliberately go for a red light. We’re realistic about this proposal?this will not eradicate piracy. What it will do is signpost to the vast majority of people who want to find legal/licensed content a great way of doing so. It will help promote those sites that have chosen to go down the route of paying creators and performers and the more traffic they experience the better for content owners and also for their own sites in terms of search rankings.”
The PRS document does point out that the red light/green light system will create a “vital” distinction will provide the “bedrock” for “an escalating series of measures to deal with the remaining determined offenders.”
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That’s good then they will know you deliberately went there and can not use ignorance as a defence 🙂
Re: Red lights on google sites
I feel this is a great idea, it’s already bad enough for songwriters and labels, from a $20+ billion annual Industry down to a little over $12 billion, which is nothing to sneeze at, mostly due to illegal downloading, this brilliant idea was needed so yesterday.
The Silver Conductor
Maybe it’ll be just like Copiepresse: Google will block all infringing sites, then the labels will see their sales dip massively and sue to get back in.
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Marcus. He is an interesting comment on ars I thought it might make an interesting discussion topic.
“Copyrights valid past the life of the author should be first to go. How can you give an incentive to produce to a dead person?”
Copyright = Life of the author plus ?70? years. How is this constitutional?
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Simple, think of the children
Perfect example,
in the movie “About a Boy”,
the main character gets money every time a jingle his dead father wrote. Hence the main character gets free money.
So see it protects the children from having to do any work at all. 70 years of free income WOOT, sign me up.
Oh wait, that would be my children.
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well hopefully someone proves stephen hawking wrong and I can go back and time and give my dad all the best cds of my lifetime
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You will have the best drink coasters EVAR!
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The usual reply to this is that while the artist was still alive, they would have been more inspired knowing that not only would they be able to profit from their work, but their children and their children’s children would also be looked after.
Reality check; if I want my children to be looked after, I’m expected to save some of what I earn while I’m still alive and put it in a trust fund.
Reality check #2; It’s not their children that end up being looked after when they’re dead, it’s their publisher (the same publisher that already creamed 90%+ of the profit while they were still alive)
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Ergo, when wealthy people die, all their property should be turned over to the state.
Gotcha. I’m sure that will catch on fast and soon be the law around the world.
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Ergo, when wealthy people die, all their property should be turned over to the state.
Gotcha. I’m sure that will catch on fast and soon be the law around the world.
It already has – it’s called death duties. This would merely bring copyright (which currently escapes the tax) back into like with everything else.
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As Lloyd George said “Death is the most convenient time to tax rich people.”
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Is there really no tax on inherited copyrights? I’ve heard that there’s a tax on simply inheriting your artsy grandmother’s original paintings, which has caused some people problems because if grandma sold just one painting for a hundred or so dollars, then all the inherited paintings are taxed at that rate.
That was something I heard about once. No idea if it’s for real. If so, it seems crazy that inherited copyrights wouldn’t be taxed in the same way.
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Because the scum-sucking, bribe-taking members of the US Congress have deemed it so. That, my friend, is what is behind virtually all the legislation passed within the last 20 years, at least. Bribes, in the form of lobbying, are still bribes, and are still crimes, but the congressional bodies chose to ignore this simple inconvenience, because it could deplete their revenue stream.
The constitution is the farthest thing from the minds of these thieves when they write and pass these laws. I know you didn’t just fall off the turnip truck, and your name is not Pollyanna, but this is what drives the government of the US to do what it does. Bribes! By any other name, it is still bribes. And any member of these supposedly respectable bodies who disputes this is themselves a liar. And I would tell them so to their faces, should they ever chose to bare them, which they will not.
Frankly, the best thing that could happen to the government of the US at this time would be a 100 megaton blast centered on the Capitol dome precisely when they are voting on their next pay and benefits increase. I would probably weep with joy at that. So would most of the nation. It’s really the only chance at freedom we have left. As it stands now, we are quite simply doomed. All government is in the hands of the corporations, and it’s simply too late to do anything anymore. Glad I won’t live to see the final act.
