France's Dailymotion Fined for Hosting Copyrighted Film Clip

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on July 17, 2007 - 12:24pm.

Paris - Dailymotion, a France-based video-sharing site that recently launched a dedicated U.S. version of its service, has been ordered by a court in Paris to pay nearly $32,000 in fines for distributing a clip of a copyrighted film, Variety reported.

While director Christian Carion was paid a symbolic single Euro for the unauthorized posting of a clip from his film, "Merry Christmas," Dailymotion will pay the film's producers Nord-Ouest about $18,000 and distributors UGC about $14,000.

Dailymotion must also publish the court's ruling on its website for eight days, or face a daily fine of about $2,000.

The company is considering an appeal, Variety reports.  

 

Related Links:
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117968683.html

http://www.dailymotion.com

Comments

DailyMotion confirmed as a hosting site

The judge condemned DailyMotion to pay (limited) damages, that is correct. But the court also confirmed a key point, which is that DailyMotion is a hosting provider and not an editor. This is very meaningful since this is core to the value proposition of being a user-driven platform dedicated to creativity and self-expression. In other words, DailyMotion can operate under the safe harbours guidelines provided for in the European Directive on the matter. Noe that is in contrast to the case of Lafesse-MySpace whereby MySpace was condemned as an editor. Another point to note is that the payment is not effective immediately if DM appeals; this is rare under French Law. What the judge wants to ensure is that DM uses all the means in its power to fight piracy at upload. The methods that have developed and deployed by DM (there are a number, some of which we do not disclose as we consider them to be a competitive advantage) were not used in this case. So all-in-all we are comforted in our ability to run the business as a hosting company and monetize our inventory. This legacy lawsuit will be superseded by the efforts and methods put in place to fight copyright infringement very proactively. I see Metacafe and DailyMotion as the best of breed in this regard. Just have a look at places like www.tv-links.co.uk or alluc.org and see how much content is driven by other "brand names" in the segment, including YT for that matter youtube.

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