syracuse

Artist’s Gonna Leave Leave Leave Leave Leave: Spotify and the Streaming Revenue Controversy

I’m sorry in advance that this is the second Taylor Swift post on this blog. I promise that I’m not usually like this – she’s just been doing a lot of really cool things lately regarding ~law and the media~ and I’ve been all over that like syrup on a stack of pancakes.

Now, with that said…

Taylor Swift has removed her entire catalogue from Spotify.

The Cat Princess herself, not giving a hoot about Spotify and gazing upwards into the future of massive record sales coming her way

 

This means that I can no longer turn on “private streaming” and rock out to songs tailored for preteens while pretending I actually hate her. As a broke grad student, I’m super upset. However, TSwift’s decision 1) Makes a lot of financial sense, and 2) Provides AMAZING fodder for bad jokes!

Let’s look at the reasoning why Our Lady of the Swift has told the world’s favorite streaming service why they’re never, ever getting back together (I am so sorry, I can’t help it).

 

REASON 1: EVERYTHING HAS CHANGED (FINANCIALLY)

It used to be that, years ago, boys and girls would flock to record stores on the days that albums were released. Now, most people patiently wait for the new albums to leak, go on iTunes, or be available for streaming. Services like Spotify allow for labels to receive some revenue for songs that are streamed, but it’s a paltry price at best.

 

REASON 2: OUR SONG (ISN’T MAKING ANY MONEY)

It’s estimated that labels receive one penny or less per song streamed – and that doesn’t even account for what portion of that goes to the artist. Swift’s posse has said that she’s collected less than $500k from Spotify over the past year for her music. While I personally would do terrible things for that sum of money, it’s a laughable sum compared to the other forms of revenue within the music industry.

 

REASON 3: (ARTISTS NEED TO HAVE THEIR) EYES OPEN

One of the biggest factors driving the push away from streaming services such as Spotify is that artists, by essentially giving their music away, feel less of a sense of pride in their work. Swift says that by demanding album sales through the discontinuation of streaming services, artists are reclaiming the value of their art and being appropriately compensated for it.

 

With artists like Jason Aldean now following our blonde heroine’s lead, I wouldn’t be surprised to see if other large artists will pull their music from streaming services prior to a new album release. It seems like Spotify is simply going to have to…

SHAKE IT OFF.

 

Okay, that’s it. I’m done. I’m so sorry.

 

 

Movie Digest: Terms and Conditions May Apply

In today’s online world, we aim to make things as quick, simple, and streamlined as possible. What the average consumer isn’t aware of, though, is that the click-through terms and conditions that almost every website require the users to waive many privacy rights that, a mere 15 years ago, would have been considered fundamental. The documentary Terms and Conditions May Apply goes into what the implications of these click-through agreements are, and outlines just how pervasive the fine print truly is.

 

Prior to the attacks on September 11, 2001, the world of online privacy was simpler and less aggressive about collecting your online information. Cookies were used to anonymously track user data, and companies voluntarily listed their privacy policies on their websites. However, after the attacks on 9/11, the world of online privacy turned on its head with the implementation of the PATRIOT Act. Language that said online entities were allowed to track and collect your information to “prevent or investigate criminal acts” became the norm, and with that came a new era of governmental influence on the way the internet works.

 

Companies quickly realized that anonymity of information isn’t a profitable business model. Once it became evident in the early 00s that user information is a lucrative endeavor for online companies, entire fields of business have been devoted to harvesting and using this information that users have waived the rights to. AT&T was one of the earliest corporations to engage in wiretapping to aid government agencies, and despite multiple promises by politicians, there’s nothing to prove that these procedures have ceased for any of the telecommunication companies.

 

What this documentary brought to light was the abundance of information that people voluntarily give about themselves on the internet. An Austrian teen proved how much information Facebook truly collects about its users when, after badgering the company’s Ireland office for the data from his profile, the company handed him a document with over 1000 pages. This document detailed everything he had ever done on the website, which he had only used sparingly for a three-year period. He found that every action he had ever done that involved Facebook was preserved in his data profile – even information that he believed had been deleted. Online companies have the right to retain this information and even information that has been wiped from a public profile is still able to be seen by governmental agencies that get ahold of your data files.