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Marx, in his Communist Manifesto, was against rights of inheritance. For musicians that barely make a living while alive, the 70+ years is more like life insurance benefits for their children. It is perfectly fair, especially if the composer got bigger posthumously.
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More like: Google will block all infringing sites, then the labels will see their sales dip massively, and then lobby even more to stop the evil pirates.
It’s not like these guys are *smart* or anything.
Copiepresse was different – the publishers knew that their sales would dip if they were deindexed, they just wanted Google to pay them for the privilege of providing traffic. They never for a moment wanted the traffic to go away, their attitude was “Google is making money off *our* content, they must therefore pay us for that privilege.” It’s the same batshit-fucking-insane publisher mentality of “I don’t care if it makes me more money – I don’t control it, therefore they should have the pay me whatever I want.”
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“Google will block all infringing sites, then the labels will see their sales dip massively and sue to get back in.”
Google blocks the labels from the internet?
That’s even better buying one of them!
I know the MAFIAA responds to open source like a house cat responds to strychnine, but perhaps they should try using a browser plug-in. They’ve been MASSIVELY successful for the other side thus far. I know that gives people a fucking choice, but maybe they should try the humble road for once.
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ummmmm, you are suggesting that they do their own work and create something innovative. that goes against their long standing policy of getting others to do your work for them, usually by suing or manipulating the government. Otherwise a good idea
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Well, I suppose doing something worthwhile with their lives would be copying, and copying is wrong!
/sarc
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If I wasn’t so lazy, I’d write a Chrome app for it myself, if only so I could personally write the Google app store description.
“This is that stupid thing the RIAA wants that puts a red mark next to sites in your search results that make them wet themselves. All it does is make your searches take slightly longer in order to display information you probably couldn’t care less about. Don’t bother installing this.”
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“This is the app you are waiting for it tells you which sites the PRS does not wish you to visit. PRS by their actions have optimized the search for infringing content, surpassing even google. This plug in works with Google, Bing, and the top seven search sites”
FTFY
They only thing this will do is make it easier to find infringing content. I say let them do this.
Re: Browser Plug-In
This is a brilliant suggestion. Google should take the view, “OK, we are willing to develop your browser plug-in for you, plus host its associated server. But it is going to cost you. Here, sign this nice contract.” Once PRS for Music is having to spend their own money instead of somebody else’s, their enthusiasm for spending the money will mysteriously diminish.
that worked out for the catholic church
The Index Librorum Prohibitorum is the catholic churches list of prohibited books. It turns out it was great advertising for those books. This will lead to an uptick in the usage of those sites.
Let me see if I can get this right, PRS wants to increase traffic to these sites. What self defeating idiots, no wonder the record labels are failing.
Re: that worked out for the catholic church
Dan Brown agrees.
heh, can you imagine host much that kind of advertising space on google would cost?
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how the heck did I type “host” instead of “how”? Stupid fingers have a mind of their own sometimes.
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Makes me think that if someone wants their policies effectively advertised like that Google should count each instance as an ad and charge them.
Infringing as defined by...
I’m sure it won’t be a challenge to apply the criteria for “infringement” while taking into account global differences in copyright law…
Re: Infringing as defined by...
PRS: Who cares about the rest of thew world? Now give me my fucking money, you entitled little shit.
Us: Pot. Kettle. Black.
Re: Re: Infringing as defined by...
Us: Fart. Poop. Stinky.
(Just an alt that doesn’t insult innocent pots and kettles everywhere.)
Re: Infringing as defined by...
Oh they already have decided on the criteria (which you’d know if you had read the Ars article). They want to base it on the number of take-down notices the site recieves.
Consumers need to be educated that youtube is a site dedicated to infringement![/sarc] Yea.. good luck selling this plan to Google.
Re: Re: Infringing as defined by...
You’re right, I could have read the article, but part of my point (ok, the part I’m making now) is that the criteria is going to be defined by them and will likely not take any sane or reasonable factors into account. For example, a take down != infringement.
