As part of our on-going push to ensure Nintendo content is shared across social media channels in an appropriate and safe way, we became a YouTube partner and as such in February 2013 we registered our copyright content in the YouTube database. For most fan videos this will not result in any changes, however, for those videos featuring Nintendo-owned content, such as images or audio of a certain length, adverts will now appear at the beginning, next to or at the end of the clips. We continually want our fans to enjoy sharing Nintendo content on YouTube, and that is why, unlike other entertainment companies, we have chosen not to block people using our intellectual property.

For more information please visit http://www.youtube.com/yt/copyright/faq.html

I think filing claims against LPers is backwards. Video games aren’t like movies or TV. Each play-through is a unique audiovisual experience. When I see a film that someone else is also watching, I don’t need to see it again. When I see a game that someone else is playing, I want to play that game for myself! Sure, there may be some people who watch games rather than play them, but are those people even gamers?

My viewers watch my gameplay videos for three main reasons:

1. To hear my commentary/review.
2. To learn about the game and how to play certain parts.
3. To see how I handle and react to certain parts of the game.

Since I started my gaming channel, I’ve played a lot of games. I love Nintendo, so I’ve included their games in my line-up. But until their claims are straightened out, I won’t be playing their games. I won’t because it jeopardizes my channel’s copyright standing and the livelihood of all LPers.

Forty five years ago Judge Lumbard of the United States Court of Appeals for this circuit called a case a "Frankenstein monster posing as a class action." ... The description fits the class aspects of this case.

The putative class consists every person and entity in the world who own infringed copyrighted works, who have or will register them with U.S. Copyright Office as required, whose works fall into either two categories: they were subject of infringement which was blocked by YouTube after notice, but suffered additional infringement through subsequent uploads (the "repeat infringement class"), or are musical compositions which defendants tracked, monetized or identified and allowed to be used without proper authorization (the "music publisher class"). Plaintiffs assert that there are "at least thousands of class members" the Repeat Infringement Class, and "hundreds" in the Music Publisher Class...

Here to make resolutions which advance the litigation will require the court to determine, for each copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed, whether a copyright holder gave notices containing sufficient information to permit the service provider to identify and locate the infringing material so that it could be taken down. That requires individualized evidence. Further, the analysis required to determine "fair use," and other defenses, is necessarily specific to the individual case.

Viacom's argument that the volume of material and "the absence of record evidence that would allow a jury to decide which clips-in-suit were specifically known to senior YouTube executives" (Viacom Opp. pp. 9-10) combine to deprive YouTube of the statutory safe harbor, is extravagant. If, as plaintiffs assert, neither side can determine the presence or absence of specific infringements because of the volume of material, that merely demonstrates the wisdom of the legislative requirement that it be the owner of the copyright, or his agent, who identifies the infringement by giving the service provider notice. 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3)(A). The system is entirely workable: in 2007 Viacom itself gave such notice to YouTube of infringements by some 100,000 videos, which were taken down by YouTube by the next business day. See 718 F. Supp. 2d 514 at 524.

Thus, the burden of showing that YouTube knew or was aware of the specific infringements of the works in suit cannot be shifted to YouTube to disprove. Congress has determined that the burden of identifying what must be taken down is to be on the copyright owner, a determination which has proven practicable in practice.

Here, the examples proffered by plaintiffs (to which they claim YouTube was willfully blind) give at most information that infringements were occurring with particular works, and occasional indications of promising areas to locate and remove them. The specific locations of infringements are not supplied: at most, an area of search is identified, and YouTube is left to find the infringing clip. As stated in UMG Recordings v. Shelter Capital Partners, LLC, No. 10-55732, 2013 WL 1092793, at *12 (9th Cir. Mar. 14, 2013) ("UMG III"),

Although the parties agree, in retrospect, that at times there was infringing material available on Veoh's services, the DMCA recognizes that service providers who do not locate and remove infringing materials they do not specifically know of should not suffer the loss of safe harbor protection.

