I objected to CBS’ taking down a McCain ad from Youtube with a DMCA notice a few weeks ago. And now NBC has taken down an Obama campaign ad:
Obama’s web team whipped up a frenzy this week with an edgy YouTube video imagining a victory by Sen. John McCain. They used archival footage of Tom Brokaw announcing the news, and the video climbed to the top of YouTube — besting celebrities, SNL clips and the Sarah Palin montages that dominate political hits at the web site. But this afternoon, NBC stripped the video off the web by filing a copyright claim with YouTube.
I haven’t seen the ad, so I can’t provide much of an analysis in favor of fair use. That said, my very strong general objection to the ability of a commercial organization to control the message of a political candidate remains. And that objection doesn’t just extend to control over political speech by public figures like Obama and McCain, but to political speech by all of us. Earlier this week, I linked to a video which blamed the CRA (and, of course, Obama) for the current economic situation. One of the commenters complained that it was taken down when he clicked on it, and I found that it had been replaced. I had assumed that the original author had just updated it somewhat, and that was the issue. In fact, it turns out that the first version was knocked down by a DMCA notice, too. Why? The original used music, as described by Larry Lessig:
So, for example. when describing how Fannie and Freddie gave low interest and no interest loans, the music is Dire Straits “Money for Nothing.” And when talking about the speculation, Talking Head’s “Burning down the house.” When talking about the influence of money inside the campaigns, AcDc “Money Talks.” And when talking about how “it ends now” if (as the author but not this author hopes) Obama is defeated, the music is “Survivor – Eye of the Tiger.” In each case, the music amplifies the message in powerfully and socially relevant way.
That’s a much tougher fair use case, and Lessig (who knows a thing or three about fair use) makes a strong argument for constructing a legal framework beyond traditional “fair use” to accomodate things like this. Check it out.