I hear PRS used google IP to promote their idea. (see above)
How do I put this gently...
Build your own fucking search engine, you bunch of parasites.
Re: How do I put this gently...
Too gentle…
If they do it, it will only last a short time… however long it takes for them to realize the ‘warnings’ are increasing traffic to said sites.
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Maybe they could charge you to use those links, therefore monetizing your use of “rogue” sites? /sarcasm
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Dammit, STOP GIVING THEM IDEAS!
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Would that be before or after Google helpfully provides a way for the user to sort the result by the “traffic light” status.
I’m thinking something like “prs_site_rating:green”.
But seriously, Google can make the effort to put that in if they wanted to, or rather, think it’s a benefit to their users. Of course, one could argue that their users are interested in search results involving “prs_site_rating: red”…
Within a week...
Someone… maybe the MAFIAAFire guys, would have a Firefox add-on to block this stupidity.
It’s high time these idiots got off the internet and turned their focus on making some quality music instead of “protecting” all the crap they’ve been putting out the last 2 decades.
Re: Within a week...
It’s so crappy you can’t stop downloading it.
Snore.
Re: Re: Within a week...
It is so crappy that people are turning to other crappy places.
http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/07/no-wonder-we-watch-48-hours-of-footage-upped-to-youtube-daily.ars
Even music piracy has gone down but apparently no money increase in sales LoL
Re: Re: Within a week...
“It’s so crappy you can’t stop downloading it.
Snore.”
Um, wow!! What an incredibly stupid reply.
Have we met?
No… didn’t think so, but yet you still think you have me all figured out, though clearly you have no clue.
If you did, you’d know that I really don’t appreciate people putting words into my mouth, making false assumptions about me, or spreading false accusations about me.
I do, however, thank you for reminding me why it is that I hate stupid people so much.
Perhaps some day you’ll grow up and become a fully functioning member of society, until then… here’s your bottle and blanky to help you snore your way back to sleep.
See? I can make assumptions too. How does it feel?
consumers.....
Ah yes, apparently on the Internet, we are ALL “consumers”. Thats what big content wants us to be.
sweet, I’ll be hanging out in Google’s Red-Site District!
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don’t forget to use a keyboard-condom…
to keep dust from collecting behind the keys
Yes, Please!
Yes, please tell me exactly which sites will allow me access to your unlicensed content. I’d also be much obliged if you gave each red site a numerical rating from 1 to 10 based on how many evil pirates were busy seeding your work there.
You know, just so I can avoid them better . . .
Given how copyright law recognizes certain rights of the consumer, not just the owner of a given copyright…
If someone who supports violating the copyright laws warrants a red stoplight icon, wouldn’t that mean that those who deny fair use would also rate such an icon? I can just imagine how much the RIAA would *howl* if their site rated such a warning…
“…this site has been found to promote violations of the copyright act, and therefore bears a red traffic light icon…”
What's missing
My favorite part: What’s wrong with this familiar-sounding phrase?
“The proposal follows the principle that sites are innocent until guilty…”
PROVEN… that’s the missing word… PROVEN. But it’s not part of the proposal… no proving, thanks.
I’d also wager that there’s more missing language…
“If a site has ignored a number of takedown requests…”
ought to add, “… or finds them without merit…” But somehow, I don’t think that’s the case.
Or.. they could do what reasonable, rational netizens do to educate people, they build their own bloody extension, that people can choose to use. i’m sure someone, somewhere would use it.
Playing devil's advocate...
I know that it’s popular around here to slam on the RIAA, but honestly, I don’t think this idea is that bad.
Consider that in a truly free market, all market participants have total knowledge. Now consider that in a real market, knowledge is limited. This is an attempt to add knowledge to the market place, and more knowledge is not a bad thing.
What they want to do is put a scarlet letter on infringing sights, but that won’t work out the way they intend. Other people rightly point out that the red light will act like a gigantic beacon, drawing in “freetards”.
