Bolinski (XVIVO) Backed Down on Inner Life of the Cell lawsuit threat…

_{April 11, 2008

Intelligent Design}

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Bolinski, with an undetermined appendage writes:

So go ahead and release your movie. Just keep track of how many tickets you sell.

Read Bolinski’s rant at Richard Dawkins’ website. It’s pretty funny.

My guess is either Bolinski got some advice from a real intellectual property attorney and/or got quietly told to back down by Harvard who doesn’t want its name dragged through the mud. I hope Doctor Bolinsky now knows that to protect styles, processes, and algorithms important to his company he must seek design and utility patents. Copyrights simply don’t protect those things.

Comments

Hi Dave, I know the quotes are accurate. I'm saying the letter is a satirical and inventive way of presenting Moran's quotes again. Been a fun couple of days, has it not?Charlie_{April 12, 2008
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austin_english I agree it's a derivative work. Is is derivative enough to win an infringement suit? I don't know and neither will anyone else until it's given a fair hearing in a court of law. But it's HARVARD, the owner of the copyrighted property, who might have a case based on the derivative claim. An infringement suit brought by XVIVO will fall flat on its face. They simply don't own the artwork under contention. Harvard does.DaveScot_{April 12, 2008
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jjcassidy I spent years working with IP attorneys at a $40 billion high tech company screening patent abstracts submitted by employees in all areas of operation. My job was to evaluate the abstracts for patentability (prior art, novelty, non-obviousness to an expert, and so forth). I don't necessarily approve of the IP protection racket but I sure know how it works.DaveScot_{April 12, 2008
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Charlie The quotes from Larry Moran are what he actually did write on his blog. You can't make things like that up. Amazing, innit? http://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2007/12/do-fundamentalist-christians-actively.html
As we've seen time and time again on the blogs (and elsewhere), the Christian fundamentalists have erected very strong barriers against learning. It really doesn't matter how much they are exposed to rational thinking and basic scientific evidence. They still refuse to listen. This is one of the reasons why I would flunk them if they took biology and still rejected the core scientific principles. It's not good enough to just be able to mouth the "acceptable" version of the truth that the Professor wants. You actually have to open your mind to the possibility that science is correct and get an education. That's what university is all about. Of course, we all recognize the problem here. How do you distinguish between a good Christian who is lying for Jesus and one who has actually come to understand science? It seems really unfair to flunk the honest students who admit that they still reject science and pass the dishonest ones who hide their true beliefs.
DaveScot_{April 12, 2008
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Paul Giem "They allow YouTube copies–flat-out copies, for crying out loud. I’m sure that the video was shown in lectures, by people who got honoraria, before. But when Bill Dembski uses them, suddenly this is not fair, and the remedy is not for Bill to give them a cut, but for him to quit using the video altogether. Apparently anyone can use the video as long as that person is not an ID supporter." The difference is that in the version Dembski showed the copyright info was stripped out and an extra narration track was included that was not part of the the original video.mathstudent_{April 11, 2008
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It's satire.Charlie_{April 11, 2008
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If the errant message that's been published by Dr. Egnor is real, not satire, then it seems to me that the Darwinists have screwed the pooch for good and all: http://xrl.in/2t9turandot_{April 11, 2008
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Congrats, Dave. You called it.jjcassidy_{April 11, 2008
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Fear of a lawsuit may not bother Premise Media. However, any theater that shows "Expelled" with the video is also subject to suit for violating the "public performance" right of copyright; theaters do not enjoy getting mixed up in other peoples' fights. The animation studio that produced the knock-off is subject to suit fro both direct and contributory infringement; it is inconceivable that they did not have access to the XVIVO video. And, if documents show that the Discovery Institute had any hand in the infringemen or in the decision to use the XVIVO video, then they are laible as well. While Premise Media and the others may laugh off the prospect of money damages, copyright infringement is also a Federal criminal offense. People do think twice when they risk going to jail. Despite the wishful thinking of some commenters, the copyright owner need not show any actual economic loss; see 17USC 505. These "statutory damages" can be 5 times higher for willful infringement. Court costs and attorneys' fees will also be awarded. The copyright owner need not show that any proprietary methods or tools were used; access to the original work and similarity of the result are sufficient. Copyright court cases tend to involve a lot of black-hat/whiter-hat reasoning. Where the infringer is willful, perverts the purpose of the original, sullies the reputation of the producer, acts in an unethical manner, or tries to make a lot of money from the copying, he will get smacked down mercilessly. Despite their sans souci attitude, if Premise Media does not consider this matter very seriously, they are smoking something illegal.Al Kafir_{April 11, 2008
