typesafe

In Latvian blogosphere, a new scandal has emerged after local self-proclaimed and unfortunately government-authorized “copyright defender” AKKA-LAA had sent emails to approx. 500 blog website owners informing them that music videos from Youtube embedded in their websites are illegal.

Website owners claim that they don’t have actual files on their web servers, they are hosted by Youtube,  AKKA-LAA in response keeps arguing that effectively user watches a copyrighted video while visiting particular website. According to them, legal solution would be not using Youtube’s offered embedding tags but posting the clickable link to Youtube’s website instead. The most interesting claim from AKKA/LAA representative is that (rephrasing) “Watching Youtube’s videos in Latvia is illegal and AKKA/LAA has initiated negotiaton with Youtube on legalizing their activities in territory of Latvia”. More on this here (in Latvian).

I agree that there’s many legal work to be done concerning copyright in Internet but I’m really wandering where do people live when they claim that “Internet is relatively new type of media”, that’s really hilarious… well, if not scary. And here’s why:

If I understand correctly, Youtube’s already paying artists fees for hosting their videos. If I was Youtube executive, I wouldn’t listen to some AKKA/LAA from some country with 2.3M population claiming that my company’s activities there are illegal and, God forbid, I have to pay them more money for allowing users to use my service. I would just restrict access to Youtube’s servers from that country’s IP addresses and that’s all.

Is this what AKKA/LAA really wants?