If they instead chose to put just green lights next to Certified Content Creator Friendly web sites, they would avoid drawing undue attention to infringing sites while simultaneously informing consumers.
Re: Playing devil's advocate...
How about they just advertise their special website like everyone else: buy an ad on TV.
Geez. It’s not like they need to wait for the SuperBowl.
Re: Re: Playing devil's advocate...
I don’t think you quite get it. It’s not about the RIAA making their own special web site. It’s about providing consumers with information about whether a web site properly licenses the material on it.
Re: Re: Re: Playing devil's advocate...
you mean it is about forcing a company to deface their own product with markings created by a third party with no liability or transparency.
“hey google! change your layout and process this ever-changing list we will send you to make accusations about the legality of other people’s content! What? why would we pay you to do this random thing we desire?”
Re: Playing devil's advocate...
If they instead chose to put just green lights next to Certified Content Creator Friendly web sites,
You mean like questioncopyright’s Creator Endorsed marks?
Red lighting
On further thought, maybe allowing the content industry to ‘flag’ a suspected site of containing/harboring alleged infringing material could be a good thing for everyone. What if, Google CHARGES whomever/whatever $1 million to ‘flag’ an offending site – each and every time. You want to flag a site? It’ll cost you! And, giving them that particular avenue of approach, the ‘offending’ sites get to sue said company should the truth be anything other.
How long until someone aggregates all those “red lights” sites and allows you to search through them? A day? A week? The people in the music industry really don’t understand technology, do they?
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8 minutes?
I was under the impression that a mere accusation wasn’t enough, under british common law (which is still used, albeit in diluted form, in the UK and most former UK colonies)
wow!
They want to help people find pirated mp3s by waving a big red flag over the URL? Thanks recording industry interweb-guys!
Google should sue
Google should sue the music industry insiders for copyright infringement for using the google logos in their FUD campaign.
How long would it take until all sites are red?
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week, a day?
Wouldn’t that make them easier to find? lol
Non-legislative
Non-legislative, therefore non-compulsory 🙂
I wonder if they paid Google a copyright fee to use those images before they added trafic lights on them?
Sigh. I heard this idea months ago – I can’t believe the UK music industry still think that this is a) workable and b) a good idea.
Typical backwards-looking UK music industry still hasn’t realised that the web is worldwide.
What’s the point in spending millions implementing this ridiculous scheme on google.co.uk, if I can bypass the traffic lights entirely by acessing google in another country?
Also, browser plug-ins like MAFIAAfire or Gee! No Evil would easily remove these changes.
I want my site to be a RED SITE.maybe they will think all of my art i have posted for free is red site stuff that way we can be a red site.
BOYCOTT ALL GREEN SITES !!!
I see the RIAA is also taking the opportunity to push their licensed not sold rhetoric. When I buy a CD, there’s no licensing involved, and unlicensed is not a synonym for infringing. Also, infringing is a not a noun, the media itself cannot be “infringing”, the act of making an illegal copy is what is infringing.
I wonder what would happen to music industry sales figures if we all stopped talking about music, stopped singing along to the lyrics, stopped sharing mix tapes, stopped telling each other about new and cool bands we’ve discovered? Would be an interesting experiment. I think we should do what the industry wants. Stop promoting their product and watch their share prices crash.
Let’s see:
Youtube: Red site
Dailymotion: Red site
fanfiction dot net: Red site
DeviantArt: Red site
Wikipedia: Red site (They stole copyrighted material without permission)
Hulu: Green site
Netflix: Green site.
Copyright is nothing but protection of materialism. Get rid of your internet right now and start asking Jesus into your heart and read the bible.
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Congratulations, you just killed the Chewbacca defense.
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Hulu: Dead site
Netflix: Dead site
FTFY.
Money is ruining the Internet, taking illusion of freedom away, and giving power to the elite.
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I disagree totally. The internet is a communication platform – just because I can buy goods over the phone network by calling a shop, doesn’t mean the phone system is fucked.
If anything, the internet gives the comman person more power, people now know more about what their government is doing for example.
