The road to implementing the EU’s proposed Article 13 started off relatively smoothly for the entertainment industries but during the past couple of months, serious cracks have begun to emerge.

In fact, the proposed legislation, which was designed to prevent large Internet platforms (such as YouTube) from exploiting the so-called Value Gap, has descended into unexpected chaos.

With large Internet platforms faced with the prospect of deploying filters to scoop up infringing content, there was outrage among huge numbers of YouTubers, who felt their livelihoods might be at stake. But somehow, in the midst of this dissent, YouTube began lobbying in favor of filtering.

With the battle lines becoming even more blurred, rightsholders began complaining about the shifting details of the proposals as they moved through the negotiation process, apparently in YouTube’s favor.

In December 2018, the Motion Picture Association, the International Union of Cinemas, the Premier League, and La Liga, announced that they were concerned about proposals for liability shields for large Internet services, which would gain power in the market, not lose it as planned.

Soon after, major entertainment organizations including IFPI complained that if Article 13 passed in its current form, they would be worse off than they were before. Things were very clearly not going to plan and were about to get worse.

Last month, the MPA and other rightsholders called for a suspension of Article 13 just as the EU Parliament and Council were about to agree on the final text. Those negotiations were eventually canceled after the Member States failed to agree on a final negotiating position.

Earlier this week, there appeared to be light at the end of the tunnel, with Article 13 proposals moving forward after France and Germany reached a deal on which services should be bound by the terms of Article 13.

Now, however, all external support for Article 13 appears to lie in tatters.

In an open letter, organizations including IFPI, IMPALA, Premier League, La Liga, and others in broadcasting and media, have effectively asked the EU to scrap Article 13 completely.

Noting that the original aim of Article 13 was to create “a level playing field in the online Digital Single Market”, the groups state that as it stands, the proposed legislation will not strengthen the positions of European rightsholders.

“Despite our constant commitment in the last two years to finding a viable solution, and having proposed many positive alternatives, the text – as currently drafted and on the table – no longer meets these objectives, not only in respect of any one article, but as a whole,” they write.

“As rightsholders we are not able to support it or the impact it will have on the European creative sector.”

While thanking parties for trying to reach a “good compromise” during the negotiations of recent months, the organizations state that the text contains elements which “fundamentally go against copyright principles enshrined in EU and international copyright law.”

“Far from leveling the playing field, the proposed approach would cause serious harm by not only failing to meet its objectives, but actually risking leaving European producers, distributors and creators worse off,” they state, winding up for the following bombshell.

“Regrettably, under these conditions we would rather have no Directive at all than a bad Directive. We therefore call on negotiators to not proceed on the basis of the latest proposals from the Council,” they conclude.

In other words, the global music industry (and others, less affected by the Value Gap) have effectively called for Article 13 to be canceled.

What happens next is anyone’s guess but Julia Reda, MEP for the Pirate Party, is cautioning that the EU probably won’t back away.

“The EU_Commission will never do the politically responsible thing and withdraw #Article13,” she wrote on Twitter.

“It is time for checks and balances to kick in. Council has to refuse the backroom deal by Macron & Merkel.”

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Five years ago, copyright industry groups and Internet providers teamed up to fight online piracy in the UK.

Backed by the Government, they launched several educational campaigns under the “Get it Right” banner.

Under the program, ISPs send out piracy warnings to subscribers whose accounts are used to share copyright-infringing material. This campaign started two years ago and has been ongoing since.

While the piracy alerts received plenty of news coverage early on, there haven’t been any official updates since. While we and other journalists have requested information on the scope and effectiveness of the campaign, the parties involved have remained quiet.

The silence was broken this week when Ian Moss, Director of Public Affairs at music group BPI, spoke at an anti-piracy conference in France which was live-streamed to the public. In his presentation, Moss discussed some preliminary results on the effectiveness of the UK alerts.

According to Moss, ISPs have sent out roughly a million piracy alerts since the campaign launched. This translates to half a million emails per year, which is a rather significant number.

Users who receive these piracy alerts are sent to a dedicated portal where they can read more information on how to prevent further alerts in the future. These emails and portal do their job, Moss said, noting that less than 1% of the recipients call for further information.

The BPI also showed some early evidence which suggests that people who received the alerts are less likely to pirate. However, Moss stressed that these are preliminary findings which come with some caveats.

