Stewardess

In response to the recent meta about fan works and racism by Franzeska, I'm posting links to stuff I wrote in 2009 about the events summarized as Racefail09. Franzeska's recent meta is in two parts, one public, and one locked to AO3 members.

My posts on Racefail09 from 2009:

--How to use white privilege to make racism disappear, January 31, 2009, on LiveJournal and DreamWidth. Contains a ton of sarcasm.

--Reckless Eyeballing in the 21st Century, March 19, 2009, on LiveJournal and Dreamwidth.

Franzeska and I have the same background fannishly and culturally. I have known Franzeska for several years, through appreciating her vidding, and through meeting her at fan gatherings. We follow many of the same fandom blogs. In 2006-2008, I wrote meta identical to Franzeska's, in my case defending racism in the Supernatural fandom/show. I was in my late forties (way older than Franzeska is now) before I made the decision to stop prioritizing the feelings of white women (myself included) over making fan spaces inclusive and safe for all fans. Racefail09 was a huge part of that decision.

Among the criticisms of Franzeska's meta is its lack of references to past discussions about racism in fandom, such as Racefail09, which is why I'm sharing my 2009 posts. My posts were unimportant to the Racefail09 discussions, but they and the comments to them demonstrate that the discussions were unmissable in my/Franzeska's corner of fandom, so I agree with the criticism that their absence from Franzeska's recent meta is an erasure of the years of struggle that fans of color have waged against dehumanization and silencing. There is not a single point raised in Franzeska's recent meta that was not addressed, at a huge personal cost, by fans of color during Racefail09.

Note: I included links to the posts on LiveJournal (an account I no longer update) because only the LiveJournal posts have comments; my DreamWidth account was created a couple of months afterward in 2009.

This techdirt article, How To Get The IFPI To Issue Bogus DMCA Takedowns On Just About Anything, says the IFPI is using link (URL) scraping to find music.

A few weeks ago, we wrote about how the IFPI (sort of the international RIAA) had bizarrely issued a DMCA takedown on Kim Dotcom's own album off of his own website, Mega. Obviously, the IFPI holds no copyright on Dotcom's album, and the takedown was obviously false.

Makes a lot of sense. It explains why the takedowns seem so random, why music posted months or even years back can get zapped, and why people get takedowns for their original work. Edit: it also explains why people have gotten takedowns for posts they deleted.

This is an argument for always creating a custom URL when you post on Tumblr, instead of letting Tumblr generate the URL. If you don't create a custom URL, then Tumblr generates one from the first text in your post, which, in the case of music, is likely to be a song title, album, or artist.

If, on the other hand, you create a custom URL such as "I-LOVE-BANANAS-089", or simply random numbers, your links will contain no useful keywords to scrape.

Not only did I never use custom URLs on tumblr, I always put song title, album, and artist in the first line of my music posts, because I had a blog style that didn't display them otherwise. :(

Unfortunately, as the techdirt article explains, the link scraping system can still be manipulated, so custom URLs are not a guaranteed way to escape takedowns.

Not using tags with music posts, or deleting tags after the fact, won't prevent takedowns. Nor will editing the audio post to delete the file you uploaded, and then changing it to a Spotify or SoundCloud post instead (this is possible; I did it a bunch of times), since that doesn't change the audio post's URL.

Contains excerpts of communications with Tumblr since 2013.

---

Dear torrentfreak.com;

Ignore the bits about prodding Tumblr for answers if you have given that up as hopeless.

Your site recently had an article about a European ISP adopting a "three copyright infringement strikes in 18 months = banned" policy due to lawsuit-threat pressure from IRMA.

http://torrentfreak.com/isps-three-strikes-scheme-is-weird-and-broken-150214/

Did Yahoo/Tumblr adopt the three strikes policy due to a real or perceived threat from the IFPI? When you consider how much copyrighted music users have uploaded to Tumblr (which Tumblr makes available through a built-in streaming audio player), the IFPI could probably sue Tumblr's pants off. The audio files aren't adequately protected. Browser extensions allowing anyone to download the audio have been around for years; Tumblr has to be aware of this. Something to ask them about.

I'm curious if other blogging sites have adopted the "three in 18" rule, too -- is it becoming a standard "Don't sue us, IFPI!" grovel among ISPs? But I don't know precisely when Tumblr adopted it; another thing to ask.

