Github now publishes all DMCA takedown notices they receive here.

by _pius • 15 years ago

188 64 15 years ago

snprbob86• 15 years ago

My first thought was "A Git repository instead of a blog? That seems like an odd choice."

However, upon a moment's reflection: this is awesome. What if someone issued a take down notice on the takedown repository or something like that? People can fork it locally and be confident that they have the right data thanks to Git's natural hashing behavior!

wrl• 15 years ago

I'm a bit disappointing that the referenced repositories appear to have been taken down anyway, though.

robryan• 15 years ago

It seems to me more about letting people know why they have taken down the content rather than challenging the law like the take down lists on things like the pirate bay.

dschobel4• 15 years ago

Per http://help.github.com/dmca/ it is up to the user to make the counter claim.

Fighting your legal battles is not a feature of Github. At least not of any of the advertised service levels.

emehrkay• 15 years ago

Doesn't it just make you want to fork the repos?

dschobel4• 15 years ago

It's too late after the DMCA request has arrived, you'll just get a 404.

I imagine they have to lock / disable all forks beyond what the notice mentions as well, unless Sony, et al don't understand how git/github works.

pjhyett3• 15 years ago

That's how the DMCA process works. The last thing we want our users to think is we're deleting repos for no reason, that's why we're publishing the takedowns from here on out.

We receive the notice, lock the repo, and inform its owner why it's been locked. At that point, they can either remove the infringing code or make a counter claim and we'll unlock it provided the original party doesn't file a court order.

More info: http://help.github.com/dmca/

rhizome2• 15 years ago

Isn't there an allowable delay in DMCA Takedowns? Some reasonable amount of time for the target to file a counterclaim before the content is locked? The way you've described it here sounds like you lock the content before notifying the user (or simultaneously).

hasenj• 15 years ago

At first I thought they were doing this for humor (like the piratebay's publishing of "cease and desist" letters), but when I clicked the links to the repos and realized they did get removed, I kinda felt sad.

lukev• 15 years ago

Don't be. The DCMA is stupid, but the fact is, people DO post copyrighted material all the time, and it IS legitimate to take it down.

We want people to copyright less, and for copyright laws to be reasonable, and punishments proportionate. Not to do away with copyright alltogether.

dtby• 15 years ago

We want people to copyright less, and for copyright laws to be reasonable, and punishments proportionate. Not to do away with copyright alltogether.

For whom are you speaking when you say "we?"

kiba2• 15 years ago

I just unlicense my stuff.

I don't really care because I got paid anyway.

jamii• 15 years ago

However, neither of the notices in the repo at the moment seem to be valid. Both are takedowns of circumvention tools which, as wtallis points out above, are covered in a different section of the DMCA to copyright takedowns.

albertzeyer2• 15 years ago

How are the ps3 utils copyrighted? Isn't that all reverse engineered work?

sliverstorm• 15 years ago

Github is not worth loosing over a copyright spat. Leave that to the folks at Pirate Bay

smackjer• 15 years ago

This kind of transparency should be the norm, rather than the exception. Kudos.

bigwally2• 15 years ago

While Google publishes the DMCA takedown requests in relation to their search engine results, it does not publish the requests for removal of content contained within their own infrastructure.

Perhaps Github should do a little further research before feeling "inspired".

magicalist• 15 years ago

what do you mean by "content contained within their own infrastructure"? I thought they forwarded the notices they get to chilling effects (and youtube ones are just posted in place of the video itself).

edit: this page http://www.google.com/dmca.html has about a 50/50 split across products between "may" and "will" be forwarded to Chilling Effects.

bigwally2• 15 years ago

A quick search of term "xenu dmca" should show you come of the shit that google has to deal with in respect to the DMCA.

Any complaints about content on blogger, youtube or the adsense/adwords network get taken seriously and aren't forwarded on for the worlds entertainment.

jcr4• 15 years ago

I curious why the names and contact details have been redacted from the notices?

seabee• 15 years ago

Do you really need them?

jcr4• 15 years ago

That's a good question, but yes, having the names and contact publicly available increases transparency. The DCMA notices are requesting the removal of something available to the public, so the public should know who, specifically, is making the request.

The short answer is, if one does not want to be known for sending DMCA take down notices, then the only option is to not send them. If one is intentionally or unintentionally depriving the public of access to a legitimate work, then the public should know.

Providing the names and contact details does open the door for possible abuse, but this is highly unlikely. On the other hand, providing names and contact details also enables the public to potentially help the copyright holders by reporting related abuses, but again, this is also highly unlikely.

