Consultative Paper to Get Draconian Copyright Laws Changed or Repealed
by Rakesh Raman June 2023Appeal: This paper is addressed to the concerned local and international authorities with the appeal to review and repeal the draconian copyright laws in the contemporary world driven by artificial intelligence (AI) and freely shareable social media content.
Author: Rakesh Raman [ a journalist and social activist ]INTRODUCTION
The archaic copyright laws that were written in the pre-tech era should not be applicable in today’s modern world where there is an information explosion and most people share content innocuously on social media or millions of blogs without any evil intent.
These days, a multitude of firms or individuals are running extortion rackets behind the opaque veils of copyrights to terrorize innocent technology users and extort money from them with the unfounded allegations of copyright violations. I am also a victim of one such fraud as a company tried to extort money from me with criminal intimidation.
Now, almost all the copyright cases filed in courts or other administrative or judicial forums should be dismissed under the “FAIR USE” statute that is supposed to promote freedom of expression and / or editorial freedom While most countries have signed the Berne Convention (adopted in 1886) which allows content reuse for quotations and news reporting, there is a need to further strengthen the content reuse framework.
The revamped content reuse guidelines should enable free flow of information as information consumption and dissemination is a fundamental right of all stakeholders, and which should take precedence over the straitjacketed copyright laws
EXISTING CONTENT REUSE PARADIGM
Today, out of 8 billion people in the world, an estimated 2 billion - or 1 in every 4persons use social media or are connected to the Internet. In other words, a large
Consultative Paper on Copyright Laws. By Rakesh Raman. June 2023. Page: 1 of 10population in the world consumes information from the Net or disseminates information through cyberspace. These netizens reproduce information which is publicly available in the web space and share it with their family members, friends, or other Internet users through social media sites
The unsuspecting users - without any intention to harm the original producer of information - share information with others, sometimes by adding their own comments with the original information. They are allowed to repost information of others under their own web accounts while this information can even belong to top media properties or corporate entities
The social media companies such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or Linkedin allow this kind of content lifting by giving sharing options under every tweet, video, or social media post, although in the traditional world it is construed an offence. The social media users are permitted to reuse information without taking explicit permission from the proverbial copyright holders The new norm is: If the information is in the public domain, it belongs to the public which is free to use it without any encumbrance.
In this process of reusing others’ information on their accounts, some Internet or social media users may attract more followers to their accounts which can translate to money. But even with this possible commercial use of content produced by others, this reuse of content is considered a fair practice because we are living in a new connected world where any information exchange is a legitimate act. This simple change in content reuse mechanism manifests the fact that the old copyright laws are redundant in the evolving world in which information exchange is the lifeblood of humans
The new reality of information exchange and content reuse models in the digital world has been accepted by the emerging new-media companies. Australian multinational graphic design platform Canva, for example, offers thousands of designs, images, graphics, and videos created by others for reuse.
New Canva users are allowed to freely reuse these content elements even for commercial use without taking permissions from original creators and without giving credit to them. It is a highly successful model which shatters the traditional copyright Consultative Paper on Copyright Laws. By Rakesh Raman. June 2023. Page: 2 of 10
norms. Similarly, Germany-based Pexels provides millions of free high-quality photos and videos to users who can use them without any permission from the original copyright holders and without any attribution. [ As a member of the Pexels community, I also offer my photos and videos to others for reuse ]
The Pixabay site is another royalty-free stock media online platform which allows free reuse of material including photos, illustrations, graphics, music, and videos created by others to all Pixabay users. A top video platform such as YouTube has also created an Audio Library to provide free high-quality music and sound effects that you can reuse without any restriction
You can also create short-duration videos - called YouTube Shorts - using others' content with automated permission. You are even allowed to monetize these videos. YouTube channels freely use photos and videos of others and YouTube rightly allows those channels to publish their videos without any restriction on the site
All these developments aim to strengthen the information exchange mechanism through web or digital channels under the “FAIR USE” guidelines which do not adhere to ancient copyright rules.
