🚂 Hello all, you may be wondering why I haven't been uploading new videos for a while, and why one of my most popular videos, Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat not available any more on my channel.
Back in March, I received a letter from a lawyer representing the Lumiere Institute in France, demanding that I take down this video as the copyright belonged to them. I have hired a lawyer to investigate this claim because I thought it was in the public domain when I chose to enhance it. The lawyer did some research and confirmed that the video is in the public domain as Louis Lumière passed away more than 70 years ago. She also noted that I have never had advertisements on my historical videos as I personally believe that it is wrong to put advertisements on historical footage that belongs to the public. Through my lawyer, I answered to the Lumiere Institute that we considered this video to be in the public domain and I was using it only to demonstrate how amazing neural networks are. (And I think many of you agree).
Shortly after sending the letter to the Lumiere Institute, I received a DMCA claim from Youtube to take down this video. Youtube removed the video and gave my channel a strike - in order to use my channel I was then required to suffer through the copyright school of Youtube - essentially a cartoon about copyright done in the style of Happy Tree Friends. Were it not for COVID, this may be the most unpleasant experience I've had all year. To add salt to the wound, I noted that several other versions of this video were still available on Youtube, and no one had been forced to take them down.
I felt the situation was quite unfair as my intention was to show off the technology using one of the earliest videos in the world, which again, we thought was already in the public domain.
I decided to file a counterclaim to Youtube that the copyright strike was a mistake, and reviewing it, Youtube agreed, removed the strike, and restored the video.
However, the Lumiere Institute again contacted my lawyer and demanded again that I personally need to remove it. In seeking a positive outcome for all parties involved, I suggested that I would add information from Lumiere in the title, description, or thumbnail of the video to clarify the difference between the video version they are selling on DVD, and my technological experiment.
A few weeks ago they contacted me again and gave me a final warning that if I did not remove the video they would take me to court and then gave me seven days to respond.
While I still think this is unfair and am deeply disappointed that we couldn't come to a mutually beneficial agreement, I have decided that I will take down the video of "Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat" until 2024, the original copyright expiration date the Lumiere Institute lawyer mentioned in their first letter. I'm not in a place morally or financially right now to continue this fight, as it would be just me fighting against an established institution (and I don't speak French).
This is why, from today, the video is no longer accessible on my Youtube channel. As an AI enthusiast just looking for ways to make machine learning and history accessible to a broader audience, this is very disappointing and honestly makes me quite sad. This is why I'm taking a small break before uploading new videos as I want to take time to consider the future direction of the channel.
I want to thank everyone who watches, follows, and comments on my videos as this is the main reason why my channel became popular and why I'm still committed to doing machine learning experiments and sharing them with the public.
Denis Shiryaev
🚂 Hello all,
you may be wondering why I haven't been uploading new videos for a while, and why one of my most popular videos, Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat not available any more on my channel.
Back in March, I received a letter from a lawyer representing the Lumiere Institute in France, demanding that I take down this video as the copyright belonged to them. I have hired a lawyer to investigate this claim because I thought it was in the public domain when I chose to enhance it. The lawyer did some research and confirmed that the video is in the public domain as Louis Lumière passed away more than 70 years ago. She also noted that I have never had advertisements on my historical videos as I personally believe that it is wrong to put advertisements on historical footage that belongs to the public. Through my lawyer, I answered to the Lumiere Institute that we considered this video to be in the public domain and I was using it only to demonstrate how amazing neural networks are. (And I think many of you agree).
Shortly after sending the letter to the Lumiere Institute, I received a DMCA claim from Youtube to take down this video. Youtube removed the video and gave my channel a strike - in order to use my channel I was then required to suffer through the copyright school of Youtube - essentially a cartoon about copyright done in the style of Happy Tree Friends. Were it not for COVID, this may be the most unpleasant experience I've had all year. To add salt to the wound, I noted that several other versions of this video were still available on Youtube, and no one had been forced to take them down.
I felt the situation was quite unfair as my intention was to show off the technology using one of the earliest videos in the world, which again, we thought was already in the public domain.
I decided to file a counterclaim to Youtube that the copyright strike was a mistake, and reviewing it, Youtube agreed, removed the strike, and restored the video.
However, the Lumiere Institute again contacted my lawyer and demanded again that I personally need to remove it. In seeking a positive outcome for all parties involved, I suggested that I would add information from Lumiere in the title, description, or thumbnail of the video to clarify the difference between the video version they are selling on DVD, and my technological experiment.
A few weeks ago they contacted me again and gave me a final warning that if I did not remove the video they would take me to court and then gave me seven days to respond.
While I still think this is unfair and am deeply disappointed that we couldn't come to a mutually beneficial agreement, I have decided that I will take down the video of "Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat" until 2024, the original copyright expiration date the Lumiere Institute lawyer mentioned in their first letter. I'm not in a place morally or financially right now to continue this fight, as it would be just me fighting against an established institution (and I don't speak French).
This is why, from today, the video is no longer accessible on my Youtube channel. As an AI enthusiast just looking for ways to make machine learning and history accessible to a broader audience, this is very disappointing and honestly makes me quite sad. This is why I'm taking a small break before uploading new videos as I want to take time to consider the future direction of the channel.
I want to thank everyone who watches, follows, and comments on my videos as this is the main reason why my channel became popular and why I'm still committed to doing machine learning experiments and sharing them with the public.
BTW I still love trains 🚂
4 years ago | [YT] | 522