The Karim memorandum states that infringing clips of some well-known shows "can still be found," but does not identify the specific clips he saw or where he found them. The Wilkens declaration submitted by plaintiffs asserts that there were over 450 such clips on YouTube at the time, and presumably some of them contained the infringing matter seen by Mr. Karim. To find them would require YouTube to locate and review over 450 clips. The DMCA excuses YouTube from doing that search. Under § 512(m), nothing in the applicable section of the DMCA shall be construed to require YouTube's "affirmatively seeking the facts indicating infringing activity."

Mr. Karim's memorandum does not tie his observations to any specific clips. Application of the principle of willful blindness to his memorandum thus does not produce knowledge or awareness of infringement of specific clips-in-suit, out of the 450 available candidates. Nor does any other example tendered by plaintiffs.

YouTube's decision to restrict its monitoring efforts to certain groups of infringing clips, like its decisions "to restrict access to its proprietary search mechanisms," do not exclude it from the safe harbor, regardless of their motivation.

YouTube enters into agreements with certain music copyright owners to allow use of their sound recordings and musical compositions.

In exchange for this, some of these music copyright owners require us to handle videos containing their sound recordings and/or musical works in ways that differ from the usual processes on YouTube. Under these contracts, we may be required to remove specific videos from the site, block specific videos in certain territories, or prevent specific videos from being reinstated after a counter notification. In some instances, this may mean the Content ID appeals and/or counter notification processes will not be available. Your account will not be penalized at this time.

The type of generalized guesswork that Viacom engages in bears no resemblance to the showing of specific knowledge of clips-in-suit that the Second Circuit demanded.

It is not Viacom's burden to prove specific knowledge or awareness. That factual issue is relevant only to the affirmative defense that YouTube is asserting; knowledge of specific infringements is not an element of Viacom's copyright infringement claims against YouTube. At trial, it will be enough for Viacom to prove that the clips-in-suit were on the website, along with some other elements of infringement liability.

Viacom does not even try to make the showing of clip-specific knowledge required by the Second Circuit’s ruling. It instead reverses course and claims that it is YouTube’s burden to affirmatively establish its lack of knowledge as to each specific clip-in-suit. Viacom’s novel burden-shifting argument is wrong. It is contrary to the Second Circuit’s decision, all the case law, and the structure of the DMCA itself. Viacom also ignores the record. YouTube has identified more than sufficient evidence of its lack of knowledge of infringement— including the very fact that the voluminous record in this case contains no evidence of such knowledge. Viacom’s inability to offer any evidence from which a jury could find that YouTube had actual or red-flag knowledge of even a single clip-in-suit requires that summary judgment be entered in YouTube’s favor.

We do not find persuasive UMG’s effort to reconcile the internal contradictions its reading of the statute creates by positing that Congress must have meant § 512(c) to protect only “web hosting” services. Web hosts “host” websites on their servers, thereby “mak[ing] storage resources available to website operators.” The thrust of UMG’s argument seems to be that web hosts do not undertake the sorts of accessibility-facilitating functions that Veoh does, and thus the services they perform “fit within the ordinary meaning of ‘storage,’” and thereby “harmoniz[e]” with the notice and takedown procedures. UMG’s theory fails to account for the reality that web hosts, like Veoh, also store user-submitted materials in order to make those materials accessible to other Internet users. The reason one has a website is so that others may view it. As amici note, these access activities define web hosting – if the web host only stored information for a single user, it would be more aptly described as an online back-up service.

As an initial matter, contrary to UMG’s contentions, there are many music videos that could in fact legally appear on Veoh. “Among the types of videos subject to copyright protection but lawfully available on Veoh’s system were videos with music created by users and videos that Veoh provided pursuant to arrangements it reached with major copyright holders, such as SonyBMG.” Further, Congress’ express intention that the DMCA “facilitate making available quickly and conveniently via the Internet . . . movies, music, software, and literary works” – precisely the service Veoh provides – makes us skeptical that UMG’s narrow interpretation of § 512(c) is plausible. S. Rep. No. 105-190, at 8. Finally, if merely hosting material that falls within a category of content capable of copyright protection, with the general knowledge that one’s services could be used to share unauthorized copies of copyrighted material, was sufficient to impute knowledge to service providers, the § 512(c) safe harbor would be rendered a dead letter: § 512(c) applies only to claims of copyright infringement, yet the fact that a service provider’s website could contain copyrightable material would remove the service provider from § 512(c) eligibility.

Copyright holders know precisely what materials they own, and are thus better able to efficiently identify infringing copies than service providers like Veoh, who cannot readily ascertain what material is copyrighted and what is not.

Of course, a service provider cannot willfully bury its head in the sand to avoid obtaining such specific knowledge. See Viacom Int’l v. YouTube.... Even viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to UMG as we must here, however, we agree with the district court there is no evidence that Veoh acted in such a manner. Rather, the evidence demonstrates that Veoh promptly removed infringing material when it became aware of specific instances of infringement. Although the parties agree, in retrospect, that at times there was infringing material available on Veoh’s services, the DMCA recognizes that service providers who do not locate and remove infringing materials they do not specifically know of should not suffer the loss of safe harbor protection.

From his post: "An entity going the vague but all-encompassing name of "Music Publishing Rights Collecting Society" has made a number of claims on various uploads."

That's not an entity. If YouTube generated that message it's because Content ID identified compositions in the upload to which a portion of the rights may be administered by any one of a number of collecting societies. Our message in these cases now reads "one or more music publishing rights collecting societies" to make this clearer -- that Facebook parody page doesn't help though. Help Center Page is here with the details.

Now that Agora has a "hook" in the video, all it has to do is choose the "monetize" option that Youtube provides, sit back and wait for the video to get views, with a big chunk of the money going to Agora. The reality of the situation is one of annoyance, rather than actual harm, in most cases. The other unfortunate reality is that this sort of low-level trolling on gameplay videos is nothing new. "Companies" using the names IMG Media UK, INgroove, and Netcom have also filed bogus claims in the past.

The bad news is this sort of thing will probably always exist, especially in the case of gameplay videos. Gameplay videos exist in a legal gray area. For the most part, game companies are more than happy to let these serve as free advertising, knowing that watching a video can hardly replace the experience of actually playing the game. (One exception that proves the rule: Sega's massive takedown of anything "Shining Force"-related in "preparation" for the release of a new game in the series.) Some companies even allow uploaders to monetize gameplay videos, provided a portion of the earnings flows back to the developer.

Because of this gray area, many gamers will feel they can't challenge Agora's claim since they themselves do not "own" what they've uploaded. Even if it seems dubious and faintly scammy, the slim possibility that Agora actually exists and has a legitimate claim is enough to deter them from disputing it.

This isn't limited solely to video game footage. An entity going the vague but all-encompassing name of "Music Publishing Rights Collecting Society" has made a number of claims on various uploads. Here's its bio (in full) from its "official" website, which is a Facebook page. (The URL listed on its Facebook page sends you to... MPRCS's Facebook page.)

"Our mission is to file copyright claims so that ads will be placed onto certain videos, and we will be able to make money off of them. We do not seek to have anyone's videos blocked in certain countries or disabled altogether, all we are trying to do is make a bit of money. That's not so bad, is it?"

They identified my (completely original) song as infringing the copyright of a completely different song that I had never heard of, that I had to search google for, which turned out to be some kind of trance remix of a completely unrelated song…Wtf?

I immediately disputed the claim and received an email from Youtube saying:

“Dear tibetanpunk,

Music Publishing Rights Collecting Society has reviewed your dispute and released its copyright claim on your video, “Sonic Sunset No.2“.” (shameless plug)

So how do collecting societies affect you as a YouTube user? If you’ve ever received a notice indicating that one of your videos may include copyrighted content administered by "Music Publishing Rights Collecting Society," or “one or more music publishing rights collecting societies,” it means that YouTube's Content ID system identified one or more musical compositions within your video to which a portion of the rights may be administered by a collecting society.

Even if Agora Aggregator goes down, and Digital Minds Entertainment follows, more will pop up to take their place. The system (such as it is) seems to have the success rate of an untargeted mass mailing -- low enough to be almost negligible, but still high enough to make it a worthwhile venture.

Youtube can't do much to prevent this abuse. It has to err on the side of the rights holders, even if the rights holders don't actually hold the rights. This is a necessity. It allows it to show it takes proactive steps against infringement, a requirement in order to benefit from the Safe Harbor protections. The other issue is the massive volume it deals with -- 72 hours uploaded every minute -- which makes it impossible to police uploads with any level of detail. The system is exploitable, and the people behind these "companies" know it.

Since it can't be stopped, the only method left to battle these trolling "companies" is to expose them as quickly (and loudly) as possible. This is only a stopgap, rather than a solution. What's happening now is mostly an annoyance. The real problems will develop later when uploaders being challenging legitimate claims, assuming them to be invalid, and have their accounts closed down. In essence, Agora (and others) are the boy who cried wolf. Only this time, when the real wolf arrives, it will be the townspeople that suffer.

The fan video of the wreck on the final lap of today’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race was blocked on YouTube out of respect for those injured in today’s accident. Information on the status of those fans was unclear and the decision was made to err on the side of caution with this very serious incident.—Steve Phelps, NASCAR Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer

GEMA went on to sue YouTube in a 2010 test case for distributing copyrighted material without permission — holding it responsible for copyrighted material uploaded by its users. Then in April last year a German court ruled that YouTube must install software filters to prevent users uploading content whose rights GEMA holds.

Die Welt reports that GEMA wants the German Patent and Trademark Office to arbitrate on whether its proposed rate of 0.375 cents per stream is appropriate — but YouTube is arguing for a lower rate.

A Hamburg court is already arbitrating another row between GEMA and YouTube over how the platform should be defined. GEMA claims that YouTube is a content provider whose business model is built on content that is subject to royalties. YouTube, on the other hand, says it is a hosting service which simply makes space available to its users.

GEMA is demanding that YouTube take down the on-screen notice blocking music videos in Germany that blames GEMA for the impasse. In November last year, GEMA head Harald Heker accused YouTube of deliberately misleading German users with the notice.

"The notice about GEMA is being posted wilfully, purely to stir opinion," he told WirtschaftsWoche magazine at the time. "YouTube is trying to awaken the false impression that the failure to license is GEMA's responsibility. That is simply wrong."

YouTube believes that rights holders and artists should benefit from their work. We have dozens of collection society deals in place across more than 45 countries because we provide an important source of income for musicians and a platform where new artists can be discovered and promoted. Music labels are generating hundreds of millions of dollars on YouTube every year. Artists, composers, authors, publishers, and record labels in Germany are missing this opportunity as a result of GEMA’s decisions. We remain committed to finding a solution with GEMA compatible with YouTube’s business model so that we can again provide a source of revenue for musicians and a vibrant platform for music lovers in Germany.

The French minister said: "No actor can jeopardise the digital ecosystem in a unilateral way."

YouTube sent the Observatory an email on Sunday that said its channels "syrianhro" and "almrsd" had "violated the policy of the site by publishing shocking and offensive videos," the Britain-based watchdog said.

The Observatory, which disseminates graphic videos on YouTube of atrocities from the bloody civil war the UN says has killed more than 60,000 people, condemned the closure.

"This is the second time in two months that the site administration has closed the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights channel," it said in a statement, in reference specifically to almrsd.

Millions of French netizens discover their YouTube streams sputter and die or never begin in the first place. Other video services, including TF1, are also struggling. The effect varies, sometimes randomly and sometimes by time of day. Respected consumer organization UFC-Que Choisir found between 20% and 50% of users surveyed online had problems.

Again, the existing connection remains and much of the traffic gets through. But Net traffic always grows and without regularly adding additional capacity many - not all - streams are blocked. French networks, with France Telecom in the lead, are refusing to accept growing traffic from Cogent, a major backbone carrier that services Google. They demand payment to accept all the streams their customers request. The independent French competition authority (Autorite de la concurrence) on September 20 approved the charging plan, leaving no doubt this is neutrality dispute.

A ban on YouTube, which Pakistan imposed after an anti-Islam video caused riots in much of the Muslim world, was lifted Saturday, only to be reinstated — after three minutes — when it was discovered that blasphemous material was still available on the site.

The Nation’s report gave a sense of how famous Mr. Nazir managed to become, despite the ban on the video-sharing site in his home country: “Around 250 people, including local politicians met him at the airport, showering him with rose petals and chanting ‘Long Live One Pound Fish!’ while TV networks interrupted coverage of the fifth anniversary of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto’s assassination to show his return live.”

Users have always had the ability to dispute Content ID claims on their videos if they believe those claims are invalid. Prior to today, if a content owner rejected that dispute, the user was left with no recourse for certain types of Content ID claims (e.g., monetize claims). Based upon feedback from our community, today we're introducing an appeals process that gives eligible users a new choice when dealing with a rejected dispute. When the user files an appeal, a content owner has two options: release the claim or file a formal DMCA notification.

“We’ve improved the algorithms that identify potentially invalid claims. We stop these claims from automatically affecting user videos and place them in a queue to be manually reviewed.”

But what he meant to say was that some of the automatic matches will be sent to be reviewed “by the content owner” — not by Google

[Lily] Dionne was one of about 79 cast and crew who say they were "grossly misled" when they answered casting calls on Craigslist, Backstage magazine and other publications in July 2011 for a film that was described as "an historical Arabian Desert adventure."

But from the beginning, Dionne said the cast and crew had questions, including why the central character in a period piece had a Western name.

"We did wonder what it was about. They kept saying George. And we were like, 'This is the Middle East 2,000 years ago. Who's George?'" she said.

In a 17-page complaint filed Wednesday in Los Angeles Superior Court, the lawsuit from Cindy Lee Garcia also names YouTube LLC, the video-sharing website on which the video is posted, and its parent company, Google Inc., as causing irreparable harm to Ms. Garcia for refusing to remove the content from their site.

"The lawsuit is not an attack on the First Amendment or the right of Americans to say what they think," but it demands the content be pulled off because "Ms. Garcia in no way consented to the use of her performance, image or likeness in such an offensive and file film," Garcia's attorney, M. Cris Armenta, said in a statement.

"We work hard to create a community everyone can enjoy and which also enables people to express different opinions," YouTube said by e-mail. "This can be a challenge because what's OK in one country can be offensive elsewhere.

This video -- which is widely available on the Web -- is clearly within our guidelines and so will stay on YouTube. However, given the very difficult situation in Libya and Egypt we have temporarily restricted access in both countries."

While I understand why YouTube is doing this, I think it's misguided for two reasons. First, stupid and hateful as the video in question reportedly is, blocking access (potentially seen as taking it down in Egypt and Libya) can be interpreted to mean that the fault for what's happening is in part with the video itself. It isn't. The guilt for this violence is not in some stupid video. It isn't even in the massive protests in the Muslim world against the video (though I'd probably suggest they learn about the Streisand Effect). The guilt for the violence and death belongs on the thugs and murderers who committed it. End of story. This is especially true when the company has acknowledged itself that the video does not violate YouTube's terms of service.

The EFF agrees.

It is easy to understand why YouTube might feel compelled to act in response to the rioting over this video, especially after three U.S. embassy employees were killed in the Libyan city of Benghazi, but the blame for the violence lies not with the video, but with the perpetrators. Once YouTube has made the decision to pro-actively censor its content, they start down a slippery slope that ends in YouTube Knows Best moral policing of every video on their site. It is disappointing to see YouTube turn its back on policies that have allowed it to become a such a strong platform for freedom of expression. We hope that this new-found enthusiasm for pro-active censorship is a temporary aberration rather than a sign of things to come.

Among all adults, radio remains the most popular tool, with 48 percent saying that's how they usually discover their new jams. But more teens, 64 percent, cited YouTube, the Web's leading video-sharing site, as a place where they listen to music. Followed by radio (56%), iTunes (53% ) and CDs (50%).