In other words, it doesn't hurt and it does help. Transparency is a good thing.

Sephr• 15 years ago

Instead of 404ing repos, GitHub should redirect to the relevant DCMA takedown notices. Also, I'd like GitHub's responses to be public too.

ihodes2• 15 years ago

I kind of agree, but this reminds me of "if you give a mouse a cookie…" Who else does this? I'd like everyone to, but it's great that GitHub does. They do great work.

mishmash2• 15 years ago

>Who else does this?

Well I think the Pirate Bay kind of started it, right?

pjhyett3• 15 years ago

Totally agree on the redirect. As far as our response, there would essentially be nothing to publish. We inform the repo owner and the rest is up to them.

wtallis2• 15 years ago

It's interesting to note that one of the two notices in this repository is from Sony, and appears to be demanding the removal of PS3 jailbreaking tools.

The DMCA's prohibition on DRM circumvention is in a different section (17 USC 1201) from the section on copyright infringement (17 USC 512), in which the safe harbor/takedown notice stuff is defined. It's not clear to me that DRM circumvention thus qualifies as copyright infringement, or that any of the safe harbor stuff would apply to hosts of circumvention tools.

Certainly, Sony's notice doesn't identify any of their works that are being infringed, so the notice seems to be invalid according to the usual rules, specifically 17 USC 512(c)(3)(A)(ii).

Can anybody more familiar with the law explain what's going on with this? Why is the procedure from 17 USC 512 being applied to a (alleged) violation of 17 USC 1201? Or is this just another flaw in Sony's handling of this mess?

Seth_Kriticos• 15 years ago

Wanted to see if I could comment on the individual files, so I posted the gist of your concern as quoted text with source as comment on the commit:

https://github.com/github/dmca/commit/d6b2d97e801dc16d2aeb25...

vulf• 15 years ago

I would guess that github doesn't consider themselves legal experts and does not want to get involved... if they comply with the takedown they get immunity from liability here. The DMCA allows the allegedly infringing party to file counter-notice if they feel they are not infringing and the takedown notice was in error, I would bet github is leaving it to those users to defend themselves.

I am not a lawyer, but I would encourage the people targeted by these notices to find a lawyer and fight back.

Hell, that might just be what github is trying to encourage by open sourcing these notices, to get the community involved and defending against baseless DMCA takedowns.

mmaunder• 15 years ago

What I love about this strategy is that is introduces a PR cost to the sender for sending DMCA notices.

It also increases the likelihood that the DMCA is legitimate, at least from the senders perspective because they'd rather not be seen lying in public.

Making this republishing policy standard among online companies with a standard URI like /dmca-notices/ would allow aggregation and probably reduce DMCA total cost to publishers.

rlpb• 15 years ago

There is a database maintained for this kind of purpose: http://www.chillingeffects.org/

rdtsc• 15 years ago

It is worth pointing out that The Pirate Bay has been doing this, also combined with hilarious responses:

http://thepiratebay.org/legal

One of my favorites:

http://static.thepiratebay.org/whitestripes_resp2.txt

fleitz2• 15 years ago

What does RFC 1036 (USENET Message format) have to do with DMCA takedowns?

Read here in their request, for some reason the lawyer is referencing RFC 1036 https://github.com/github/dmca/blob/master/2011-01-28-tera.m...

drdaeman• 15 years ago

I believe, nothing. Just a wrong (and, possibly, outdated{ copypasta.

I also wonder, is it really illegal to re-implement MMORPG server?

fleitz2• 15 years ago

Probably not, but it doesn't appear that they filed a protest.

TillE• 15 years ago

If we look at the bnetd case as precedent, it probably is illegal under the DMCA. The justification is that it's a tool for circumventing copy protection.

RiderOfGiraffes• 15 years ago

With regards the contact details being redacted ...

In an ideal world this wouldn't be necessary. The dispute would be settled by rational discussion and agreement reached amicably. But the world isn't like that.

Rightly or wrongly someone will take exception and possibly pursue what they see as "justice". Publishing the contacts details might prove just a little too tempting for some.

I do think that actions such as DMCA take-down notices should be a matter of public record, and should be available in a standard place. I would even like to see a "central" repository for easy reference.

n-named• 15 years ago

github is using Github to share DMCA takedown notices with you!

albertzeyer2• 15 years ago

All the PS3 tools are hosted here now: http://gitorious.org/ps3free

I really wonder how that falls under DMCA at all.

Github now publishes all DMCA takedown notices they receive here.

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