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Good points -- I hadn't looked at it that way. You're probably going to get the sheeple jumping to the conclusion that it's copyvio without actually examining the facts (like the good PZ, at least for a while:). On the other hand, they're already ignorant enough to believe whatever they're told without looking into it, so there ain't much we can do with them anyway:). And in the process, you're going to get a lot of attention from both sides, maybe some media coverage, and (if they choose to exploit it) a chance to use it against the opposition, because of how beautifully their reaction illustrates the problem itself ...ungtss_{April 11, 2008
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ungtss Before you get too upset over this, keep in mind the following: In all probability the Expelled group asked politely to use the footage, offering to pay for the privilege and to plug the site in the process. After Dembski's experience they pretty much knew what to expect, but did it anyway just to make the point, which will come out when the DVD is released. (And there was no risk; if XVIVO agreed, they had a bunch of low-cost video which made their point very well, thank you.) They figured on a refusal, and got their own people together working on a replacement video. They wanted to evoke the feeling the original gave, so they left most of the general scene intact, panning from the opposite side, changing coloration, adding spikes, etc. just enough so that nobody could make a copyright infringement claim stick, but close enough so that those who were not thinking this through objectively would be tempted to threaten and even file suit. These guys have used similar tactics promoting The Passion of the Christ, on which they got a lot of free publicity out of claims that the movie was anti-semitic. They are very good at this. I might feel sorry for the poor XVIVO folks at the borderline plagiarism if they didn't have such a hypocritical dog-in-the-manger attitude. They put it out on the net for everyone to see. They allow YouTube copies--flat-out copies, for crying out loud. I'm sure that the video was shown in lectures, by people who got honoraria, before. But when Bill Dembski uses them, suddenly this is not fair, and the remedy is not for Bill to give them a cut, but for him to quit using the video altogether. Apparently anyone can use the video as long as that person is not an ID supporter. As someone else said in an earlier thread, the goal is not to get a reward for a job well done; it is to shut down speech of which they do not approve. So Expelled has beaten them at their own game and tweaked their noses in the process. Tough break, XVIVO.Paul Giem_{April 11, 2008
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ungtss Harvard refused to let any ID sympathizers display the video. I'm sure the producers of Expelled would have preferred to get the animation from Harvard unmodified and with full permission and credits. It's to their benefit to have Harvard's name on it to lend credibility for the depiction. All they wanted to do was let people see how intricate and orchestrated are the things that "science" says is a purposeless accident. Harvard produced this as an educational video but it appears they don't want the unwashed masses to see it in the wrong context - the wrong context being "Look at this. Does it look like an accident?"DaveScot_{April 11, 2008
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I hope Doctor Bolinsky now knows that to protect styles, processes, and algorithms important to his company he must seek design and utility patents. Copyrights simply don’t protect those things.
Doesn't that statement admit that the styles, processes and algorithms were indeed stolen and copied? Regardless of the patents or copyrights that may or may not be associated with them, Isn't stealing wrong?christophersisk_{April 11, 2008
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Apollos, I copied copyright law and "best practices" into the earlier thread. https://uncommondescent.com/legal/expelled-plagiarizing-harvard/ Section 106 says that the copyright owner has “exclusive rights… to prepare derivative works based upon the copyrighted work.” Section 107 gives fair use limitations. I indicated that Expelled seems to make fair use of the XVIVO animation. Anyone who watches the Expelled animation right after watching the XVIVO video knows that it is a highly derivative work. "The answer? Produce your own from the ground up, and make it as similar as possible in regards to quality, but only produce what you need to get the job done (a few minutes of compelling visualization)." The producers of Expelled didn't choose the answer you did. The animation is nowhere close to "from the ground up." Watch the "walker" sequences in the original http://aimediaserver4.com/studiodaily/harvard/harvard.swf and then the derivative sequences in the previews. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/clips-of-our-fearless-leaders-in-expelled/ I predict you won't see the Expelled animation released independently as an ID educational resource. I think that would be legally risky. Inclusion in a documentary is what protects it.austin_english_{April 11, 2008