ABUSE OF COPYRIGHT LAWS
These days, a significant proliferation of companies that abuse the copyright laws is happening. These companies baselessly accuse users of copyright violations with the evil motives of terrorizing them and extorting money from them as fines.
Last year (2022), I also fell victim to a fraud perpetrated by a Germany-based company Copytrack which falsely accused me of copyright violation related to another company Since it was a false accusation, I complained against Copytrack to the Chief of Police, Berlin Police in Germany and other authorities.
I explained the entire case to them and urged them to initiate criminal proceedings against Copytrack managing director Marcus Schmitt and his company for terrorizing me and other people to extort money by using a fraudulent cyber scheme After that so far I
Consultative Paper on Copyright Laws. By Rakesh Raman. June 2023. Page: 3 of 10have not received any threat from Copytrack. [ You can click here to read the full case report. ]
Similarly, my editing rights were restricted on Wikipedia where I was contributing content as an editor. Wikipedia is full of mercenary editors who work with fake identities on behalf of certain people and organizations and remove critical content about them under different pretexts. Since Wikipedia works in a free-wheeling manner and mostly operated by naive or dishonest editors, there is no reliable mechanism where you can complain about arbitrary removal of your content.
First, my contributed content about corruption in India’s political outfit Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was removed from Wikipedia Although the AAP leaders about whom I was writing are in jail for their acts of corruption, I was told by some Wikipedia editors - who were presumably hired by AAP - that I cannot tarnish the image of some living persons. [ You can click here to read the full case report ]
Recently, in March 2023, my editing rights were restricted under the pretext of copyright violations when I started adding content to Wikipedia about the alleged financial frauds of Adani Group companies. Since the chairman of the Adani Group, Gautam Adani, is a close partner of India’s prime minister Narendra Modi, the critical content about the Adani Group started disappearing from Wikipedia [ You can click here for details ]
A recent investigative report of Hindenburg Research accused Adani of commiting one of the biggest corporate frauds in the world In the report released on January 24, 2023, Hindenburg said that the Adani Group has engaged in a brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud scheme over the course of decades. However, I was not allowed to contribute Adani-related content to Wikipedia saying that there are copyright violations, although no original copyright holder of the content had complained against me and I was following all the Wikipedia rules for editors. In this case, Wikipedia itself claimed in February 2023 that the Adani Group content on Wikipedia is being manipulated unscrupulously. However, some dishonest Wikipedia editors ignored all my truthful arguments and deprived me of my editing rights under the garb of copyright rules. I operate with my identity Rrthakur22 on Wikipedia.
Consultative Paper on Copyright Laws. By Rakesh Raman. June 2023. Page: 4 of 10The copyright laws are being misused by some rogue outfits to such an extent that even journalists can expect copyright violation notices from them when journalists use text or images from press releases. When journalists or bloggers pick information from press release distribution services, they can simply write the names of the brands or companies in their news reports to avoid copyright infringement. Similarly, some writers and bloggers rightly refer to the original news reports while writing their own stories without taking explicit permission from the original content creators. This practice is considered right and does not break any copyright laws
In some cases, journalists and bloggers also give backlinks free of charge to the brands or organizations about which they write on their news sites or blogs. Backlinks are a source of income for news sites, but in order to respect copyright laws they provide backlinks to companies that issue press releases through their corporate sites or press release distribution services In such cases, the agents or public relation (PR) firms that interface between brands and journalists can send copyright violation notices to the editorial writers. It is a clear misuse of copyrights laws.
NEED TO REPEAL COPYRIGHT LAWS AND CONTENT PROTECTION
The existing copyright laws should preferably be repealed as they are increasingly being misused to harass innocent users However, until these laws are completely annulled, the local and international judicial frameworks should provide sufficient safeguards to the consumers.