 

Even more pervasive than Facebook, however, is the online trail each of us leave without ever realizing it – and just how easy it is to track that data trail. Surveillance technology conventions occur with regular frequency and are attended by dozens of vendors, and each offers technology that allows the purchaser to track every move of an online target. One product, called Finfisher, targets individuals and tracks their every digital movement. It was even used during the riots in Egypt to trace the moves of the rebels and even predict their next motions. This is due in part to the fact that cell phones hold more information about our personal lives and actions than any other device, even our laptops. Technology is readily available to hack into your online profile and analyze your every move, as long as you’re able to accommodate the price tag.

 

Overall, this documentary opened my eyes to the depth of government involvement in our everyday lives online. The point of the film was to make the viewer think twice about posting on Facebook, and that goal is certainly

All in favor, say “woof”

John Oliver’s talk show, Last Week Tonight, has been highly regarded as one of the most biting new shows in the “news satire” field, but he took it to an entirely new level on Sunday with his depiction of US Supreme Court oral arguments – played by dogs.

In an article on the WSJ Speakeasy Blog, the author contends that the oral arguments by the Supreme Court are paralyzingly boring.  However, the author implies a question that has been expressed by countless other bloggers, television personalities, and even by John Oliver himself in the clip: Why must the Supreme Court place a prohibition on recording devices in its courtroom?

Many have an issue with the fact that the most prominent court in our nation is also one of the most secretive, particularly when it comes to the few decisions that it hears and publishes opinions for. Oliver contends that the reason he created this bit to begin with is to draw the attention of the American public to the importance of the Supreme Court opinions. However, I disagree that creating a visual aid for the arguments is the best way to go about creating public interest.

The Supreme Court says that they don’t allow visual recording of the arguments for fear that the words will be taken out of context. However, that risk is still present with the audio recordings. I disagree with the author (and the media as a whole) that Supreme Court arguments should be recorded, simply because the act of having a camera facing towards you when you’re doing anything of importance changes the way you behave.

It’s been proven that the presence of visual recording devices alters behavior, and although it usually changes people to behave better, that could have disastrous consequences for legal authenticity. Part of what makes the Supreme Court so revered is that the judges are appointed for life, they (purportedly) are free of bias, and because of this, they are the ultimate interpreters of the law of our land. If anything about this free-flowing legal idealism is altered, the entire scheme of our justice system changes, and not for the better.

Although I disagree with the implications of the Supreme Court being recorded in future arguments, I’ve got to admit – seeing Ruth Bader Ginsburg adjusting her glasses made me absurdly happy. Check out the clip below:

Albums that aren’t yet “out of the woods”

On October 13, Taylor Swift released the second single, “Out of the Woods,” from her upcoming album 1989.

With all the publicity that she’s been getting for her new music, I can’t be the first to express surprise at the fact that this album hasn’t leaked yet. And, as someone who (until recently) didn’t consider herself to be a Taylor Swift fan, I’m a little disappointed that snippets of the new material aren’t yet floating around the dark corners of the Internet.

The lack of album leakage for 1989 made me begin to think about what the implications are for copyright and sales statistics once the album actually is finally released. Much to my surprise, leaked albums usually aren’t detrimental to album sales, and it seems to be a pretty close split between artists who are upset about leaks versus artists who don’t mind.

When I searched for our lady TSwift’s leaked album, however, I had an interesting message pop up on my google search:

Screen Shot 2014-10-17 at 3.17.36 PM

I’ve had to do a decent amount of research on the DMCA for my law classes, and it’s interesting to see the type of forms and arguments used when filing a copyright violation notice under the Act.When you follow the link to ChillingEffects.org, the page that comes up is a list of ten copyright violations for upcoming albums (generally for lesser-known artists, but includes the likes of T-Pain, Lenny Kravitz and Taylor Swift) an extensive laundry list of website URLS with the “offending” leaks. The complaint was submitted by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, and effectively worked to put a hold on the further activity of those links (and the allegedly illegal content within them).

The issue here arises such that when a company sends a cease-and-desist notice to a website, they’re constricting the free speech rights of the website owner. Whether or not the owner has been engaging in illegal activity is an entirely different story, but the DMCA imposes regulations when a web poster has circumvented copyright regulation measures regardless of whether or not a copyright violation exists. Although I’m a believer that copyrighted works should be protected, I take issue with the fact that it’s possible to be found in violation of a law when you’ve committed no foul play.

So, while the rest of us go about our daily lives and trudge about until we can legally get ahold of the shiny new pop persona of America’s most popular blonde chanteuse, I’ll remain content with humming along to YouTube videos.

