Member's Area Vids - 2257 Compliance

[GPallan]

Hey guys,

Do the vids in your member's area need to display the "date of production" and the "custodian of record" information/address before the vid begins?

I'm seeing this on a lot of sites and just wondering if it's absolutely necessary or whether it's over-kill. Or whether this is only something that’s necessary for the vids on the preview tours. ??

We've gone through editing more than half of our vids for our new site without displaying that info. Do we need to go back and re-edit them with that info in there?

Thanks,

Allan

[TropixxxStudios]

Allan,

I asked that same question to two different lawyers at AVN last year and got two different answers. We opted to error on the side of caution and begun including them a few months ago, but did not go back and re-do the ones we had already done. We did create a page that listed all our dates of production that can be linked to from inside the members area, etc. Overkill perhaps.

I think Chad, (Chadknowslaw.com) said it best (paraphrase here) As long as you are making a good faith attempt to be compliant, you should not have too many problems.

If I were you, I would simply include them.

- Michael

[gaybucks_chip]

Chad told us that without question, ALL clips (including previews) need to have a 2257 notice. For that matter, flyers, postcards and ads containing explicit content do also.

One of our concerns is with the use by affiliates or, for that matter, outright theft of our content. If somebody sticks up one of our clips somewhere and there's no link to 2257, we don't want any question that we've complied. If the 2257 notice is only on the HTML page and not on the clip itself, it could be argued that we haven't properly identified the content.

While it might be overly conservative, there's pretty much no downside to it, and our movie galleries seem to convert extremely well for our affiliates with the 2257 notices included in them, so I don't think there's any reason at all not to include the notices.

[citiboyz]

Question: If a webpage containing video clips is required to have individual 2257 statements on each clip, why aren't still photos or frame captures required to have them? It's all content, right? Shouldn't the 2257 notice that applies to that page be enough?

Chad told us that without question, ALL clips (including previews) need to have a 2257 notice. For that matter, flyers, postcards and ads containing explicit content do also.

One of our concerns is with the use by affiliates or, for that matter, outright theft of our content. If somebody sticks up one of our clips somewhere and there's no link to 2257, we don't want any question that we've complied. If the 2257 notice is only on the HTML page and not on the clip itself, it could be argued that we haven't properly identified the content.

While it might be overly conservative, there's pretty much no downside to it, and our movie galleries seem to convert extremely well for our affiliates with the 2257 notices included in them, so I don't think there's any reason at all not to include the notices.

[gaybucks_chip]

Question: If a webpage containing video clips is required to have individual 2257 statements on each clip, why aren't still photos or frame captures required to have them?

That's a really good question I've asked myself as well. The only answers I can reasonably think of are (1) there's no practical way to embed 2257 info onto a still image, other than using Digimarc, while it's no problem to do so in a video, or (2) I suppose someone could make an argument that stills are usually displayed within an HTML page, while videos are displayed in a standalone media player.

Granted, both of these arguments have flaws; as far as "practicality" goes, there's no practical way to archive 24/7 live cam feeds either, and yet that was still part of the regs until the injunction went into place. That's why all of this stuff is conjecture until there's case law backing one position or the other. We're just relying on common sense, a "reasonable effort" and the advice we get from Chad and material I read from other attorneys.

[basschick]

GPallan - every lawyer i've talked to said yes, the custodial info needs to be at the start of each and every movie. as i recall, it is actually clearly written in the law.

[chadknowslaw]

Up until the XBiz show where the FBI agent who supervises 2257 inspections spoke to the industry, I strictly interpreted the law to require a 2257 notice at either the beginning or end of every video.

Agent Joyner said that they were looking for a 2257 link on the page with the video or on the video itself. He stated that if there was a link at the bottom of the page, he considered that compliant.

What Chip says is very relevant--if your clip is used somewhere other than that page having the notice at the beginning or end of each clip keeps the video compliant. If you have absolute control over your vids, having a notice on the page will keep you compliant according to the FBI agent that is supervising the inspections. To be completely safe, put a notice at the beginning OR end of the video will keep that video compliant.

[collegeboyslive]

question on the 2257 notice on the video . how LONG does it have to be?

does it have to stay up there fro 5 seconds? 10 seconds or 1 single frame that people searching for that info can frame step though to find?

[TropixxxStudios]

question on the 2257 notice on the video . how LONG does it have to be?

does it have to stay up there fro 5 seconds? 10 seconds or 1 single frame that people searching for that info can frame step though to find?

Here is what the actual law says:

For any electronic or other display of the notice that is limited in time, the notice must be displayed for a sufficient duration and of a sufficient size to be capable of being read by the average viewer.

What is average? It does not define. Just be sure that it is long enough for people to read.

- Michael

[gaybucks_chip]

"Capable of being read by the average viewer" means just that... the time an "average" person would take to read the notice. The average reader isn't super fast or super slow, so if you look at your notice and think how long it would comfortably take someone to read it, that's probably the right length.

On full-length clips or DVDs, we make this notice about 7-10 seconds long. On our 30 second clips, we make this about 1.5 seconds long, which is a little short, but under the argument that it isn't reasonable to have the 2257 notice be 1/3 the length of the clip.

I saw an HBO special on porn a while back on pay-per-view, and their 2257 notice was literally a flash on the screen. I had to go back about 3 times to actually see it, it was maybe 1/3 second at most. It also didn't name an individual custodian. That notice was definitely not compliant, but I doubt we'll see Time-Warner get busted for 2257.

[TropixxxStudios]

On full-length clips or DVDs, we make this notice about 7-10 seconds long. On our 30 second clips, we make this about 1.5 seconds long, which is a little short, but under the argument that it isn't reasonable to have the 2257 notice be 1/3 the length of the clip.

Have you thought about making your 30 second clips actually 37 seconds long, and having the same 7 second statement at the start? That is basically what we do.

In our opinion, it is our 30 second previews that are outside of our membership area that are most likely to be seen by the most people, and potentially seen by someone with an axe to grind. Our theory is that those should be treated with the most caution.

[gaybucks_chip]

We have, it's in part a bandwidth issue. Our movie gallery clips are 720x480 at 500KBps, and they are 30 second clips with about 25 seconds of content, 4 clips per gallery, so increasing each clip by 7 seconds would be increasing our total gallery server bandwidth (which is already over 25Mbit/sec on average) would increase our bandwidth needs by 25%.

Each 2257 notice is individual for the clip it references, so the correct production information is on every individual clip. We believe that, particularly with the gallery clips, if we've provided enough length that someone can stop the video easily and read the 2257 notice, we've complied with the spirit of the regulations.

I agree that those clips are the most likely to be traded around, but it's one of those things where AJ and I also feel like the combination of efforts we make to comply would put us in a pretty good position if we had to go in front of a jury.

I've seen so many clips where people don't bother to comply at all (no 2257 notices whatsoever) or else they do something like "the 2257 notice for this clip can be found at ________.com" which is DEFINITELY not compliant.

[TropixxxStudios]

Wow. I never gave thought to the bandwith issues that a large site such as yours must face. Sounds like you have the right plan for your situation. On such a small site like mine, the 7 seconds make little or no difference. Maybe someday I will be lucky enough to have to worry about issues like that. :donmike: