From the PubDef archive — published September 19, 2007, restored 2026. Links and embedded media may point to archived copies.
Yesterday evening, Multimedia KSDK, Inc. filed a complaint with YouTube about our posting of a video contrasting a September 13 story by reporter Mike Owens which ended with a promise to air a tape of an allegedly crooked real estate seller “saying he makes regular payments of cash to the local alderman” with their September 14 follow-up story that makes no mention of the allegation.
At 5:29 PM we received notice that YouTube took that video off-line. Then late last night, around 1:00 AM, all of our videos went off-line. That’s around the time KSDK Channel 5 filed a second complaint, this time on the posting of the original Sept 13 video. YouTube responded by suspending our account and taking all 500 of our videos off-line.
First, we believe our usage of Channel 5’s video falls under the “Fair Use” doctrine, the same doctrine Channel 5 presumably operates under each week as they use video content from other sources in their news broadcasts. In fact, PubDef’s own video has appeared on local television without our expressed written consent, presumably under “Fair Use”.
Secondly, KSDK never contacted us to ask us to remove the content and its labeling of us as a copyright infringer with YouTube is wrong and has caused us and our readers quite an inconvenience.
As we work this issue out with YouTube, we’d just like our readers and our community to know what’s going on, and the extent to which KSDK has gone to crush fair journalistic criticism.
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