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Google Continues To Try To Appease Hollywood, Though It Is Unlikely To Ever Be Enough

Overhype

from the because-of-course-not dept

Fri, Oct 17th 2014 01:44pm -

Google has come out with the latest version of its “How Google Fights Piracy” report (pdf link), going to great lengths to show how the company goes above and beyond what is required by law to try to drive people to authorized copies of content while also increasing opportunities for content creators to monetize their own content. There really aren’t too many surprises in the report — it just looks like an extension of what they’ve said in the past. The company is apparently about to roll out an update to its program that “downranks” certain sites based on how many DMCA notices it gets — something that’s been a huge point of contention from the RIAA and MPAA. In effect Google is basically saying to the major music and movie companies: you guys still haven’t figured out how to optimize your content for search engines (like nearly everyone else online) so, fuck it, we’ll do it for you if you’ll just stop these ridiculous accusations. Of course, it’s unlikely to work.

Just this week James Murdoch insisted, incorrectly, that search engines love piracy because it brings them revenue. This has never made any sense at all, but it’s a myth that flows through the legacy entertainment industry. How Google actually makes any money from those links is never explained, because there isn’t an answer. And the question of why the industry doesn’t do a better job getting its own content more highly ranked is ignored as well.

And, of course, there’s a real risk that by strengthening the “signalling” power of DMCA notices, what Google is really doing is giving the legacy players a tool for search engine “de-optimization”, so that rather than improving their own offerings, they now have every incentive in the world to just file a bunch of DMCA notices against sites they don’t like. This is why there’s reasonable fear from many that this new move by Google will actually lead to an increase in bogus DMCA notices that result in legitimate content being censored.

But, here’s the thing: as we said when Google first came out with this report, it will never be enough for the legacy guys in Hollywood. That’s because they incorrectly blame Google for their own inability to adapt to the changing market. They blame their diminishing revenue on Google, and even as Google makes it harder and harder to find unauthorized content, that revenue isn’t going to come back… so they’ll still blame Google. But Google was never the problem. The legacy entertainment industry and its political supporters will continue to point to search results that don’t exist and search terms that are never used as some sort of “proof” because that’s what they do. Rather than adapt, they really just want Google to do things for them. And for whatever reason, Google is doing more and more… and it’s unlikely to ever please the likes of James Murdoch, because Google “not doing things” was never the real problem.

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Comments on “Google Continues To Try To Appease Hollywood, Though It Is Unlikely To Ever Be Enough”

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85 Comments
Median Wilfred says:

Re: Re: Confirmation Bias.

ou forget that none of those films will ever make a net profit.

Yeah, man! Right on! No profit because of Evil Big Search allowing the skiddies to find stolen copies of movies. It’ll be real sad to see Universal, and Warner Brothers and 20th Century Foxes’ quarterly earnings reports, because of Evil Big Search doing contributory copyright stealing! Right on! Preach it, dude!

John Fenderson (profile) says:

Re: Re:

The quality of google’s search results has been declining over the past few years, there’s no question about it. I’ve been trying out various alternative search engines, though, looking for one that is even close to as good as Google’s, but have been unable to find one even with Google’s fall in quality. Which ones do you suggest?

Jim says:

Hollywood won't be happy until...

Google just throws up its arms, and sends out the following press release:

“As of Noon PDT tomorrow, Google will shut down all operations. All servers will cease accepting HTTP requests. This means the immediate cessation of all of Google’s services, search, Drive, GMail, Docs, YouTube, Google+, and including all services operated by Google, either linked from the home page, or hosted as 3rd party services.

We now understand the folly of operating on the Internet, given that the Internet has afflicted untold harm on the Entertainment Industry. The loss of hundred of billions of dollars of lost sales to that industry, and our recognition of how wonderful Hollywood is, has led us to this momentous decision. We regret any inconvenience that this may cause. We will also liquidate all assets to be distributed amonst shareholders.

If there are any questions, please e-mail us at PR@gmail.com, but you better get them in quickly. Thank you.”

Anonymous Coward says:

Re: Re: Re:2 Re:

Google UK policy manager Theo Bertram: “Most people doing piracy are not some guy in his bedroom altruistically sharing music with his friends. It’s people making money out of piracy, and it’s big business: some of these sites have 2m visitors regularly, and they’re not doing a bad business from advertising.”

That One Guy (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:3 Re:

Found a quote myself, from another article on TD, with the quote itself from a report done on the subject.

