What does “index somewhere” mean? Doesn’t this index have to be owned by someone? The owner of the index would have to remove the copyrighted video from the index don’t they?
And the liability is for the author of the program right?
Well yes, technically users “run” the website: they download the html, css, images and javascript and then run it locally in their own browser. How is that different from clearnet? It isn’t. These files are also transfered on clearnet and run in users own browser.
The only difference is that the owner has outsourced hosting to a decentralized platform rather than a centralized hosting. He still remains the owner and legally responsible for what occurs on his platform because he is in control.
The distinction you could make is that there is no server-side code on maid, while there could be, and usually is on clearnet. I don’t believe that is a significant point because the data transfer itself is illegal, the server processing is not relevant. If a clearnet host sent you a html file and accompanying image file with copyrighted material, it would be in trouble because it has the ability to modify and/or stop serving those files. Similary on maid, the owner, the person who uploaded those html files has the ability to stop serving them on his site name, and should do so. He cannot stop the version history, but the current latest version, the one that people see when they visit his site name, that’s the one that must be moderated. If he doesn’t do it, he is legally responsible. That’s how I see it.