The slide that was shown to the audience suggests that the “Get it Right” campaign, in general, led to a 26% reduction in piracy, compared to a control group of people who weren’t exposed to the campaign.

Since these data go back to 2015, they refer to the broader educational campaign as well, as the email alerts didn’t start until 2017. Based on the slide, piracy rates among the ‘exposed’ group dropped from 57% to 42% in three years.

While these data aren’t ready for official publication yet, the early preview suggests that the broader “Get it Right” campaign, which also includes educational videos and social media outreach, have a positive effect.

BPI’s Director of Public Affairs noted that about one in four members of the public has seen their messaging by now, which is a pretty significant number. According to the music group, official data and other figures will follow later.

With a fresh £2 million in funding from the UK Government, the campaign is guaranteed to continue until 2021. By then, we hope that the responsible parties will also release their findings through the official channels.

Effective or not, the alert emails are definitely not a silver bullet since they only address BitTorrent piracy. While that was the main threat years ago, the music and movie industries are more concerned about stream-ripping and pirate boxes nowadays.

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Dedicated anime pirate sites are popular around the globe, but in Latin America they are huge.

AnimeYT has been one of the main players in the area. With millions of regular visitors, it was the top pirate site in countries including Argentina Chile, Peru, and Mexico.

The site is among the top 50 most-visited websites on the entire Internet in these countries, beating traditional streaming and torrent sites by a landslide.

The massive reach of these sites is a thorn in the side of copyright holders, which are increasingly taking action in response. Over the past weeks, several Brazilian anime sites folded after legal threats and this weekend AnimeYT shut down as well.

In a goodbye message, AnimeYT’s operator “TioYT” mentions the situation in Brazil as the reason for the decision. He doesn’t point a finger at a specific legal threat and chooses to end with a personal message instead.

“I spent many years translating animes, arguing with fans, watching anime girls on this page. So much that when I look back at my life, I think that at least a quarter of my memories are linked to this site, to this community,” the operator writes.

“Remember that behind the dude you call ‘TioYT’ there’s a common and ordinary guy who has his own problems, his family, who has other responsibilities and who is more than anything very grateful for all the love and the support they everyone has shown to the website in general,’ he adds.

The shutdown has created a lot of uproar on social media and many of the site’s former users are taking out their anger on the legitimate anime streaming platform Crunchyroll, which is seen as the driving force behind many of the recent shutdowns.

Crunchyroll has reportedly gone after several Brazilian anime sites but, thus far, we haven’t seen any official confirmation that it approached AnimeYT directly. It could also be that there are other rightsholders involved.

Another popular anime site that shut down last week is AnimeMovil. This site currently redirects to Crunchyroll. The site reportedly took this decision after the Japanese studio Toei Animation went after it for publishing a copy of  Dragon Ball Super Broly, shortly after it premiered.

The shutdowns have resulted in a surge of new traffic flowing to AnimeFLV, another popular anime site in Latin America. In addition, inventive users have also started to upload Dragon Ball episodes to porn sites, hoping that they’re safe there.

While AnimeYT and AnimeMovil could certainly be classified as pirate sites, many people relied on them to get the latest anime shows quickly. 

That anime is more than a simple pastime for kids was made clear last year when local Mexican authorities planned to premiere the 130th episode of Dragon Ball Super in football stadiums and other public places, even though they had no license to do so.

Although several massive anime sites have now fallen, it’s expected that others will fill this gap, as is usually the case. That doesn’t mean, however, that AnimeYT and the others aren’t missed dearly; a quick search on social media makes that quite clear.

En memoria de anime YT… pic.twitter.com/ZPh7uG8yWl

— ?M?????? O????? (@MomentoDeOtakus) February 3, 2019

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While India has a thriving movie market that is loved both at home and overseas, it also has serious problems with piracy.

With around 1,000 films produced every year, most major titles are quickly pirated and distributed on the black market, whether on physical media (for around $1 per copy) or for free via the Internet.

One of the key problems is the swift availability of Indian movies on pirate sites, often within hours of their theatrical debut. Aside from the so-called screener copies that sometimes leak out, around 90% of ‘pirate’ releases can be tracked to unauthorized in-theater recordings, usually via camcorders or cellphones.

To target this unlicensed copying, earlier this year the Indian government proposed amendments to the Cinematograph Act to deter people from undermining the local movie industry. On the table were three-year jail sentences for pirates and/or a maximum fine of Rs.10 Lakhs (US$14,000), with the aim of plugging a claimed $US2.7 billion hole in the market.

