the public? Hell how about educating google/youtube who do take downs against videos that don't even infringe. I can imagine the fun they will have Monday with people uploading content
Google is legally obligated to do so by the DMCA's safe-harbor provision (otherwise they lose their safe-harbor status). The problem is with the people who request the takedowns.
In particular, the DMCA (17 USC 512) requires that, in the takedown notice, the sender must state that they have a "good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law", and anyone who "knowingly materially misrepresents under this section that material or activity is infringing" is liable for damages, both to the person who posted the not-actually-infringing content, and to the service provider in their act of taking down and reinstating the content.
This should be a safeguard, and a sufficiently enthusiastic legal team ought to be able to make the argument that there is a lot of knowing material misrepresentation going on. (It's hard for robots to have good-faith beliefs!) But I think very few people have been trying this argument in court. The EFF has been involved in a few, relatively tiny cases, which seem to have been successful, but nobody's been fighting this at scale.
Does Content ID exist because otherwise Google would run afoul of 17 USC 512(c)(1), that people could argue that Google is "aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent" or something, because even the general public knows that lots of YouTube videos use other people's music?
It doesn't seem like it's in Google's inherent engineering interest to build this system. Of course, that doesn't distinguish from "the law makes them" and "their business relationships make them", but the hypothesis that Google feels beholden to other companies needs a little more evidence.
For instance, Google's 2013 revenue was $50 billion, and $66 billion in 2014, and the entire music industry's 2013 revenue was $7 billion (2014 data isn't out yet). Placating the music industry doesn't seem like particularly well-directed greed.
No, they do do it because of the DCMA. The only reason they are provided safe harbor is by taking down the content upon request. If they didn't, they could potentially be liable for what they host.
But only for the same reason, so that they wouldn't be sued for hosting copyrighted material. The DMCA simply gives an official way to not have liability. The problem of overzealous litigation would still be there without the DMCA, unless we tackle that, then content providers are going to be quick to take things down so as to not be liable for hosting the content in the first place.
What I'm saying is that no, they won't do it to not harm their business relationship, they'll do it because otherwise, they'd be potentially sued for hosting copyrighted material without authorization.
If copyright rules were more lax, I'd doubt they'd be willing to cede nearly as much ground to NBC Universal and the like with Content ID and Content Verification Program.
I wish Google would take my videos down. When Google took over Youtube, and just needed to change the login to "I want it in My name Daddy!"; they screwed up somewhere because
I have an account I can't access. I can't remove my videos.
Yes, I went to the boards. Yes, I went to Google, but they
were too busy to take care of my trivial problem. By the way, this huge company doesn't seem to have a phone number--unless it's sales related? (My videos were were basically
a personal diary of things I need to do. One had a product brand name in it and took off. I always thought I could delete, so I never cared about how my videos looked.)
I wish Youtube would take my videos down? When Google couldn't
leave a decent login in system alone, and had to tie it to
"I want it in my name daddy!", I can't access my account to
delete my old videos. Yea, I tried all the stuff they recommended, but I can't access the videos. I contacted Google, but they didn't have a clue, and told me to go to the
boards. It was a very polite email. (I used Youtube as a personal diary of things I need to do, or projects that needed further work. One video had a product brand name in it and gained attention. I never thought they would be kidnaped? They are boring videos, but there's one I want off
for multiple reasons).
