This book presents a guide to the resource acquisition, legal, and financial necessities of producing an independent film.  Every aspect of the planning and execution of the business side of filmmaking is discussed, including hypothetical situations based on the personal experience of the entertainment lawyers who co-authorized the book.  The book introduces the roles of producer and lawyer, then outlines the film development process through deal making, financing, hiring, licensing and distribution.

As is pertains to my project, this book provides valuable insight into the warranted concern that filmmakers have had with the 21st century dispute over Internet distribution rights.  In the case of Viacom v. Youtube, the exclusive rights per the 1976 Copyright Act for copyright owners to reproduce their works became the basis for allegations against YouTube for a count of direct copyright infringement.  The authors of this book advise filmmakers to negotiate with distributors on the basis that they "cannon distribute on the Net until there is adequate 'border protection' to prevent access outside licensed territories" (132).

Erickson, Gunnar, Harris Tulchin, Mark Halloran, and J. Gunnar Erickson. The Independent Film Producer's Survival Guide: A Business and Legal Sourcebook . New York: Schirmer Trade Books, 2005

As Alfred Yen, professor of law at the Boston College Law School, states in his introduction, this article "studies the construction of third party copyright liability in light of the recent Supreme Court case Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. v Grokster, Ltd.” The article is broken up into five sections: the first describes the doctrines that governed third party liability before Grokster, the second uses “fault and strict liability to expose the theoretical and practical tradeoffs implicit I these differing constructions, the third analyzes the case itself, the fourth describes the implications of the decision and “sets forth the general contours of an improved, post-Grokster­ construction of third party copyright liability, and the fifth gives some thought to the future of this subject matter.

The Grokster case is the latest in a series of cases where an internet service provider has been prosecuted for the actions of its users. Yet, even with this new decision in the books, little progress has been made to determine who is really the most responsible for infringement or how to hold them adequately responsible. Yen writes that “third part copyright liability benefits society by encouraging individuals to stop others from infringing, but those benefits come at a price… third party copyright liability suppresses non-infringing as well as infringing behavior.” Overall, this paradox illustrates the biggest deficit of internet copyright law: the inability to find the balance between, in Yen’s words, “desirable and undesirable consequences” of new technology. At this point in time, there seems to be no obvious strategy for regulating the internet without stifling future innovation and creation.

This article points out that although Grokster “gave the Supreme Court the opportunity to straighten out the law of third party copyright liability” little to no progress was actually made in interpreting pre-Grokster doctrines of third party copyright liability. Instead of “choosing between” existing “differing interpretations” of the law, Yen writes that the court “adopted a dormant theory of third party copyright liability, inducement.” Overall, Yen’s article shows that “inducement give courts a new tool for holding culpable defendants liable which reducing the risk of undesirable side effects.” Yen describes the Grokster decision as being “not a landmark, so much as a milestone, ratifying a continuing détente between those who build on the Internet and those in a position to regulate the builders.” This decision has also turned the focus of internet gate keeping to controlling software and PC uses ability to run that software rather than the ability to control the entire network.

Whether or not one agrees with the merit of the new inducement doctrine, this article is a comprehensive look at an area of copyright law that is important and continuing to quickly evolve. The story of these laws will continue to change drastically in the years to come, but this is a useful, informative and through-provoking look at the situation thus far.

Section 512 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is called “Limitations on liability relating to material online.” It specifically outlines what an online service provider (OSP) can be held responsible for and the times when they are exempt for responsibility. 512 provides copyright holders the right to ask OSPs to remove material that appears on their sites or in their programs if it is an infringement of copyright. However, a service provider is not liable for “monetary relief” or for “injunction or other equitable relief” if “the service provider does not have actual knowledge that the material or an activity using the material on the system or network is infringing” and upon obtaining such knowledge “responds expeditiously to remove, or disable access to, the material that is claimed to be infringing or to be the subject of infringing activity.”

In other words, a service provider is, in many cases, not liable for the content posted by its users, but must act swiftly to remove the infringing material from its site or service once it is notified of the infringement. Basically, if the OSPs comply promptly and effectively with copyright holders’ take down requests then they are protected by a “safe harbor” provision. According to reference.com the definition of a “safe harbor” is “a provision of a statute or a regulation that reduces or eliminates a party's liability under the law, on the condition that the party performed its actions in good faith.”

Therefore, this section of the DMCA is particularly important in determining secondary liability. A safe harbor can only be created if the site or service follows proper protocol and has been cleared of primary liability in the first place. Napster was held liable for the content being uploaded by its users because it provided a centralized server through which all information had to be passed, and thus was not granted a safe harbor.

YouTube is currently being protected by 512 because of its compliance with any and all take down notices it receives. YouTube's safe-harbor status is also helped by the fact that it has partnered itself with big, copyright-holding companies. Of course, if YouTube wasn't also complying with the takedown notices being issued by copyright holders in the first place, these partnerships wouldn't matter - or at least we’d like to think it wouldn't... The business possibilities for YouTube may almost be enough to outweigh the law, if they get the right business partners on their side.

512 is an important provision because it allows sites and services with substantial non-infringing uses to function with the possible existence of infringing material in exchange for removing that infringing material as quickly as possible. A no-tolerance infringement policy seems to be outside the scope of available online practices, therefore 512 allows services to exist with the understanding that there is inherent infringement on the internet.