The first time I saw Tumblr mention three strikes was November, 2014, but my first "alleged copyright infringement violation" on Tumblr was in August, 2013, when Fox went bananas and had every image of "X-Men:Days of Future Past" removed from Tumblr, most of them publicity stills Fox had released to news services. The email notice from Tumblr didn't mention the "three in 18" rule then, but said vaguely:

"Should you be subject to repeat uncontested copyright infringement notifications, your Tumblr account may be terminated."

My next copyright infringement occurred a year later, in August, 2014. Tumblr's notification did not include who had requested the takedown, but judging from the response I sent to Tumblr it was Fox going after X-Men publicity photos again. The notice from Tumblr was more ominous, but still did not mention the "three in 18" rule:

"We're writing to let you know that, due to repeated uncontested notifications of copyright infringement against one or more of your blogs, your Tumblr account is one more uncontested notice away from termination. PLEASE CONSIDER THIS A FINAL WARNING."

( Read more... )

My tumblr account stewardish was terminated today due to "repeat copyright violations." Tumblr has a "three strikes" policy. After three takedown notices in 18 months, your account is terminated.

The violations:

1. The song "The Rains of Castomere," purchased through Amazon and uploaded to tumblr as a streaming audio post in April, 2014. Jeremy Banks of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) is using bots to find song posts going back years and issuing takedowns for each one. Note: there are millions of uploaded songs on tumblr. Most IPs recognize the songs (which stream, not download) are good advertising for them, not piracy.

2. A November photo edit of a scan a fan made of a hobbit calendar. I mistakenly tagged the photo "bofa visual companion," and got a takedown notice from Harper Collins, publishers of The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies Visual Companion. The post was deleted; I notifed tumblr the image wasn't the property of Harper Collins and asked them to restore the post and remove the "strike." Tumblr did not respond and the post stayed deleted.

3. A photo edit of a Days of Future Past still that appeared on thousands of websites and blogs. Like the IFPI, Fox went through tumblr and issued takedowns for everything tagged "dofp" regardless of content. I notified tumblr my edit of the photo was fair use and that the strike should be removed. Tumblr did not respond.

I've asked tumblr to restore my account. If they do not, I do not have the heart to return to a website where my content can be wiped out on the say-so of takedown bots, and where my requests for help are ignored. Alleged copyright takedowns are treated as genuine takedowns by tumblr every time.

Recently finished:

No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission That Killed Osama Bin Laden, by Mark Owen, Kevin Maurer. As a first-person special forces narrative, it's only average (Eric Haney's Inside Delta Force remains supreme in the genre).

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. Hilarious and hugely informative general science book. Ten years old, and sometimes wrong about stuff. Still very much worth it. The audio version is great; I checked out the audio version from the library, then bought the book and read it.

Currently reading:

Halfway through Shelby Foote's long Civil War history. It's great as military history, not so much history in general. For socio-political stuff, you need Eric Foner. Foote's books are about the men who fought, how they fought, and what they experienced at the time. Foote is excellent at putting you there, reminding you that when people are engaged in Great Historical Events, they are almost never thinking about Great Historical Events, but about how many cigars they have left, or whether someone else will get promoted ahead of them, or how the newspapers might write things up, or all of those things at once.

Twelve Years A Slave by Solomon Northrup. Eighty percent done, and I am simultaneously looking forward to and dreading the movie. Why I am looking forward to it: Northrup recounts an experience that happened thousands of times but was always covered up by the slavocracy: slaves' frequently successful physical resistance to subjugation. Northrup fights off and beats the crap out of a white man (Edwin Epps), and everyone (except the slaves) pretends it didn't happen. I am sure Steve McQueen, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Michael Fassbender will do the scene justice (I don't know if McQueen has included the scene in his film, but I am 99% certain he will, because it is pivotal).

Midnight Rising by Tony Horwitz, about John Brown and the raid on Harper's Ferry. Listened to audio version (thanks, library!); bought the Kindle version to read.

Spreadable Media: Creating Value and Meaning in a Networked Culture: 80% done with it, and it is not working for me. I am not one of those folks who generally complain about "soft science," but that's what this is. One of the authors writes, "But who the heck knows why people gossip!" Behavioral scientists and neurologists, that's who! Don't you academics TALK to each other? I would boil the book down to: "Giant billion dollar entertainment corporations should be nicer!"

The Feminist Porn Book. Met one of the authors, Constance Penley, at Escapade! I've read 20% and am enjoying the hell out of it. Constance Penley was one of the best things about Escapade for me.

About to read:

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Main source for the recent film that won all the awards.

The Complete Personal Memoirs of General William T. Sherman. Obtained through Project Gutenberg, whooo!