At the end of last season I tried to contact TBA to try and collaboratively work on embedding our archive into their match results content. I never heard back from them on the topic.
Thanks! Its been added to our list. You should see it in the archive in the next few days.
Create an issue and bring it up there. Somebody can help you out there with the development process (I wouldn’t mind doing it, but it might not be for a while - I have a lot of other projects I’m working on and am still learning the TBA code base)
Hi Everyone!
Bochek, we must have lost your email to us. Please reach out to us on our mailing list at https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/thebluealliance-developers and we’d love to get involved!
The Blue Alliance is collaborative project because we know we can’t do as many things as we’d like to with the time we have. Whether you’re a developer who can commit code, or you want to help suggest more videos, data, or other ideas (coordinating at https://www.facebook.com/groups/moardata/ ), we’d love to have your help!
Cheers,
Eugene
I think the reason people are reacting negatively to this is that teams like 1676 spend a lot of time recording, editing, and uploading their match videos. To have their videos copied with no credit to their original effort is what hurts. If another site started linking your videos without your consent I’m sure you’d be unhappy (even though they weren’t yours to begin with).
It’s great that WFN wants to create an archive. I’m all for it because I know personal youtube channels are not reliable and I’d love to be able to rewatch old matches 5-10 years from now. But I think the way to get 100% community support is to 1) Cite the source from your video and 2) Share the videos through TBA. If you need to pay someone to develop your website and really aren’t making money off your site, it sounds like a match made in heaven for you to partner with TBA. WFN provides cited backups of videos and TBA provides the infrastructure by which to share them. This would be a huge improvement to the current situation!
My 2 cents. Good luck 
That’s not the issue. The ad is there because you get some benefit for it being there. It might be cheaper hosting, it might be money to the team, it might be money to you, whatever. The point is that the ad is there and that the only way to view the content you took from other teams is via a page with the ad on it. Even if you’re not “profiting” in the traditional sense of receiving checks in the mail, it’s still quite clear you’re setting up your website to take this content from other people and make it only viewable on a site with an ad on it. That’s not fair to the people that worked hard to make and upload the content.
The proper way to resolve this is to ask for permission to take other people’s content. That simple.
This. The very act of using a third party piece of software to download match video and then reposting them on a site borders on/is copyright infringement. That’s why youtube allows you to embed their videos into a site, kind of like what TBA does.
Also, the audio getting removed because of copyright issues is not as big of a deal as some would make it seem. I haven’t seen many videos, if any this year where that has happened.
Just FYI, I sent an email about three days ago but haven’t received any response yet.
^ does this imply mentors get paid in other countries? I didn’t know that was a thing…
EDIT: I gladly donate my time on behalf of the students to see them learn and grow. It was just shocking to me to think that mentors get paid for their time.
I as a mentor in the USA do not get payed either. We, as mentors, benefit at the end of the 6 weeks seeing the students have fun and compete in the Regionals/Districts. So as the below statement reads last time I checked it goes against what FIRST stands for.
Try having your work purloined and see how you feel about it.
They only had to ask, but since they did not, it is copyright infringement, and I intend to pursue that.
Simply put: WFN has taken a teams work and is using it without permission. Intellectual Property Theft may be legal in Canada, but not in the United States.
Glad to see that this party didn’t stop. Hope this drama can tide everyone over until someone gets “wronged” in eliminations on Saturday.
A lot of people watch stuff that happens on this site and in the greater community. Including a lot of kids.
“♫ You take the high road and I’ll just sit here and complain on the internet ♫”
As author Lisa Kleypas said, “A good conversation always involves a certain amount of complaining.”
You just made yourself look more childish than everyone in this thread…
Alright, let’s stop this immature mudslinging and act like grown-ups. We all have been behaving like little kids in both this thread and in Shaun’s (now-mod-closed) ‘Video Stealing’ thread.
WatchFIRSTNow has been gracious enough to remove the footage that I wanted to be taken down, and I’m sure if anyone else wants their footage deleted from WFN’s account, all they have to do is ask. Thank you, WatchFIRSTNow, for complying with our request.