As it transpires, things move quickly in India. In an announcement Wednesday by Sitanshu Kar, Principal Spokesperson for the Government of India, it was revealed that the amendments to the 1952 Act have been passed by the Union Cabinet.

To tackle Film Piracy & Copyright infringement,#Cabinet approves amendment to the Cinematograph Act, 1952; Penal Provisions for unauthorized camcording and duplication of films pic.twitter.com/WAb8mmJs6S

— Sitanshu Kar (@DG_PIB) February 6, 2019

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As detailed above, no one will be able to legally make audio or video recordings of a movie (or part thereof) without first obtaining permission from copyright holders.

Also outlawed is the use or attempted use of a device (likely a cellphone or similar) to record or transmit any part of a movie, something which immediately rules out any type of live streaming or transfer.

As detailed in the January 2019 proposals, punishments will indeed go ahead on the basis of a potential three-year jail sentence and/or a maximum fine of Rs.10 Lakhs (US$14,000) for infringers.

While the new punishments will likely act as a deterrent to some, they are unlikely to tame India’s big online boogeyman.

Despite massive court-ordered blocking by dozens of ISPs against a long list of its domains, torrent site TamilRockers looks set to continue business as usual, both with its high-profile cam-sourced leaks and regular taunting of the authorities.

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Over the past two years, there’s been a wave of copyright infringement lawsuits against alleged cheaters or cheat makers.

Take-Two Interactive Software, the company behind ‘Grand Theft Auto V’ (GTA V), is one of the major players involved. The company has filed several lawsuits in the US and abroad, targeting alleged cheaters.

Last August the company filed a case against Florida resident Jhonny Perez, accusing him of copyright infringement by creating and distributing a cheating tool. The software, known as “Elusive,” could be used to cheat and grief, interfering with the gameplay of others.

The “Elusive” cheat was previously sold online at prices ranging from $10 to $30, depending on the package. Before filing the lawsuit, Take-Two attempted to find out exactly how much money was made in the process, but Perez failed to hand over detailed financial records.

Initially, the game company was open to negotiating a settlement but, due to the lack of response, it saw no other option than to take the cheat maker to court. Perez, however, did not respond to the complaint which prompted Take-Two to file for a default judgment.

According to the company, it’s clear that the cheat maker is guilty of both direct and contributory copyright infringement. As such, it asked the New York federal court for the maximum statutory damages amount of $150,000, plus $69,686 in attorney’s fees.

Take-Two argued that these damages are warranted because the cheating activity resulted in severe losses. According to an estimate provided by the company, the harm is at least $500,000. In addition, the maximum in damages should also act as a deterrent against other cheat developers.

This week the court ordered on the motion for default judgment, siding with the game company.

“Take-Two has been irreparably harmed by Mr. Perez’s infringing conduct and will continue to be harmed unless enjoined,” US District Court Judge Kevin Castel writes in his order.

“Mr. Perez’s Elusive program creates new features and elements in Grand Theft Auto which can be used to harm legitimate players, causing Take-Two to lose control over its carefully balanced plan for how its video game is designed to be played,” he writes.

In addition, the Judge notes that the cheat discouraged users from future purchases and gameplay and that the unlimited currency cheat undermined Take-Two’s pricing and sales of legitimate virtual currency.

The Court, therefore, finds the cheat maker guilty of both willful direct and willful contributory copyright infringement, as well as breaching Take-Two’s user agreement.

Judge Castel ordered Perez to may the maximum statutory damages of $150,000 and an additional $66,868 in attorney’s fees. To our knowledge, this is the highest damages amount that has ever been awarded in a game cheating case.

In addition to the monetary damages, the Court also issued a permanent injunction prohibiting the cheat maker from continuing infringing activities moving forward.

Elusive hasn’t been available for sale since last year. It was taken offline after Perez was contacted by Take-Two.

“After discussions with Take-Two Interactive, we are immediately ceasing all maintenance, development, and distribution of our cheat menu services,” a public announcement read at the time.

At the time, the cheat maker informed its users that it would donate the proceeds to a charity which Take-Two could pick. However, the default judgment makes it clear that this money should go directly to the game company instead.

…

A copy of the order granting Take-Two’s default judgment against Mr. Perez is available here (pdf).

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