It should be the responsibility of the copyright holder to protect their content If some content is in the public domain, the public should be allowed to reuse it freely without taking permission or without paying any money to the original creator As an analogy, you cannot complain of a theft if you do not put a lock on your house.
The content creators can use a Canva-like model which allows some content to be used free of charge and users are supposed to pay for some content which is marked “PRO”. As the entire Canva process is automated, there is no possibility of a copyright conflict. Therefore, the companies should follow such modern processes instead of blaming others for content lifting. Consultative Paper on Copyright Laws. By Rakesh Raman. June 2023. Page: 5 of 10
I have also explained some content use, reuse, or content protection guidelines in my case related to Copytrack. For example, when information – including text, images, or videos – is used by journalists for editorial purposes – as opposed to commercial use –by giving due credit to the information supplier, it cannot be a copyright infringement And when information is taken from a press release, there is no need to take a separate permission for using the information from the organization that issues the press release.
The creators, who want to protect copyrights, should add price tags to their images or other content items so that the users could know that they are not available free of charge If copyright holders or their agents want to protect their content elements, they should not allow people to use those elements until they pay for them as is the practice for other products which are sold online. In order to stop the reuse of their content items by other users, the copyright holders or their agents must put a watermark on their content items that are released openly on the web
There are plenty of other ways to protect the content elements such as text, photographs, and videos. You can disable mouse right click and warn the user at the time of downloading a content element. A copyright notice link at a remote place or at the bottom of a website does not help in preventing the reuse of content by others while such links are actually put to deceive and trap the content reusers.
When the price of content is not mentioned and other methods are not used to warn the users and stop them from reusing the content without payment, the unscrupulous companies become part of a colossal worldwide cyber racket to first allow the users to use their content and then blackmail and threaten them with legal actions to extort money from them. With concealment of sales information, the rogue agents or companies start intimidating the gullible users with threatening emails and notices to demand money illegally.
As an analogy, suppose you allow a person to take an item of no value free of charge today from a shop And after several days, weeks, or years, you call that person a thief and threaten them to pay hundreds of dollars or euros for that no-value item or else face legal action. This amounts to criminal intimidation and willful deception by copyright holders to falsely implicate an innocent person
Consultative Paper on Copyright Laws. By Rakesh Raman. June 2023. Page: 6 of 10
If you really want to protect your content items, you need to stop that person at the time of taking those items. If you are not doing so, you are deliberately laying a criminal trap to extort money from the innocent reusers of those items. Then this is a case of criminal conspiracy and fraud to extort money worth hundreds of dollars or euros for items that won’t sell even for pennies.
With the principle of natural justice, the copyright holders should first send a simple email request of content removal to the user instead of sending extortion emails to demand money. If the user does not remove the content or does not give due credit to the creator, the original creator can take steps to get the content removed But the creator cannot suddenly demand money after many days, weeks, or years from the users who were never told that the content items that they are using are priced – particularly in the case of editorial use
If you follow the distorted definition of copyright, every name of the person or organization that you use without permission in an editorial article is a copyright infringement. It will make the entire information collection and dissemination work on the Internet very complex and almost impossible.
Most journalists – particularly those who run small news sites single-handedly like I do –take utmost care while using information from external sources and give due credit to original creators mostly with hyperlinks to the external sources. Thus, they do not violate any copyright rules. But they do not have resources to take permission for every bit of information that they use from the public domain or press releases. If they are explicitly warned, these journalists will never take information which is prohibited So, it is not copyright infringement when they follow this procedure in good faith.
But some corrupt companies and agents have devised a fraudulent business model to earn money unscrupulously from honest people who reuse content without any evil intent. Such corrupt companies and agents must be prosecuted and punished for unfair trade practices and for running criminal enterprises that extend their tentacles in different parts of the world.
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Moreover, the existing copyright laws cannot be applied to the emerging AI universe driven by ChatGPT (or Generative Pre-trained Transformer) and other AI technologies On AI platforms such as ChatGPT, Midjourney, and Lexica, for example, the content should belong to the users who write prompts to generate content. So, the courts should not accept copyright violation complaints related to AI-generated content
CONCLUSION
As a content creator or consumer, you should fully respect copyrights and intellectual property rights. But you should not find yourself in a situation where you are intimidated by the criminals who use copyright laws as threat weapons against innocent individuals to blackmail them.
Under “FAIR USE” principles, the secondary content users should be allowed to freely reuse the content which is freely available on the web, as information exchange is more important than content protection because information consumption is a fundamental human right of individuals in all parts of the world.
Until the copyright laws are completely dumped, a copyright infringement should be considered a minor civil wrong which should not attract any penalty for the content reuser Rather, the courts should dismiss all petitions that are filed under the garb of copyright laws. This change is required to protect fundamental rights related to information exchange and freedom of expression.
ABOUT ME: RAKESH RAMAN
This consultative paper has been authored by Rakesh Raman who is a national award-winning journalist and founder of the humanitarian organization RMN Foundation Besides working at senior editorial positions with leading media companies, he was writing an exclusive edit-page column regularly for The Financial Express (a daily business newspaper of The Indian Express Group)
Nowadays, for the past 12 years, he has been running his own global news services on multiple news sites He runs various environment protection, education awareness, and
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anti-corruption campaigns, and publishes digital magazines and research reports on different subjects. Earlier, he had been associated with the United Nations (UN) through the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) as a digital media expert to help businesses use technology for brand marketing and business development.
At present, Rakesh is associated with the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Project as a Country Expert for India to provide expert research inputs on multiple topics pertaining to democracy and governance. The V-Dem Project is managed by V-Dem Institute under the University of Gothenburg, Sweden He has been publishing The Unrest news magazine since 2020 to cover economic and political upheavals in the world.
In order to inform the Indian citizens and the global community about the extent of corruption in India, he compiled and released in October 2022 a comprehensive report on corruption in the country Under the title “India Corruption Research Report 2022 (ICRR 2022),” the research report covers diverse aspects of corruption in India
He has also been publishing The Integrity Bulletin news magazine since 2018 to cover local and international corruption issues to engage with different stakeholders who are trying to combat corruption in the world. He has also announced the new project for 2023 to compile the India Corruption Research Report 2023 (ICRR 2023) You can click here to know about the project and support it financially with your donations.
He has launched a nationwide campaign to introduce social democracy in India in order to build an egalitarian society in which all citizens could enjoy equal rights, opportunities, freedoms, and access to justice. He is running an editorial section / microsite “Power Play: Lok Sabha Election 2024 in India” to cover the election news, events, and political campaigns.
He is also running a nationwide campaign to save school students of India from directionless education so that students could acquire modern skills that can help them in the job market. In his anti-corruption activities, he participated in a global petition led by Germany-based international organization Transparency International to call for the
UN General Assembly Special Session against Corruption, UNGASS 2021, to direct all countries to set up central, public registers of beneficial ownership.
He runs a community-driven anti-corruption social service “Clean House” to help the residents of Delhi raise their voice against the growing corruption and injustice in housing societies where millions of people suffer because of rampant corruption and lawlessness. He has also formed an environment protection group called Green Group in New Delhi, which is the most polluted national capital in the world.
As Rakesh has been facing constant threats including death threats for his editorial and anti-corruption work, the Paris-based international organization Reporters Without Borders (RSF) that defends freedom of journalists has urged the Indian government to save him from threats and persecution. You can click here to read his full profile.
Contact
Rakesh Raman
Editor, RMN News Service [ Website ]
Founder, RMN Foundation [ Website ]
463, DPS Apts , Plot No 16, Sector 4
Dwarka, Phase I, New Delhi 110 078, India
WhatsApp / Mobile: 9810319059 | Contact by Email