There are also more ‘little’ people making a good living without having to be a wage slave to some faceless corporation.
In my book, this adds up to a more powerful, more informed and wealthier populace.
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Huh?
Might as well put little signs saying Free Music click here! So soon we’ll have .xxx domains, pointing us to pron, and little red dots pointing us to music. The future looks bright.
Just who the f*** do they think will pay for this? it would require a huge amount of manpower to simply check the status of each site. Who also pays for dealing with complaints? Besides which, it simply would not work – within a week there would be plugins for chrome / firefox that disable it!
what are they saying here are the sites that offer free downloads I can see the headlines now.
FIFTY MILLION PEOPLE RUN A RED LIGHT on the internet.
Quote:
Source: http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/07/stop-red-site-copyright-group-proposes-traffic-light-search-ticks.ars
And there you have it folks, things that wasn’t suppose to do things get expanded to include more things. So when anyone tells you that COICA or ACTA or any other nonsense like that will not be used in some way you can bet it will be used in the future to do everything they said it wouldn’t be used to.
Quote:
They don’t want consumer advocates on that panel ever apparently since they forgot to mention those who try to protect the people.
Source: http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/07/stop-red-site-copyright-group-proposes-traffic-light-search-ticks.ars
Quote:
Source: http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/07/stop-red-site-copyright-group-proposes-traffic-light-search-ticks.ars
Translation “We are already thinking of ways on how to use that to block websites that are accused, without caring if the website is actually innocent or not, and we will use this to force ridiculously pricey contracts on others or they face being labeled illegal websites”.
On the bright side who cares, I don’t, most of music piracy happens on legal sites anyways since piracy for music have dropped dramatically is obvious that people found other ways to find that music and they are not paying for it LoL
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Translation “We are already thinking of ways on how to use that to block websites that are accused, without caring if the website is actually innocent or not, and we will use this to force ridiculously pricey contracts on others or they face being labeled illegal websites”.
This is exactly why it’s proposed. It’s step one on the master plan towards censoring the pages.
If you can id them, it’s not hard to censor them. You can hear it now, “Google knows which pages are hosting infringing content, just look at the red lights! It’s their duty to prevent lawlessness and blatant disregard to IP on the interwebs!”
This is an excellent opportunity for Google. Google can Charge a fee to the Music Industry to implement this service (there costs + 3000%). The end user’s benefits also as they see which sites are worth going to.
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yep the ones with a red light?
Simpler method
Assuming you agree to their bullshit, there is a simpler way than using ignored DMCA takedowns.
Just have a whitelist of approved sites, based on the PRS own knowldge of licensensing deals. All other sites are therefore unlicensed.
Or is that too simple for the idiots at PRS?
(Yes yes I know that all of this is secondary to putting in place a good business model, not sueing the fans etc)
Hmmm....
By their illustration, did they just appropriate Google’s intellectual property without licensing it? Someone’s in for a red light!
Also, I like how the traffic lights are to the left, while all other Google/AV icons are to the right. Don’t want to get jumbled in with everyone else’s information; this is important to know this arbitrary status.
If they know what sites are infringing
If they know which sites are infringing, then why don’t they use their draconian laws to simply get those sites shut down.
Why are they always so focused on links. Enablers. Facilitators. Why harm innocent people. Why not just go directly after the pirates?
Why extradite a kid who ran a site that is legal in his own country, just because he LINKED to some videos? How many other sites link to those videos? If you simply got rid of the site HOSTING the videos, then the sites that link to them wouldn’t matter anymore.
It’s like trying to get rid of signs that say “The Crack House is located on 123 Maple St.”. If you get rid of the crack house, then all of the signs that direct people to it become irrelevant.
These people are not very bright.
Don’t they have the draconian laws to just shut down the hosting sites? Don’t they own enough governments that will do whatever they say? Oh, but it must be the links that actually matter.
how do i enlarge graphic? it is not full size and clicking on it doesnt work
The only acceptable trade off is see is that the Music Industry would in return put red lights on all records they release that suck