Alleged 'rights group' tries to have 4,000 anti-Scientology videos removed from YouTube

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According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a rights group called the American Rights Counsel LLC has attempted to have at least 4,000 anti-Scientology videos removed from the video sharing website YouTube. Upon further investigation, Wikinews found that most videos and clips were added to YouTube by the copyright holders of the material; as DMCA requests are for the purposes of requesting removal where service providers host material that infringe on the copyright of the complainant, the merit of these requests remain questionable. It was also discovered that the alleged rights group does not exist as a physical entity. In an in-depth report, Wikinews investigated the incident and obtained exclusive information and interviews from individuals including Mark Bunker.

Within the past 24 hours, according to the EFF, the Counsel "sent out over 4000 DMCA takedown notices to YouTube, all making copyright infringement claims against videos with content critical of the Church of Scientology." A DMCA notice, or Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice means an attempt to limit the use of copyrighted material that is often infringing on the rights of an alleged copyright.

Wikinews made attempts to contact American Rights Counsel LLC for comment on the take-down notices, but was unable to obtain contact details for the alleged organisation. One post on a YouTube discussion page related to the organization states that they "do not appear to exist outside of these claims on YouTube." Wikinews contacted YouTube several times asking them if they have a process of verifying DMCA requests from individuals or entities claiming copyright infringement, but when they responded, they directed Wikinews to their terms of service saying, "item 8 addresses the DMCA and 8 B addresses counter-notice procedures."

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Pastor Michael Guglielmucci admits his cancer was a hoax; Videos being removed from YouTube

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Christian Pastor for the Planetshakers youth movement in Australia Michael Guglielmucci has admitted that his cancer is a hoax. Wikinews has also learned that one of the churches he preached at has had videos showing his claims of cancer removed from YouTube, claiming copyright infringement. He has also admitted to being addicted to pornography for over 16 years.

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Controversial development training cited in religious discrimination lawsuits

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A controversial development training course called "Landmark Forum" is cited in religious discrimination lawsuits in United States federal courts in New York and Washington, D.C. The seminars are run by a San Francisco, California-based for-profit training company called Landmark Education. The company evolved from Erhard Seminars Training "est" which was developed by Werner Erhard, and has faced criticism regarding its techniques and its use of unpaid labor. The sperm bank and surrogacy company Los Angeles-based Growing Generations is named as a defendant in the New York lawsuit, and the Democratic political action committee Twenty-First Century Democrats is a defendant in the Washington, D.C. case.

In separate lawsuits filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan, New York, and in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in Washington, D.C., former employees are suing their employers for monetary damages and claiming religious discrimination after their employers allegedly mandated that they attend courses at Landmark Education.

This is not the first time employees have sued claiming mandatory attendance at "Forum" workshops violated their civil rights. In a lawsuit filed in December 1988 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, eight employees of DeKalb Farmers Market in Decatur, Georgia sued their employer claiming their religious freedom and civil rights were violated when they were allegedly coerced into attending "Forum" training sessions.

Landmark Education itself has come under scrutiny for its controversial labor practices. The company has been investigated by the United States Department of Labor in separate investigations originating out of California, Colorado, and Texas. Investigations focused on the heavy reliance of unpaid labor in the company's workforce, which Landmark Education calls "assistants" and deems volunteers. Government labor inspectors in France have also investigated Landmark Education for its employment practices and use of unpaid labor.

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YouTube banned in Turkey (again)

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The popular video website YouTube has been blocked in Turkey once more. Several sources quote complaints against a video that insults Atatürk, founder and first president of the Republic of Turkey, as the reason for the block. On Friday, internet users in Turkey found the website replaced by a notice saying:

Access to this web site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2008/55 of T.R. Ankara 12th Criminal Court of Peace.

At the moment, it remains unclear which video exactly is to blame. Some media sources say that the video compared Atatürk with a monkey. This led some YouTube users to suspect that a video entitled 'ataturk was a gay and a monkey turkey turkiye turks' led to the block. This video was added on November 7, 2007, and is a series of images with Atatürk's face on monkeys, homosexuals, obese individuals and several pictures of Borat. The uploader of the video, known as gaymal45, has several other videos which mock Prime Minister Erdogan and President Abdullah Gül.

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