The popularity of YouTube is dramatically higher among teens than all adults. Only 7 percent of all respondents said they discover music most frequently through the site.

Again, probably not the kind of statistics you'd exactly consider jaw-dropping. But let's think about this for a moment. If the jump between those that utilize evil YouTube the most to discover new music (for which they'll potentially buy either music, concert tickets, etc.) is from 7% of the total population and 64% of the teenage population, that indicates to me that the real transition in how we discover new music as an entire population has only just begun. And, if the music labels want to continue to fight against YouTube rather than utilize it, they appear to be ill-prepared for what is a statistical tidal wave that these teenagers will represent when they become paying adults and have children of their own. Failing to embrace YouTube as a promotional tool and fighting against that kind of tsunami is akin to...well...fighting against a friggin' tsunami!

From the CNN article we also learn this:

Strangely, the report doesn't address teens' listening habits on music-streaming sites such as Pandora, Spotify or Grooveshark.

And that's a mistake. If YouTube is the trend for this generation of teenagers, there is a very real likelihood that the next trend is going to be either those music-streaming sites, or others very much like it. That is, of course, if the music labels don't continue to try to kill them as well. 

But the point remains: people will use new internet services to discover new music. This represents a boon for music as a whole, and could represent the same for the major labels, but only if they stop fighting the tide and instead ride the wave.

 

Content ID, by contrast, is an opaque and proprietary system where the accuser can serve as the judge, jury, and executioner. Worse, the person whose speech is being silenced has little recourse. The Content ID system tips whatever balance is present in the DMCA and allows even more pernicious forms of manipulation and abuse. In a Wired column earlier this year, Andy Baio enumerated some of the problems that YouTube users encounter:

But there has been a dramatic rise in Content ID abuse in the past couple of years, wielded in ways never intended. Scammers are using Content ID to steal ad revenue from YouTube video creators en masse, with some companies claiming content they don’t own deliberately or not. The inability to understand context and parody regularly leads to “fair use” videos getting blocked, muted or monetized.

But even without taking scammers into account, the premise behind Content ID is just incompatible with fair use and the public domain. It's impossibly complicated to define in a set of "business rules" for automated enforcement. Allowing Content ID robots to apply the rules leads to oversimplification that chills legitimate speech.

But in accommodating the demands of large copyright holders, YouTube has inadvertently reminded us all of the crucial point that flagging copyright infringement isn't nearly as simple as it is often portrayed by rightsholders. Even scanning videos for exact content matches that exceed certain thresholds (in order to preserve at least some fair uses) actually fails in all sorts of interesting ways.

Rather than acting as a neutral arbitrator between major content companies and independent organizations, YouTube's system favors the larger rightsholders that make use of its Content ID system over smaller creators. And because it's a private system that goes beyond the DMCA, the Content ID system is under no legal obligation to comply with the DMCA's safeguards and timelines.

Whatever Google's motivations, it should come as no surprise that the users—and providers—of such tools get pretty annoyed when they are blocked. Through PaidContent, we learn of a petition to Google launched by the founder of YouTube-MP3.org, asking the company to allow third-party recording tools. The petition, which is nearly at its goal of a million signatures, makes the case that this is how things have always been:

For decades people were allowed to take a private copy of a public broadcast. You could record the radio program with a cassette recorder or make a copy of your favorite movie by using a video recorder. All these techniques have been opposed heavily in its early years by the big media companies who didn't want the public to have such technology. They did describe such technology as criminal and as a threat to their business.

Several years later history is about to repeat: Google has teamed up with the RIAA to make the same claims against all sorts of online recording tools for their 21th century broadcasting service: YouTube ("Broadcast yourself"). Google is taking action against nearly every service that enables its users to create a private copy of a public YouTube broadcast while the RIAA is threatening news media like CNet for promoting such a software.

