Olympic committee rethinks copyright infringement claim on YouTube

The International Olympic Committee has retracted a Digital Millennium Copyright Act takedown request it sent to YouTube over a Tibetan protest video.

According to Corynne McSherry, an attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the IOC requested earlier this week that YouTube remove the video called "Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony." The video, posted by Students for a Free Tibet, is a montage of scenes from Tibet protests around the world. The Olympic rings are shown in the video briefly a couple times.

YouTube initially removed the video, but subsequently questioned whether the IOC could truly file a DMCA claim and asked the group to withdraw its takedown notice. The EFF also questioned the IOC on its copyright infringement claims. The IOC retracted its request, and the video was reposted. (Warning: The video, shown below, contains some graphic images.)

The IOC has been working with YouTube to provide content as well as to monitor for copyright violations.

McSherry said that such takedown requests have little to do with copyright infringement, but are instead "timed to directly interfere with the impact of a political message."

YouTube has not yet responded to a request by CNET News for comment.

Click here for more stories on tech and the Beijing Olympics.

[Pete Bardo]

Wow! Just shows how flawed the DMCA is. Why would IOC complain about this video? And what copyright did they claim had been violated? More curiously, why would YouTube comply with the request? Why is it that the content must be removed when the request is received with no chance for the posting party to respond first? It's getting crazy out there!

[victor_sf]

By naming the video "Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony" they are actually putting the label "Olympics" on something that the "owners" of the label might not agree with. Think of it this way - you search for "Linux" in YouTube and you find a clip named "Linus Torlvalds Gives A Speech About Linux" in which you actually see Steve Balmer bragging about Word 2.0 without a mention of Linux... Even rms has the opinion that names, diaries, etc. should not be completely free for everybody to play with.

[The_Decider]

Olympics shouldn't be copyright-able.

[The_Decider]

The DMCA is unconstitutional and YouTube and others should file a lawsuit to that end.

If a notice is given, then nothing should happen without a chance for response by the alleged violator. The law as it is written offers little protection against abuse.

[ianbetteridge]

I would bet that someone charged with monitoring YouTube at the IOC took one look at the title, didn't bother to watch the video, and put in motion the DMCA request.