If you post a 10-second video clip of the good parts of a
soccer match, you could be showing the only parts that many viewers care about
(the one goal). This could significantly
decrease sales/subscriptions to the video service. Why would you buy the game
if you can get the good parts for free? Maybe not the true soccer fans. But on the margin this could be a lot of lost
sales.
If you post a 10-second video clip of the good parts of a
new movie, you are probably going to increase sales by ginning up interest.
Many people will gain trust that the movie is good and become more likely to
spend $10 to go see it.
So what is the case with Google Books, which posts a few
pages of a book along with some metadata?
Do those few pages increase or decrease the potential revenue for the
authors/publishers? The Second Circuit just ruled that Google Books is Fair Use
because it is transformative of the original content. It is a research tool rather than a basic
copy. The service would increase interest in a book
more than it would decrease it. Again
not 100%, but on the margin.
A recent article in Bloomberg warns that this could be
concerning to other industries if it leads to a more open definition of Fair
Use and a looser definition of transformation.
Transformation has to be significant enough that the new content is different
from the old content. Using a few chords from an old song in a completely new
song is transformative. 2 Live Crew’s sampling of Roy Orbison’s song Pretty
Woman was
deemed transformative in 1994, but Blurred Lines by Robin
Thicke and Pharrell Williams was too close to Marvin Gaye’s original Got to Give it Up.
Many industries rely on copyright protection as part of
their business model. Movies, music,
art, games, software, and more. Billions of dollars, euros, and yuan (and
bitcoin) are at stake.
Here is your free preview of the adventure story. Stay tuned
for more.