While I agree with the purpose of the petition, I actually think this description misses the mark. The real point is that recording is still entirely possible. With everything from screen capture software and programs like AudioHijack to the good old fashioned analog hole (where you could still use those same VCRs and cassette tapes if you wanted) there is just no way to stop it, which makes sense, because the simple fact is that the data is being transmitted to your computer. Your computer may be instructed to discard it soon after, and to not make it obvious where it's storing it in the mean time, but that data is still there and gets copied several times on the way from the server to your screen—it's just a matter of capturing and retaining one of those copies. Meanwhile, services like YouTube-MP3.org are not quite recording devices: rather than capture the data at the rate it is delivered to your computer for playback, they bypass the streaming interface to obtain a full copy of the source file. This is a technical distinction, but an important one—and it has potential legal implications, since the one way such a service could be seen to violate copyright law is under the anti-circumvention clause of the DMCA.

That said, the fact that recording will always be possible highlights the silliness of blocking such tools and of anti-circumvention laws in general. The fact is that YouTube is making this data publicly available, and their servers obediently deliver the files. Blacklisting particular sites and citing "terms of service" is a weak response, and at its core is rather similar to websites that claim you need permission to link to them or to display them in an iframe within another website. Google knows as well as anyone that one of the true sources of the internet's potential is the ability to build on top of other services, and to build new services around other sources of data, so it's disappointing to see them block tools like this. Hopefully the growing response from users will spur them to rethink their position.

It is possible to use a banana to rob a bank.  It is also possible to use a phone to defraud people of millions of dollars.  But we do not make possession of a banana or the use of a phone illegal.  We make bank robbery and fraud illegal.  We do not outlaw bananas and phones because bananas and phones serve any number of socially useful services.  It would be dumb to outlaw them just because someone could use them in a bad way.

That’s why the test that the Supreme Court identified in the famous Betamax case is so useful.  As long as a technology is capable of “substantial noninfringing uses” we welcome it.  Because those substantial noninfringing uses are great to have, and we cannot stop innovation just because it can sometimes be abused.

We noticed that government agencies from different countries would sometimes ask us to remove political content that our users had posted on our services. We hoped this was an aberration. But now we know it’s not.

This is the fifth data set that we’ve released. And just like every other time before, we’ve been asked to take down political speech. It’s alarming not only because free expression is at risk, but because some of these requests come from countries you might not suspect—Western democracies not typically associated with censorship.

For example, in the second half of last year, Spanish regulators asked us to remove 270 search results that linked to blogs and articles in newspapers referencing individuals and public figures, including mayors and public prosecutors. In Poland, we received a request from a public institution to remove links to a site that criticized it. We didn’t comply with either of these requests.

Brazil: In December, we received an electoral court order that resulted in the removal of four orkut profiles for content related to political campaigns.

Canada: We received a request from the Passport Canada office to remove a YouTube video of a Canadian citizen urinating on his passport and flushing it down the toilet. We did not comply with this request.

Pakistan: We received a request from the Government of Pakistan's Ministry of Information Technology to remove six YouTube videos that satirized the Pakistan Army and senior politicians. We did not comply with this request.

Poland: We received a request from the Polish Agency for Enterprise Development to remove a search result that criticized the agency as well as eight more that linked to it. We did not comply with this request.

Spain: We received 14 requests from the Spanish Data Protection Authority to remove 270 search results that linked to blogs and sites referencing individuals and public figures. The Spanish Data Protection Authority also ordered the removal of three blogs published on Blogger and three videos hosted on YouTube. We did not comply with these requests.

United States: We received a request from a local law enforcement agency to remove a blog because of a post that allegedly defamed a law enforcement official in a personal capacity. We did not comply with this request, which we have categorized in this Report as a defamation request.

We received a request from a local law enforcement agency to remove 1,400 YouTube videos for alleged harassment. We did not comply with this request. Separately, we received a request from a different local law enforcement agency to remove five user accounts that allegedly contained threatening and/or harassing content. We terminated four of the accounts, which resulted in the removal of approximately 300 videos, but did not remove the remaining account with 54 videos.

We received a court order to remove 218 search results that linked to allegedly defamatory websites. We removed 25% of the results cited in the request.