The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is the weapon of choice for the RIAA. The music industry’s battle to control their properties often snares innocent citizens and puts tremendous pressure on ISP’s to police the net 24/7 searching for pirates big and small. Under the agreement, passed by unanimous approval of the US Senate in 1996, an accused copyright offender is punished before being able to offer proof of legal use. You see all you have to do is to send a take-down notice of copyright infringement to an ISP or website and as written, the service provider must remove said offending items or risk huge penalties. Before a content producer can respond, action is taken and the burden of proof rests with them to appeal and defend their case.

For many independent producers the cost of such procedures can put them out of business. The DMCA is a great way for the big CO’s to stomp on creative competition.

Not satisfied with having all this power, the RIAA is now using the DMCA to promote and sell their artists on the backs of puppies. Yes, videos of cute, innocent puppies are being hijacked and exploited to sell records thanks to the DMCA. So who would want to watch a video of an adorable puppy frolicking carefree and playing with his chew toys? Hmmm… maybe parents and little children?  And what kind of people would serve up pornographic lyrics to the parents and children watching the cute puppy frolic? You’ve guessed it, the good folks at the RIAA!

Universal Music Group an RIAA member, has flagged a video of an adorable cute Yorkshire Terrier puppy named Buttons as a lawbreaker. Ok, not Buttons himself but the video creator – me. The punishment for allegedly using copyrighted music in the video – an ad for UMG rapper Grandaddy Souf and his song Candy Licker. Ahh they must know that a video of a cute-as-a-button Yorkie puppy will appeal to the little ones in the audience and kids love candy so it’s a perfect match. Unfortunately for horrified parents around the globe, the candy Grandaddy is talking about is umm.. well how do I describe this… how about another name for a kitten?

And it seems that ‘ol Grandaddy wants to lick the kitty a lot. He says so in a not so delicate manner over and over in his song Candy Licker. I know this because I saw a notice that my video of our sweet and delightful puppy Buttons has been tagged as containing copyrighted material and the copyright holder has forced YouTube to include an ad for some dirty Grandaddy extolling his compulsion to share his love of licking candy.

I made the video of our oh so wonderful (and did I say adorable?) puppy Buttons with iMovie and used one of the COPYRIGHT FREE songs included in iMovie that we have all heard way too many times. The sweet tickling of the ivory’s served as a bouncy little soundtrack for our precious pup to play to. Seems like Grandaddy owns a Mac too. He used the COPYRIGHT FREE track as the musical backdrop to his ode to licking candy. Now UMG thinks the COPYRIGHT FREE track belongs to them and is hunting down all the bad people stealing their work. Some beast in the machine algorithm scanned Grandaddy’s work and matched it to my video and now I have an ad for oral sex accosting my puppy and impugning my reputation.

I am beyond upset at this. For any parent who clcked on the link to the offensive song – my sincerest apology. I have appealed to YouTube and am awaiting a reply. To UMG – to say that I’m disgusted with your tactics and misuse of the DMCA here is an understatement. How do I get back the pure joy of watching this video without being reminded that your sleeze knows no bounds? To Buttons – you are much too young to understand why I may have to take down the video of your first days with us. It seems that Universal Music Group thinks that you are the perfect way to peddle x-rated songs to children.

Click here to see the video.

“Candy Licker” song.