Copyright claim against Dawkins video

[djarm67]

Hi All,

I have recently received a copyright claim against a Richard Dawkins video (Break the science barrier) I have on my YouTube channel (djarm67).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gj3rAXurdUM

My channel is a not for personal profit and any Dawkins related videos I have uploaded include links to his website. This copyright claim is by GoDigital Media Group. It allows GoDigital Media to place adverts and generate revenue from this video. I have no issue with legitimate copyright holders from generating advertising revenue from videos which I have uploaded. Currently, National Geographic, Discovery Channel, Monty Python, Channel 4 and Sony all generate revenue on some of my uploaded videos.

I initially responded to this claim by GoDigital with a counter claim as a misidentified video as I occassionally receive these types of claims from Fox News which I counter as false claims.

This has now supposedly been reviewed by the "content owners" and I received a "re-claim" as such from YouTube,


All content owners have reviewed your video and confirmed their claims to some or all of its content:

* Content owner: GoDigital Media Group Type: Audio content

I cannot find any association between GoDigital Media Group and the "Break the science barrier" video.

I did notice however, that one of their clients is Vivendi Entertainment who was involved in the mockumentary "Expelled".

Would anyone be able to assist me in determining if this "GoDigital Media Group" has anything to do with the Dawkins video "Break the science barrier"? If so, they are quite welcome to generate advertising revenue from this video, if not, I will be filing a DMCA counter claim to remove their ability to generate any revenue from this. I have asked this question on the RDF as well.

Thanks
DJ

 

[CosmicSpork]

Looks to me like you're not the only one.

I reckon they're doing this to get advertising revenue off things they don't even own.

http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/youtube/thread?tid=72105c743363fdeb&hl=en

http://www.google.co.uk/support/forum/p/youtube/thread?tid=1789d9a465903486&hl=en

http://www.techdirt.com/article.php?sid=20091028/0306106704#c314

http://aglanceatmyworld.blogspot.com/2009/10/im-hacked.html


They run an AdShare program which means they have a vested interested in the advertising that can be attached to a video...

http://adshare.godigitalmg.com/


None of this seems right to me, but they don't appear to be a small company and are involved with some big names, but I don't see how they can claim ownership of any of this stuff themselves.

The entire video is available on Google Video:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4875349040600901161&hl=en

As far as I can see Break the Science Barrier has absolutely nothing to do with GoDigital, I don't think it was even distributed on DVD by them or any subsidiary. The copyright for any of it (as far as I can tell) belongs to the Richard Dawkins Foundation and/or Channel 4.

I can't even see how they could claim copyright over any of the small bits of music in there, any copyright would have been sorted out when the show was produced.

The DVD appears to have been produced and distributed by Upper Branch Productions, Inc. who as far as I can find have no relationship with GoDigital...

I keep feeling that something dodgy is going on here and someone is trying to gain revenue from videos they have no right getting it from.

 

[Aught3]

Doesn't make sense to me, I can't see what legitimate claim they have over the audio content on the video. They could have been authorised to act for the RDF but it seems unlikely given that the RDF is happy to have Break the Science Barrier on YouTube (PiroNiro) and Google Video. Given the other cases that Sporky has uncovered where GoDigital Media Group has made claims against self-composed music tracks, I'm guessing they are running the audio through some sort of recognition program which is giving them false results.

Good idea about emailing the RDF getting the all clear from them would pretty much cover you, but even if you don't get a reply it seems unlikely that GoDigital Media Group has a legitimate claim.

I'm not clear whether this was a DMCA claim, if it was GoDigital Media Group could get themselves into trouble if they don't have permission from the actual copyright holder to file the notice.