YouTube Puts Some Monetary Weight Behind Fighting For Fair Use: Others Should Too | Techdirt

"Back in 2013, we were impressed when the folks at Automattic (the company behind WordPress), actually filed some lawsuits against people who were abusing DMCA takedown notices just to takedown content they didn't like. Earlier this year, the company also took a strong stand against DMCA abuse by including a 'Hall of Shame' in which it called out and shamed particularly egregious takedowns. At the time, we mentioned that other companies should pay attention. Fighting for your users' rights is important, but too many companies don't do it (and many just take things down on demand). Now YouTube has stepped up a bit as well. There have been plenty of complaints about how YouTube -- and ContentID in particular -- deal with fair use. It's quite difficult for an algorithm to determine fair use, and that's part of the reason why we get nervous when copyright system defenders insist that you can automate takedown processes without collateral damage. However, Google has announced that it will promise to pay the legal fees (up to $1 million) of certain YouTubers where takedowns have been issued in cases where YouTube agrees that fair use applies ..."