DECLARATION OF ALLEN ASCH REGARDING YOUTUBE VIDEO TITLED:

“Fox News Softens Criticism of Bush from Daily Show AGAIN”

 

 

            I, ALLEN ASCH, declare as follows:

            I am the person who created, controls, and uses the YouTube account under the username “LiberalViewer.”

            I reside at XXXXXXXXXX, Sacramento, CA 95821 and my home phone number is (916) XXX-XXXX.

            My home address is within the jurisdiction of the United States District Court in the Eastern District of California, I consent to the jurisdiction of that court, and I will accept service of process from Comedy Central, Viacom, and/or their agents at my home address.

            On November 1, 2006, YouTube notified me that, as a result of a third-party notification by Comedy Central claiming that my material is infringing, YouTube had disabled access to the following material I uploaded to YouTube:

My video titled “Fox News Softens Criticism of Bush from Daily Show AGAIN” at the URL, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y08H6Bbm1kY.

            Although I am no expert on intellectual property law and my study of the subject provided murky answers at best, I am informed and I believe in good faith that my video fits well within the FAIR USE exception to the copyrights laws for the following reasons:

            1. My video is noncommercial and its purpose is to educate people on public issues and provide media analysis/criticism commentary that transforms the fairly used material into something substantially different.

2. While Comedy Central airs primarily entertainment programming, the fairly used material was chosen for its news value and studies show Comedy Central does have substantial news content. See, e.g., Lee Hurwitz, “Daily Show News Equal to Networks: IU Study Finds Coverage Rivals ABC, CBS, NBC,” Indiana Daily Student (October 5, 2006) at http://www.idsnews.com/news/story.php?id=38119

3. The fairly used material is made up of short clips from a 30 minute television episode (the portions of the fairly used material with unmuted audio are all less than 180 seconds in length). One clip of fairly used material in this video is slightly under three minutes in length because the topic of this video is the biased way that Fox News edited a clip it took from the Daily Show and it was, thus, necessary to show the UNedited version for comparison. Even at this length, however, the material should also qualify as “fair use” because a significant portion of the fairly used material is itself news footage that Comedy Central fairly used for its program.

4. My video has a small audience (the YouTube website says this video got less than 17,000 views, some of which are not unique) and, as something of a “fan tribute,” I believe my video actually increases the market for Comedy Central programming, if it affects that market at all.

            I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct except for those things stated on information and belief, and, as to those things, I have a good faith belief they are true.

            Executed November 2, 2006, at Sacramento, CA.

           

                                                                              

                                                                                          

                                                                               ___________________________________                     

                                                                                           ALLEN ASCH

                                                                                           YouTube username “LiberalViewer”