The Swedish trial of The Pirate Bay trial in 2009 became an occasion for all sorts of competing estimates of revenues. Record industry group IFPI estimated the site’s revenues at $3 million per year. The MPAA described $5 million in revenues. But prosecutors endorsed a much lower number: $170,000 from advertising (against what the defense characterized as $112,000/year in server/bandwidth costs and $100,000 per year in revenue). This is for a site that appears consistently among the top 100 visited sites in the world.

Take those numbers and throw them together, and the profits aren’t that big at all. $170,000 is a hefty sum, but subtract $112,000, and you’re left with $58K over the course of a year, or $4800 per month. For one of the most visited sites on the internet.

Assume for the sake of the argument that all of that is due to piracy(while the Pirate Bay is obviously used for piracy, that’s very much not all it’s used for, but just for the example…), if a site as massive as the Pirate Bay is ‘only’ making $58K in the course of a year, the idea that smaller piracy sites are raking in the cash really doesn’t seem to match up

Reality bites (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:4 Reality never enters the room with the RIAA an MIAA

You are talking about true criminals, they steal from the artists, they steal from the general public, just parasites sucking on the neck vein of mankind.

Joe Rogan, Louis CK etc are all taking the correct route with media distribution, direct to the consumer, no blood sucking parasite stealing from everyone in the middle.
The sooner the riaa and miaa are stomped out of existence the sooner the artists start making more and the consumer pays less.

Anonymous Coward says:

Re: Re: Re:5 Reality never enters the room with the RIAA an MIAA

+1

It’s amazing. The publishers have one job: get content to users. Yet, somehow, they spend most of their time and money preventing that very thing, and it’s a downwards spiral; the more they try to cut illegitimate use, the more people will turn to illegitimate sources. People like Louis CK and Cory Doctorow have realized this, let’s hope more of them will.

Mike Masnick (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:3 Re:

Google UK policy manager Theo Bertram: “Most people doing piracy are not some guy in his bedroom altruistically sharing music with his friends. It’s people making money out of piracy, and it’s big business: some of these sites have 2m visitors regularly, and they’re not doing a bad business from advertising.”

As someone who runs a site that “has 2m visitors regularly” I can tell you that advertising at that level doesn’t pay very much at all.

I find it amusing that people who know nothing about the online advertising business pretend they’re experts in it.

Yes, Google makes money from advertising, but from search advertising, which is quite different from low level network advertising that appears on file sharing sites (no high level advertising program is allowed on those kinds of sites). Network display advertising pays shit. You’re lucky if you can get 10 cent CPMs these days.

Mike Masnick (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:5 Re:

The entire non-retail web economy is based on selling ads. Google, Facebook, everything.

Google makes nearly all of its money on search ads — which are ads that work, because it’s relevant information when people are looking for something. Facebook makes money from knowing a ton about people and now from it’s “promoted” stories. They’re also massive, so even at low rates, they still make tons of money.

Anyone running network ads — which is the case for most everyone else, makes very, very little unless they’re massive in size.

If you don’t understand the difference between network display ads (all that the sites in question can get) and direct sales ads, you shouldn’t be commenting on these issues.

Our network ads (what we run when we can’t sell direct) nets us less than our servers/bandwidth.

Mike Masnick (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:7 Re:

So yes, the entire non-retail web economy is based on ads, and no, you’re not going to post any of your numbers to back up your assertions. Gotcha.

Are you being deliberately obtuse, or do you just not understand basic facts? Most sites do NOT make money on advertising. We among them. A few big sites do. That’s it. Lots of sites have advertising on them, but I assure you the money made from advertising is limited unless you’re doing direct sales. The companies in question are not doing that.

I’m not sure what you think you’re demonstrating here, but I assure you it’s just your own lack of understanding of the nature of internet advertising.

Anonymous Coward says:

Re: Re: Re:10 Re:

I’m not the one here claiming there’s no money in advertising. Are you such a doltish sycophant that you swallow that bullshit?

Masnick says things and then doesn’t back them up. He is nothing but a bullshitter. And I don’t work for the “mafiaa”. I’m someone that thinks Masnick’s lies and the notion that they are then promoted on Google is disgusting. These are horrible people you’re defending. All because they back your piracy habits? Fix your life, dude.

Mike Masnick (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:13 Re:

This site is covered in ads. Masnick claims they make no money. Why have them here then?

This is why discussing these things is so ridiculous when you don’t even understand the basics.

1. There are many different kinds of ads. There are network display ads and direct sold ads (those are just two of a longer list).
2. Network display ads pay shit. Tiny amounts, but are generally what sites will use as what’s called remnant inventory, when you’ve got nothing else.
3. We run display ads when we can’t sell spots directly.
4. Those display ads — which are not “all over the site” pay very little, less than the cost of running our servers.
5. Without them, though, it’s more difficult to sell direct ads, because advertisers can’t see what your ads look like.

