Copyright Troll & DMCA Abuser Serin Jameson Learns About Fair Use

Updated 2021-11-26 to change Serin’s pronouns to be ambiguous (and thus more degrading) based on a comment whining about them. Be sure to read the comment for a great example of “tolerance.”

Serin Jameson is the founder and artist for a Facebook group called “Star Trek Shitposting.” I discussed the group and its toxicity in an unedited, rambling video six weeks prior to this post. It took that long for someone in the group to notice the video. What followed was a 109,000-person Facebook group descending upon my video to attempt to make me feel bad for mocking them, with literally thousands of comments being posted, many of which proved that the loudest and most accepted people in that group are indeed horribly toxic and evil people.

Sadly for them, I don’t care what they think about me, and their insults either resulted in pity or amusement on my end.

However, Serin Jameson is the lone figure who stands above all others for taking a good old-fashioned pile of internet banter way too far, jumping straight into the realm of brazenly breaking the law.

Serin Jameson's copyright abuse
Serin Jameson’s copyright abuse

To understand the problem, one must first understand the concept of “fair use” within United States copyright law. In general, copyright law grants the rightsholders of a work the exclusive right to distribute their work for a limited period of time to encourage the ongoing creation of new works. (There are several issues with existing copyright law, including the “limited” term being insanely long, but that’s a conversation for another post.) U.S. copyright law explicitly carves out exceptions to this exclusive right, and the only one that’s important for most people is what is known as the Fair Use Doctrine. This portion of the law lays out four factors by which a fair use exception is judged. A fairly comprehensive explanation of the “four factor test” is available from the University of Texas. I won’t go over too many of the details here, but suffice it to say that my use of Serin Jameson’s artwork for the purpose of criticism and commentary combined with my heavy transformative use of the work place my use squarely within the bounds of the Fair Use Doctrine.

Transformative use of Serin Jameson's Star Trek Shitposting 6th Anniversary artwork
Transformative use of Serin Jameson’s Star Trek Shitposting 6th Anniversary artwork; from top left: original, transparency added, upper/lower layers added, completed image

Serin Jameson used (via a YouTube form) a provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) that allows rightsholders to send a DMCA takedown notice to an online service provider to notify them of posts that infringe on their copyright and have them taken down. My work constitutes plainly obvious fair use, so this action was inappropriate, and Serin Jameson knew this to be the case, and has thus stomped into Section 512(f) of the DMCA, which states (irrelevant portions excluded):

Misrepresentations.

Any person who knowingly materially misrepresents under this section…that material or activity is infringing…shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys’ fees, incurred by the alleged infringer.

Serin Jameson is invoking U.S. law regarding material stored on U.S. company servers by a U.S. citizen, jurisdiction here is clearly and exclusively within the United States, despite Serin Jameson apparently being in Australia. United States case law requires that Serin Jameson perform a fair use analysis of the work in question prior to filing a DMCA takedown request (Lenz v. Universal Music Corp., 801 F.3d 1126 (9th Cir. 2015)). Failure to do so violates the declaration of the good faith required by the DMCA in any DMCA takedown request.

Based on the publicly available communications of Serin Jameson, my email notifying him it of his its failure to conduct a fair use analysis, and his its public confirmation of receipt of that message, Serin Jameson fits all of the requirements under the DMCA to be held legally liable for filing a false DMCA takedown against my content. I have already sent a counter-notification to YouTube.

I am posting this as both a lesson and a warning: you should not abuse the law to silence people you don’t like.

Also, for the curious: yes, United States judgments are enforceable in Australia. Serin Jameson could find itself on the receiving end of some Hauge secret sauce.

Finally, as they say on the internet, I’ve brought receipts.

Serin Jameson Facebook post 1 - planning a false DMCA takedown
Serin Jameson Facebook post 1 – planning a false DMCA takedown
My email to Serin Jameson to resolve the conflict
My email to Serin Jameson to resolve the conflict
Serin Jameson Facebook post 2 - confirming receipt of my email
Serin Jameson Facebook post 2 – confirming receipt of my email

6 thoughts on “Copyright Troll & DMCA Abuser Serin Jameson Learns About Fair Use

    1. Serin is a her? How was I supposed to know that? I have never heard the name Serin before and I really don’t care what gender Serin is, but Serin uses a Facebook avatar that looks like a blonde male, so Serin itself has chosen a male-by-default identity in the only context I’ve ever witnessed it. Now, thanks to you, Serin is an “it,” devoid of all gender references, with all references reverting to the vagueness of being a thing composed of unknowns.

      Congratulations on demonstrating how tolerant social justice types really are. “Transphobic fuck” is a great name to call someone you know absolutely nothing about while going after them for not addressing someone with the gender you expect.

  1. Jody: Ha, ha! Masterfully played. You kneecapped the bastards. Like “Kodak”, “Serin” is an artificial and intentionally nebulous, sexless name that normal parents would find abhorrent to give any child. You were dealing with a psycho here so keep checkin’ yer 6. Love ya, $upport ya. Cheers!

    1. Thank you for your support! It makes a lot more sense why there seems to only be one “Serin Jameson” on the entire planet, then. The desire to be unique and stand out is strong with this one. Regardless, I’m glad it’s done and over with and Serin ultimately ended up being the loser in 100% of attempts to screw with me.

  2. On the subject of names, if I may… Before today (…I stumbled upon, and was then impressed by, one of your popular videos about software/hardware ownership rights – then had a wander around your websites) …before today, I had never, ever encountered the name “Jody” for (what is evidently) a man. Maybe this is a geographical thing (I’m English), or maybe I’ve not been paying enough attention to the world around me, but this is a first for me. Did I learn something new today, or are you one-of-a-kind?

    It occurs to me that I could simply ask the omnipotent, omnipresent Google – but, every now and again, I think it’s nice (more human, even) to ask a human being… And you’re probably the best human being for me to ask.

    Thank you,

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