S.978 Panic: Is Justin Bieber Going To Jail? (In A Word: No)

BIEBER!

by Nando Di Fino | 12:47 pm, October 26th, 2011

» 9 comments

The buzzword of Tuesday wasn’t a word at all — it was a collection of numbers and punctuation marks; more specifically: “s.978.” The measure, which is expected to be brought to Congress today, essentially extends charges for bootlegging DVDs and music albums into the 21st century, making it a felony to illegally stream copywritten material. The bill was introduced by Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, who took some unnecessary lumps by the pro-Bieber crowd, as the bill was fully misinterpreted and brought to new heights of irrationality by the people behind FreeBieber.com. The site caused a minor panic by starting a petition to thwart s.978, saying that Justin Bieber, who rose to fame covering songs on YouTube, could be sent to jail for five years under the bill. CBS News didn’t help things by jumping on the bandwagon.

Simply put, Bieber is safe. Unless he starts a website that charges $10 for people to stream digital copies of films, TV shows, or live sporting events that he hasn’t been given permission to stream, he will remain free. The only way the teen pop star is getting arrested under s.978 (assuming it passes) is if he opens a site — we’ll call it Biebster — and just begins streaming movies like Paranormal Activity 3 without the permission of Paramount on that site.

The YouTube fears — that Bieber will have to pull down all his early cover songs or be thrown in jail — are also unfounded. Even if Bieber uploads 50 videos of him covering copywritten songs each day, he is only the uploader, not the streamer. That action, however questionable, is covered under a different law. YouTube, as the streamer, has a responsibility to take the content down (which it has been very good at doing), or else they will be hit with the penalty. s.978 goes after nefarious YouTube clones who illegally stream copywritten material, not after Canadian teenagers with floppy hair and angelic voices. And it does so with a felony charge, as opposed to the misdemeanor that it had been carrying before.

So Bieber is safe, for now, unless he gets into some very un-Bieber-like behavior. With that all being settled, please enjoy — legally — some of they early Bieber magic from his YouTube channel, below:

Amy Klobuchar, copyright law, Justin Bieber, s.978, YouTube

http://baptistthinker.wordpress.com/ Will

This is disappointing then.
Anonymous

what an idiotic bill. Way to kill any kind of free expression.
http://twitter.com/mcsey Micah Seymour

Bieber makes a cut of the ad sales Youtube generates from his cover video. Bieber uploads ten cover videos. Bieber goes to jail the way this law is written even if that’s not what the law intends. Don’t report on what the law intends, who gives a crap what intends. Report what it says… the actual text, the text that without any stretch of the imagination could be used to put Bieber-clones in jail.

Now the merits of jailing Bieber-clones on general principle are strong, but…
Anonymous

He should be sentenced to life in prison for his music.
Anonymous

Streaming media you don’t own and don’t have permission to stream (ie. stealing) is free expression?
Anonymous

merely covering a song on youtube is. It’s the same bullshit that wmg has been pulling on youtube for awhile. Essentially they’re Going to be going after happy birthday videos for kids because it has a song they own, it’s unethical and idiotic.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=586802903 Graeme Edgeler

Also, I’d wager that the law doesn’t have extra-territorial effect, so that even if Bieber was doing something in breach of it, he’d probably have been doing that in Canada, so would be fine.
Clamkisser

While I’d LIKE to see Bieber go to jail for crimes against music, some Zappa-esque gulag where he’s forced to listen to his own music, this law is a little shortsighted. I’ve heard lots of music on Grooveshark that I later went and bought.
joshuathirteen

Very legally knowledgeable and serious organizations like the Electronic Freedom Foundation and Demand Progres are very concerned about this bill. The sponsors intent is nearly meaningless. The bill is over broad and could very much be interpreted by law enforcement and upheld in courts to apply to streaming covers, mashups etc. Sure it would be the streamer held responsible, but it still would destroy the ability to place this kind of thing on the net, as no legit site would allow it. The courts will rule on what it says, not what was in someones’s mind when they wrote it. The FBI has a long history of interpreting the law, such as the patriot act, to allow them to do many things they legislators never intended. If a law can be justifiable interpreted in a certain way, it will be.