“Celebgate” Attorney and Google Begin Legal Tango

On October 1, 2014, Google was reminded of how poor a choice it is to not reply to your email in a timely fashion.

Martin D. Singer, a partner in the law firm that represents over a dozen of the celebrities whose photos were leaked over Labor Day weekend after their iCloud accounts were hacked, sent an email to Google and YouTube executives stating the grounds and demands of a lawsuit in wake of the leaked photos. Martin’s 4-page email details how Google failed to take measures to prevent the spread of the leaked photographs, and by doing so, was in violation of copyright law.

The primary ethical issue here is that Google has been on notice of the demand to remove the photographs for over four weeks, and their lack of action is blatantly in violation of their own codes of integrity and honesty. Singer’s letter highlights the discrepancies between Google’s mantras and their actual conduct, and makes the fierce allegation that the online giant was only looking out for their bottom line – not their ethical line.

As for the legal basis of the suit, Singer is choosing to implicate Google on charges related to the violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which mandates the removal of copyrighted material by ISPs upon request. By saying that Google had knowledge of the stolen copyrighted material and continued to disseminate it online by allowing for the pictures to be searched and refusing to take down the websites that hosted the photos, Singer claims the corporation has violated copyright and privacy law.

Twitter has been buzzing with news of the $100m lawsuit:

…although some are skeptical of the celebrities’ intentions.

All in all, the right to privacy for the impacted women has undoubtedly been breached, but in the “wild west” of copyright law on the internet, the chances of a lawsuit of this magnitude being successful aren’t high. This story is only just beginning, and the coming developments are likely going to have an impact on internet copyright law in the long run.

Seven Things That Made Me Yell At the TV When Watching “How To Get Away With Murder”

I’m going to be honest here – I’m not the biggest fan of most television shows. When I want to sit in front of a glowing box and numb my brain, I prefer to watch HGTV and cry at the fact that House Hunters is actually scripted television (how dare they?!). So, when I sat down to watch the series premiere of How To Get Away With Murder last night, I had high expectations.

As someone who’s been through the meat grinder that is your first year of law school, I was curious to see how the notorious 1L was depicted on the small screen. I was terribly, terribly disappointed, and I had to be restrained from getting up and shutting the TV off halfway through the episode. Here’s what made me nearly throw the cable box out the window.

 

1. They missed the huge blood spot on the floor when they were cleaning.

HOW DID THEY NOT SEE THE MASSIVE PUDDLE OF BLOOD?!

 

2. Only gunners wear suits to class.

Do less, people.

 

3. Those classes are WAY too large. What kind of school is this?!

Most first-year law classes don’t have more than 60-70 kids in them. This class had at least 100.

 

4. There were about a million ethics violations in and out of the courtroom.

I can’t even begin to list them. The entire courtroom scene would have every lawyer and judge in front of the ethics bureau for a suspension hearing.

 

5. No sorority girl would let a maintenance guy just walk into your house.

Nobody called for him? DON’T LET HIM IN!

 

6. The first day of class is NOT like The Paper Chase.

The teachers try to scare you, but it’s not as intense as that.

 

7. Law students do not have time to commit a murder.

We barely have time to bathe. Disposing of a body is a LOT to ask.

 

More than that, though, I was annoyed at the image of the legal profession that this show, amongst others, provides for the general public. Law isn’t as conniving, vicious, and heated as television makes it seem – on the contrary, most of the time law is pretty calm and based on paperwork and research. A very minuscule percentage of cases actually do make it to trial, and even then, cases are typically settled outside of the courtroom. There are times that law can be sexy and entertaining, but this show amplifies it to an extreme and creates a negative image of the criminal defense field.

Although the show was entertaining, I don’t think that I have enough patience to refrain from yelling at the TV every Thursday. What did you guys think of the show?

Not Giving It Up So Fast – Robin Thicke and the “Blurred Lines” Copyright Controversy

For a man who rose to fame by crooning “I know you want it,” Robin Thicke needs to take a step back and consider what he wants in the legal battle surrounding his hit single, “Blurred Lines”.

In an article from The Hollywood Reporter, the unsealed depositions of Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams are made public in light of the current lawsuit between Thicke and the estate of Marvin Gaye. Gaye’s estate has claimed that Thicke’s single is an unauthorized derivative of Gaye’s 1977 classic, “Got To Give It Up.” In the disclosed documents, however, both Thicke and Williams state that Thicke had little to do with the actual writing of the controversial song – mainly because Thicke was extremely intoxicated for the majority of the songwriting.

The transcripts show that Gaye’s counsel played a mashup of “Blurred Lines” and “Got To Give It Up” on top of each other, and apparently, the result was entirely disastrous. You can try for yourself and see if you hear any similarities, but to my untrained ear, it doesn’t seem as if the two songs don’t share anything other than a similar, but not identical, bass line.

In fact, the article focuses on how these celebrity depositions seem to be more of a distraction from the actual issue of the case – the copyright infringement suit.

In order to pass their motion for summary judgment, the Gaye estate as the cross-claimant to the suit must prove that Thicke’s song is substantially similar to Gaye’s. What the general public is taking from the deposition disclosure has nothing to do with that fact, and the bulk of the media attention surrounding the pending litigation has been in regard to Thicke’s substance abuse.

The most important point of the article is how the depositions don’t do anything to refute the claims that the songs are in violation of copyright law. While the deposition reveals how Thicke says that he admires Gaye, he states several times that the songs are very different and points out the differences between the songs within the transcript. Simply taking inspiration from a song isn’t a violation of copyright law, and the article even says, “[h]ow all this fits into the ongoing lawsuit is an intriguing question in and of itself.”

Although Thicke’s and Williams’s statements are certainly shocking, they aren’t particularly relevant to the legal matter at hand. This article does a good job of recognizing that fact, and helps to bring the legal argument back into the forefront of the audience’s mind by placing the legal discussion at the end of the piece.

“I’ll take a burger deluxe, with a side of extortion”: Yelp and Potential Review Inflation

Online reviewing systems are largely viewed as a bastion of free speech and an unfettered source of consumer opinion in today’s heavily-marketed world. Reviews on Amazon can often go viral, and a bad write-up on a blog or another reviewing platform has been the kiss of death for more than one business. So when one of the biggest reviewing websites gives its clientele an opportunity to do away with the negative side effects of a disgruntled customer, how will that change the online review landscape?

Yelp is about to find out.

Earlier this month, the 9th Circuit held that Yelp is entitled to alter reviews of businesses in exchange for advertising fees. 

The court’s rationale behind the decision was that, at the end of the day, Yelp is a business – they need to do what’s going to keep the dollar signs rolling in. However, the decision to protect the right to essentially charge for inflated reviews doesn’t come without criticism, and many opponents are yelling extortion. In the case of smaller businesses, the capital necessary to invest in Yelp advertising might not be available. Charging for ad space in exchange for better reviews will definitely put larger businesses at an advantage, and in today’s consumer climate, that’s a controversial move.

Business reviews on Yelp have already been under scrutiny, and there’s currently a bill in the works in California to protect consumers when they do choose to write negative reviews. Having a business punish customers for writing negative reviews certainly impedes their right to expression, but how does it play out when the company that hosts the reviews is the one doing the censorship?

The court’s decision means that Yelp’s automated algorithm that controls business reviews is allowed to skew those reviews based upon Yelp’s own criteria under the logic of “hard bargaining” in the business world. Whether or not this review alteration will be based primarily on which businesses take out ads can only be determined in the future, but I’d be hesitant to believe that we’re not going to be seeing some rating inflation on a few dubious bodegas.

For today, however, it seems like a consumer’s right to leave a nasty comment might not be as solid as it seems. If I want to invoke my first amendment rights to warn the masses about unsatisfactory curly fries at a diner, I want the ability to do so – without having to worry if my review will be deleted.

Image cred: Here

Welcome!

The law.

It sounds intimidating, right? The word “law” sparks mental images of people in jail, police sirens wailing, and judges sitting at benches waiving their gavels with reckless abandon.

The truth is, the law is much, much more simple than people realize. And it’s way more applicable to real-life, too.

The law is what happens when celebrity photos are leaked. The law is the force that allows open forum websites to exist, even under questionable circumstances. The law is what allows for social media campaigns to create actual changes in state and national legislation.

Media would be nothing without the law, and the law wouldn’t be the same without media.

In this blog, I hope to explore and provide my own insight on the current issues at the intersection of law and the media – with a fair amount of wit thrown in for good measure. The First Amendment is there for a reason, right?

Thanks for stopping by, and I hope that you keep reading along with me!