The PGA tour is very strict about banning cell phones at their events so I guess team sports could try to ban all video cameras too. Just because you make the video yourself doesn’t mean it’s legal.
I agree with this. Recording an NFL game with your own camera wouldn’t violate the NFL’s copyright, but the NFL and the teams likely have contracts that give a very limited number of people (including the broadcasting network) the right to record the game, so you could be violating their contract rights. And that’s separate and apart from whatever prohibitions you agree to by purchasing your ticket (check the fine print) or entering the stadium (check the posted warnings).
I think that you’re right. It was right in front of me the whole time. THEIR descriptions and accounts are copyrighted. So, I can’t use Collinsworth’s latest dickweed description about said game without consent of the NFL. I can say whatever I want about what I saw…
There’s nothing illegal about violating someone else’s contract rights. Maybe tortuous interference? Let’s say I’m in an FAA approved flight-path in a hot air balloon, and there’s not much of a breeze, and I have a really long, steady zoom.
Yeah, I acknowledged that in a way by mentioning it was against rules, which aren’t laws.
The way I read the NFL’s idiotic warning is that they are warning about copying the descriptions and depictions of the game as told by the broadcasters/sportscasters/etc. which are actually broadcast, and thus copyrighted.
I’d love to see the NFL try to sue someone for simply describing a game.
To use a nearby example, this thread begins with this:
How is this anything other than a description of some NFL games? Omniscient presumedly wasn’t in the stands so he probably basing his description on the telecasts. (Although being Omniscient, he would know the outcome anyway.)
I believe that “private”, in the context of the disclaimer, means “non-commercial”. (I’ve heard the phrase “private non-commercial use” in other sports broadcast disclaimers.) Of course you can talk about the broadcast and post on a message board about the broadcast; you just can’t make money off of it.
IANAL. But I once heard a copyright lawyer claim on a radio program that you cannot copyright current events or descriptions of them. He took this to mean that the TV and the play-by-play cannot be copyrighted, although any canned interviews can be. The same of course is true of any kind of breaking news.
I have no idea if this is true (or ever was–they could have changed the law since this was decades ago), but I would like to hear a genuine legal opinion from someone who knows.
I read a NYTimes article about 1-2 months ago about a related situation involving the NCAA and bloggers. The NCAA is trying to assert that only credentialed press people (who pay NCAA for those credentials) may legally post a description of the game online.
Apparently there a bunch of fanatic bloggers who go to the game as a plain audience member then post live real time pix, vid, and commentary from their netbook or phone. NCAA wants their cut. But without offending any fans. Good luck.
Doesn’t that (banning cell phones) have more to do with preventing disruptive noises and talking?
Apart from that I’m pretty sure they don’t want us wandering around the course with video cameras.
It’s a common misaken belief that copyright violations can be excused if the violator isn’t making any money. It’s the opposite if anything. If I xerox off copies of Dan Brown’s new book and charge people ten dollars a copy, I’ll presumedly hurt the sales of the authorized book. But if I give away copies for free, I’ll hurt the sales of the authorized book even more.
Yep, that’s the end-around reference to the Super Bowl.
Of course, the NFL tried to copyright “The Big Game” as well, but Cal and Stanford (who had played the Big Game for decades before its oblique reference to the Super Bowl) had a fit and it didn’t go through.
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2007/05/25/the-nfl-punts-on-trademarking-the-big-game/