Youtube is doing a quite phenomenal effort in dealing with copyright infringement these days, summarized here:
“In those cases, we try to give people options when they receive a copyright claim. Instead of automatically blocking videos, we give uploaders the choice to dispute the claim (in the case of Fair Use, for example), use our AudioSwap tool to replace the track with one from our library of pre-cleared music, or to replace the video with a new version with no sound.” #
The article, from which that quote is taken, covers a lot of the same ground as what Flickr is facing, and despite the fact that it may not be easy for Vidal to get his video back up, or even get Viacom to tell him what exactly it violates, at least the video wasn’t simply deleted from his account. If only others — and by others I specifically mean Flickr, though I know that Vimeo shares this approach — would do the same instead of blanket deleting everything with no option for recovery.
