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Comment by wolfgke | Hacker News Reader

> 1. False Positive -- Video is brought down despite it being technically legal. Creator is mad, but YouTube suffers no more liability.

Solution: Create a law that makes it possible for the creator to sue YouTube for a false positive for the same sum that a media company could sue YouTube for for a false negative. This would counterbalance the scales of both types of errors.

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Unfortunately, even if that law existed, how many creators have the financial resources to go to court with someone like YouTube (i.e. Google). I don't think this is the only case where even if you are technically right, you will go bankrupt before you prove that in court. Case in point: the whole existence of patent trolls.

Creators could join together into a class action. Perhaps even form a union to collectively bargain with YouTube!

You are not a worker of YouTube. You just used the service and contributed some content. A professional association would be more appropriate.

The problem is that a lawsuit takes time and money. MegaCorp Inc. has plenty of both of those, whereas Bob Youtuber probably doesn't want to (or can't!) fight a protracted court battle against an adversary with effectively infinite resources about getting paid for their videos.

Soutions: a) youtubers can collectivise b) expensive law firms pick it up with the resouces to win (bob gets nothing but knows MegaCorp gets stung) c) use bad publicity - MegaCorps hate bad publicity d) rich people pretend to be bob, get sued, unleash lawyers on MegaCorp and make lots of money, so MegaCorps get very wary of the 'little' people.

A and B still mean YouTubers have to dedicate a lot of time and energy to a lawsuit. C is possible today (this article is an example). D is interesting but I am skeptical that even in this hypothetical scenario, "do a thing, wait to get sued and then counter-sue" is the most efficient way for rich people to make more money.

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