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Apollos: All true, but we're in the court of public opinion here. Most folks don't have the sophisticated understanding of copyright law that's being articulated here. Most folks think copyright and plagiarism are roughly equivalent. Plagiarism, while not illegal, is not ethical, particularly in the academic environment. And there's a decent argument to be made that replicating the final product of a year of research without giving credit to those who did the research is borderline plagiarism. It's pretty clear who did the heavy lifting here. They could avoid all this by giving props where they are due.ungtss_{April 11, 2008
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ungtss wrote:
It does a fantastic job of bringing out the irrational bile and hatred, though.
I agree. There might be more to it though. From Bolinski's post:
Equally astonishing is the "Intellgent Design" treatment of these and other proteins surfaces, which XVIVO derived using procedural iso-surface skinning of the PDB cloud data of our proteins' atom placement. There are an infinite number of possble "correct" solutions to that problem.
It may have taken more of a year to develop procedurally skinned point cloud data, but it only takes a fraction of that time when you're able to focus directly on the appearance of the result rather than needing to develop the process. It's easy enough to geek out on algorithms and processes that are really cool, and it must sting a little when another party can produce a compelling result without investing the same time and effort. Also, the algorithms used may very well be proprietary, but if they are what they claim, then they produced moderately accurate results. The effect is then an elucidation of biological appearances, and I'm not sure how you claim an exclusive right to that. Once you've "spilled the beans" on what biological machines look like and how they work, it hardly seems appropriate to claim exclusive rights to the visage of them.Apollos_{April 11, 2008
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Apollos: Valid points. I guess I just would have varied it a bit more (camera angle, colors, details of the processes, etc.), unless I was trying to harken back to the other video. It does a fantastic job of bringing out the irrational bile and hatred, though. Holy smokes. If that's what the producers were shooting for, mission accomplished.ungtss_{April 11, 2008
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I'm not convinced they were really baiting a lawsuit. Here's the situation. You have a documentary that would benefit from state of the art computer animation of cellular machinery. The group that produces the premier version of that animation hates you vehemently and will sue you even if it falls within "fair use." The answer? Produce your own from the ground up, and make it as similar as possible in regards to quality, but only produce what you need to get the job done (a few minutes of compelling visualization). Trying to "beat" XVIVO might be the thing to do at some point, but not when you just need a few minutes of good footage.Apollos_{April 11, 2008
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Apollos: I agree with you; the copyvio doesn't have a leg to stand on, legally. But why do it intentionally? If you're going to have a company reengineer it, why not have them do it better? Fix the mistakes? Use different camera angles? Take it to the next level? Why bait a lawsuit!?ungtss_{April 11, 2008
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When you produce something as well done and unique as Inner Life it shouldn't be a surprise when it becomes the de facto standard of visualization. I think there would be more room to gripe if direct competition was an issue. We're talking about a couple of clips of similar looking animation in a documentary. It's not by any means a duplication. I understand they're ticked that the movie is being released, and that it shows compelling cellular machinery visualizations reminiscent of their own; but the whole attitude really comes across as so much whining. It's too bad for them that Darwinists don't have a monopoly on showing how complex and wonderous the cell truly is. From a PR standpoint, I get the frustration. Millions of people will see that world brought to life for the first time, and will credit the ID side with showing it to them. Once you "raise the bar," it doesn't typically get lowered again. Tough luck.Apollos_{April 11, 2008
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I'm not sure where you get the impression that he "backed down." After the line you quote, he says "We may just find that data valuable, too." It's clear that the line you quote is along the lines of "Go ahead, make my day." Some comments on this blog appear to indicate that this was all part of a publicity stunt. If it was, it was poorly conceived. This is ID's big opportunity to show itself to be new, creative, and better than the opposition -- not get involved in a copyright infringement lawsuit over material put together by the opposition.ungtss_{April 11, 2008
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It looks like they're hinging their case on inferring intelligence... I wonder how that will go over. Your honor, everything that happens happens by random chance except for when these people make a movie so don't let them release it pretty please!Marie_{April 11, 2008
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