I’m not lying. I’m just a hell of a lot more knowledgeable about this shit than you, because I run this site, and you don’t know shit about internet advertising.

Mike Masnick (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:15 Re:

Yeah, I don’t know anything about advertising. Uh huh. Post the numbers, you coward.

1. It would clearly go against the terms of the agreement with our advertising partners to post any numbers — as you would know if you actually knew even the tiniest bit about how online advertising works.

2. Even if we did post our numbers, you wouldn’t stop your crusade against us.

3. I’ve already told you exactly the truth, which is that our network display ads pay for less than our servers.

You still don’t seem to understand the differences in the types of ads that appear on sites. I’m curious why you have this comprehension problem.

Anonymous Coward says:

Re: Re: Re:18 Re:

“9. Confidentiality
You agree not to disclose Google Confidential Information without our prior written consent. “Google Confidential Information” includes: (a) all Google software, technology and documentation relating to the Services; (b) click-through rates or other statistics relating to Property performance as pertaining to the Services; (c) the existence of, and information about, beta features in a Service; and (d) any other information made available by Google that is marked confidential or would normally be considered confidential under the circumstances in which it is presented. Google Confidential Information does not include information that you already knew prior to your use of the Services, that becomes public through no fault of yours, that was independently developed by you, or that was lawfully given to you by a third party. Notwithstanding this Section 9, you may accurately disclose the amount of Google’s gross payments resulting from your use of the Services. “

Gwiz (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re:11 Re:

I’m someone that thinks Masnick’s lies and the notion that they are then promoted on Google is disgusting. These are horrible people you’re defending. All because they back your piracy habits? Fix your life, dude.

Ahhh, I’m guessing you must be Lowery or one of his sycophants.

Still freaking out about the big, scary Google-man, I see. And still claiming that anyone who holds an opposing view to yours is nothing but a slimy pirate to boot.

At least Techdirt isn’t so afraid of dissenting comments that they delete them and ban users like that silly Trichordist site does.

Oh, by the way, Karl has put up a blog to counter the bullshit spewed on the Trichordist since any dissenting argument isn’t allowed over there:

http://tritonester.wordpress.com/

Anonymous Coward says:

What pirate would go to Google to look for stuff? About the only ones this effects are the clueless. Those that go to pirate sites use the software at that place to find what they are looking for and most of them don’t use Google.

Personally I long ago left Google. I dislike their non-privacy TOS and their penchant for loading everything with ads. There are ways around it. I find most everything I seek without Google’s assistance. I am not a fan of Google nor it’s services. Unlike the trolls that come here I don’t beat that drum; it’s a personal choice.

bob (profile) says:

Bull

Please. All it takes is one look at YouTube to understand how GOOG feels about piracy. The artists have three choices:

1) Get short changed on the ad revenues by partnering with the big company that’s given them a deal they can’t refuse.
2) File endless DMCA requests because GOOG can’t seem to use their cool automation to stop people from uploading the same clip again and again
3) Ignore them.

Notice that none of the options actually include sharing many revenues with the people who did the work.

Imagine if GOOG used the same tools to police YouTube as it does to stop scammers from using the Google Compute Engine. On that platform, they want to double check your real identity and so they insist on linking your account to a cell phone which, not surprisingly, tracks your every movement. They’re not going to let idiots have free rein on their computing platform.

But when the idiots are uploading content and making money for GOOG, there are zero impediments. And if we file jump through all of the hoops to file a DMCA request, the piracy appears again. They brag again and again about using their content ID system to pay a fraction of the ad revenue, but somehow they can’t use that same system to file DMCA notices automatically.

Now– all you file “sharing” suckers out there — be prepared for a change. As GOOG starts to get more revenue out of Play, they’re slowly going to start seeing the piracy as a net loser. When that happens, I’m hoping that GOOG will finally start seeing the light and building real partnerships with the hard working artists who create the content that fuels their revenues. But I may be overly optimistic. That revenue at Play may never come along.

That One Guy (profile) says:

Re: Bull

1) Get short changed on the ad revenues by partnering with the big company that’s given them a deal they can’t refuse.

Funny, swap out ‘ad revenues’ with ‘sales revenues’ and that sentence would seem to be a perfect match with the recording industry(somewhat less so now, with more alternatives giving artists more bargaining power, but historically…).

‘Sign over all your rights to us, or never have anyone beyond a handful of people in your area hear your music.’

So come on then, where’s your angry condemnation of their ‘take it or leave it’ deals?

2) File endless DMCA requests because GOOG can’t seem to use their cool automation to stop people from uploading the same clip again and again

Tell you what, you program, on your own dime, and your own time, an algorithm that can accurately and without significant error, monitor countless hours of uploaded data in real time to check for matches to reported videos, is able to tell the difference between file A(the original reported video), and file B(same video with a slight tweak), and file C(same video, put up by the artist themselves this time), is able to tell what is and is not ‘authorized'(something that you lot consistently insist is ‘easy’, despite the fact that the only people who can reasonably know the authorized/unauthorized status of a file is the rightsholder themselves)…

You do all that, and then maybe people will take you serious when you act like it would be easy for Google to do the same, and they’re just choosing not to out of greed or laziness.

On that platform, they want to double check your real identity and so they insist on linking your account to a cell phone which, not surprisingly, tracks your every movement. They’re not going to let idiots have free rein on their computing platform.

Tell ya what bob, as one who apparently believes that giving up your real name and phone number to use a service isn’t a big problem, I have only this to say:

You First.

Post under your real name, with your real phone number. If you really believe that people should be forced to hand over that kind of information to use a service, back up your words with action, and provide an example for others to follow by providing your personal information. Show that you believe that doing so is an acceptable cost of using a service through your own actions.

Or show your hypocrisy by admitting that while you see no problem with others being forced to hand over their personal information in case they might be accused of copyright infringement, you don’t believe the same should apply to you. Either works.

Anonymous Coward says:

Re: Bull

but somehow they can’t use that same system to file DMCA notices automatically.

Um… Only the righstholder can file DMCA notices. How is Google going to swear under penalty of perjury that they own the copyrights to the content they’re removing from their own servers?

And anything “automatic” means without human participation beyond pressing start. How does a script or a program swear anything under penalty of perjury?

Do you even read the laws your shillmasters bought?

TwelveBaud (profile) says:

From page 5:

Piracy often arises when consumer demand goes unmet from legitimate supply. As services ranging from Netflix to Spotify to iTunes have demonstrated, the best way to combat piracy is with better and more convenient legitimate services. The right combination of price, convenience, and inventory will do far more to reduce piracy than enforcement can.

Hmm, where have I heard that before? ????

Josh in CharlotteNC (profile) says:

Sad I missed reading this last week, but I have a different take on this. I think Google is playing the long game. I don’t think you’re giving Google enough credit.

Google is giving the studios enough rope to hang themselves with (as they’ve been doing with the newspaper publishers). As you mentioned, they are basically asking for a flood of bogus DMCA notices. And when there are so many bogus notices coming in – they have a case on how unreliable they are, how much of a burden it is, and how something needs to be done to fix the law.

Also, Google has repeatedly shown they are experts (in the long run) of preventing people from messing with their rankings. Whenever a SEO figures out some way to manipulate rankings against the good of the end users, the tactic is found and killed off – we have semi-regular stories on Techdirt of just this, don’t we?

There probably will be unforeseen consequences and causalities, but I think Google can withstand them better than the studios and knows exactly what they’re doing.

Gwiz (profile) says:

Re: Re:

You really can’t admit when you’ve been caught lying. Says everything.

But nothing has been proven with this silly line of questioning.

Only a moron would compare Google’s AdSense boilerplate TOS, which is mainly for low traffic, soccer Mom blogs, with an advertising contract for a site that consistently gets over a million pageviews a month.

Gwiz (profile) says:

Re: Re: Re: Re:

Are you retarded?

Nope. Nice way to start a comment with an ad hom, though.

Read his responses again. He got caught lying.

I have read through this thread. Like I stated above, I don’t believe anything has been proven. You have compared a boilerplate TOS with a contract you are not party to and claim they are the same. That only makes you look foolish to me.

Stop wasting your life defending this douchebag simply because he defends your addiction to stealing content.

Too funny. Once again, anyone who disagrees with you is a slimy pirate whose opinions are to be disregarded. That’s the debate playbook of someone arguing from very weak position, you know. I’m guessing when you debate in real life you also think you win if you yell the loudest too.

For record, I don’t pirate content because I believe that creators should be compensated, but I also don’t think that current copyright laws are benefiting society as they should and in some cases are eroding the inalienable rights I hold dearly. Those are not mutually exclusive philosophies.

If you are even slightly interested as to why I comment on Techdirt, I have stated it here for all to read:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110603/21143914551/gwizs-favorite-techdirt-posts-week.shtml

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