> I'll be honest and say that if I was a forum owner I'd probably be
> just as nervous about such material.

It's never been a problem for youtube, and youtube handles this
in a private manner, doesn't publicly humiliate or otherwise
punish its member. Youtube does a much better job of balancing
due diligence by balancing the rights of it's members and copyright
claim owners. RSC feels the need to publicly lable what it
deems as offenders (even when no actual offense has occurred) with
it's yellow and red card infraction system.

> As for the rest of your post... I'll also be honest and say I'm not on your
> wavelength at all. I'd have just removed the clip when asked.

Which I would have done immediately on being told they were concerned,
but they already removed it, but that wasn't enough for them. They felt they
needed to punish me as well by having a yelow card avatar added to every post
I had ever made at RSC (hundreds of these at the time, going back for years),
not even just the offending post (which also would be bad). I got several
pms and emails asking why I got the forum equivalent of a "scarlet
letter" added to every one of my posts, since all but one of them were
non-offending, even in RSC's viewpoint, the intent was to label me
as a violator instead of the individual post. The people that pm'ed me
were puzzled since all but one of the tagged posts were not the perceived
issue by RSC moderators.

> I appreciate why others would choose not to though.

It's the concept of the publicly punishing a member by adding the yellow
or red car flag as avatars to every post made by a member as opposed to
just the offending post or handled privately via pm's or emails the
way the rest of the world deals with this, combined with their attitude
of guilty until proven innocent, and their own determination of
copyright violation without receiving any actual claims.

Going back to youtube as an example, the people running youtube appear
to be much more informed these situations and handle these issues
in a much different way, and is a good example how such issues should
be handled, and in such a manner that youtube meets the legal
requirements for due diligence while at the same time not abusing
it's members.

Youtube does not preemptively remove videos, except as noted below.

Youtube does minimal or no screening of videos, relying on their
viewers to report any issues with their videos. Posted videos remain
on youtube unless a copyright infringement claim. However the video
remains, and the poster is asked via private communication to either
remove the video or to respond why the poster doesn't feel the video
is infringing. If the poster doesn't respond within a reaonsable time
the video is removed. If the poster does respond, then youtube
will go back to the infrigment claimer to ask for some evidience that
they actually own the copyright. This policy satifies the legal
reqirement for due diligence as determined by prior court cases.

A violation of the copyright policy at youtube counts as a "strike"
against the poster, but this is done privately, unlike the public
infraction system at RSC. 3 strikes and the account can be removed,
depending on the circumstance, but there is no "perma-ban" and the
poster can create a new account.

If a specific infringing video becomes a problem, then youtube will
pre-emptively remove videos based on catch phrases in the video
description, as specified by the copyright owner. Sometimes this
gets abused as Viacom, made such a pre-emptive claims against
all videos with the terms "Underworld" "Trailer" (from a tomb
raider game), even though they only have rights to one of the
four versions.

If a video is removed, the explanation is that the video was remove
for "copyright claim". Youtube avoid defamation issues by not
using the term "copy infringment", as only a court judgement
could make this call. Youtube does not label it's members as
violators to the rest of the public.

RSC on the other hand, will issue an public infraction to a member
for posting a video that they feel to be potentiallly infringing
without ever receving any actual claims of infrigment from a
supposed copyright owner. Then they punsish the victimized member
by attaching a yellow or red avatar to every post ever made by
the victim, not just the offending post.

Imagine the reaction from youtube members if every video posted
by the member included a yellow or red violator status attached
to every video for an alledged perceived violation in one of
those videos (now removed) even though no actual infringment
claim had been made.

One reason this isn't done is because of defamation of character
laws. It's not legal to make negative accusations against others
without susbstatial proof, and there's still the risk of a lawsuit
where the proof of the accusation is required. The burden of proof
in defamation (libel if written, slander if spoken), is on the
person or company making the accusation, yet RSC was routinely
doaling out public infraction avators (the forum equivalent
of a scarlet letter) without any semblance of proof.

I find RSC's public infraction system unacceptable, and my lawyer
friend states, it's violated defamation laws, especially when
the policy is to apply infractions when there is no evidence
(no infringment claim) that any infraction actually occurred.

Although the public infraction system is now noted in the rules,
it wasn't at the time I joined RSC, so essentially RSC violated
my member agreement at the time. In spite of the fact that
RSC now notes the public infraction system, they could be held
liable for a defamation lawsuit if they ever applied an infraction
without substantial proof of the infraction. They should also
suggest that members not use their real names because of the
public infraction system.