With that, how about the rest of us now show our GP to WatchFIRSTNow and bring this thread back to what they created it for. If you recorded an event and want to post a link to your playlist for WatchFIRSTNow to transfer to their Vimeo account, please do so below.
Also, if anyone has **constructive **suggestions for how to improve WFN or archiving in general, I’m sure it would be gladly appreciated, but perhaps PM those in charge or start a new separate thread for it instead of further bogging down and cluttering WatchFIRSTNow’s thread.
P.S. - Mods, I know it was said that you would keep the ‘Video Stealing’ thread locked for 24 hours. Why don’t we just keep that thread locked permanently so no more harm is done.
It’d be excellent if they would just take down the content that isn’t theirs, without being asked. There’s still three years worth of FiM footage uploaded, still with ads underneath it.
I’m not sure how you can call it “work” per se but when it comes to any sort of element of FIRST and online videos and pictures I would be honoured for my stuff to be spread about the community. Yes the common courtesy is to ask but we also have to remember that WHATEVER is posted on the internet is pretty much free game since there isn’t exactly an INTERNATIONAL Cyberlaw that stipulates or mandates anything. Yes there are “Terms and Service Agreements” but how often would they actually hold up in civil court? Keep in mind the team affected the most is currently from the USA and WFN is run by Canadians.
Again I will reiterate what I have said before… this should NOT be about legalities but rather continuing to spread the word of FIRST via archived matches. WFN isn’t altering the videos, they are simply moving it from one server to another so everything is in one space and doesn’t get lost years down the road if teams shutdown.
Basically what it boils down to is the WFN needs to work out some kinks. They are ASKING for solutions and this is your OPPORTUNITY. Resolve the issues without getting into your legal resources. Suing people over this would be the most stupid thing I will EVER see because it will actually most likely do MORE HARM than good.
REMEMBER what we are preaching about… STEM Education… Inspiring Science and Technology AND remember who we are doing it for… the STUDENTS! Teaching them to reach out to a legal power rather than civilly working out the issues personally is not the way I would handle the situation.
Let’s put on our thinking caps and give WFN some realistic solutions they can work with and develop (this isn’t going to happen over night folks).
I leave you with this article…
If created in the U.S., it’s a copyrighted work if it is a creative work of authorship fixed in a tangible medium of expression.
I didn’t actually view the allegedly infringing material, so I’m curious: was 1676’s footage original (i.e. the video was a creative work by someone on the team1), or was it a direct copy of FIRST’s feed? Because if it was a direct copy, no matter how much work you put into making that direct copy, no new copyright exists.2
As for the question of whether it’s enforceable in Canada, yes, it probably is, if the copyright holder is willing to bear substantial inconvenience. There actually are international treaties that govern copyright that specify procedures for handling foreign copyrights.
I’m still curious about their intentions, and whether they intended to claim fair use/fair dealing, intended to infringe, or didn’t know one way or another.
1 For completeness: or, was the copyright assigned to the team or its representatives (official or unofficial)?
2 There is, of course, ambiguity about what a direct copy is—but the core consideration is that only creativity can create a copyright.
It’s not. They sit in the stands and–with almost ridiculous diligence–record every match.
I doubt Ryan is talking about suing anyone. Is it legal? I don’t know, and frankly I don’t care. Would your grandmother be ok with you copying someone’s hard work and getting something out of it for yourself without asking? Use your own compass. Mine says it doesn’t matter what other good could come of it, you’re taking something (video views) from someone, you ask and you credit.
I still think this is a valid thing to do. We barely have any match footage from 2004 save some matches at Championship and a few others here and there on YouTube. No I don’t think YouTube accounts are just going to go away, but stranger things have happened and it never hurts to have a copy as a backup.
But I think the appropriate way to handle it would have been to ask if you could archive their content first, not just going ahead & doing it. Always get permission when it comes to re-using & re-hosting someone elses video content. If you didn’t capture it & edit it yourself, you need to ask.