From the category archives:

Copyright

Decision in Viacom v. YouTube: Dog Bites Man (Mark Cuban was wrong)

June 25, 2010

Despite all the hoopla, this week’s copyright decision in Viacom v. YouTube (link on Scribd) was predicatable – a decision in the opposition direction would have been a shocker.  Viacom accused YouTube (owned by Google) of massive copyright infringement.  The court dismissed the case on summary judgment in favor of YouTube. Of course, there is

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Defendant Choses a New Trial in Minnesota File Sharing Case

February 1, 2010
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When I wrote about the trial judge’s remittitur order in the Jamie Thomas case last week, I didn’t mention that a legal aspect of remittitur is that the defendant may accept it, or reject it and demand a new trial. I now understand that the defendant in this case has not accepted the judge’s remittitur,

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“$2 Million for Stealing 24 Songs for Personal Use is Simply Shocking” Says Minnesota Federal Judge, Issuing Remittitur Order

January 23, 2010
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Out of more than 30,000 cases filed against downloaders by the record companies only two end-user download cases have gone to trial and judgment: the Tenenbaum case in Boston, and the case against Jammie Thomas-Rassett in Minnesota. In the second case, the jury awarded the copyright owners $2 million for downloading (and allegedly distributing) 24

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An Early Open Source License

December 29, 2009

One of the first open source copyright licenses: This song is Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright # 154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don’t give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to

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Tenenbaum Final Judgment

December 8, 2009

Final judgment in Sony v. Tenenbaum entered by Judge Nancy Gertner today.  The 30 day appeal clock starts to run.  Should be interesting to see what the First Circuit does with this one, although I suspect that the betting is heavy in favor of quick affirmance. A few choice quotes from Judge Gertner’s opinion, which

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First Circuit: Judge Gertner, You Do Not Have the Authority to Permit Webcasting in Your Courtroom

April 17, 2009

The First Circuit’s decision upholding the RIAA’s challenge to Judge Gertner’s decision to permit webcasting of a motion hearing in the RIAA v. Tenenbaum case was issued on April 16, 2009, very shortly after oral argument. The First Circuit, interpreting a D. Mass. Local Rule, held that U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner’s interpretation of the

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First Circuit Affirms Preliminary Injunction in Copyright Case

April 13, 2009

Here is the First Circuit’s recent decision upholding a preliminary injunction in a copyright case  out of D. Puerto Rico.  The sole issue on appeal was the holding on substantial similarity.  The products were stuffed animals, specifically, frogs.  Or, more specifically, the Puerto Rican tree frog, the Coqui.   I’ve tried to find a picture of

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Oh, Sweet Irony, How Thou Doest Tease Me

April 9, 2009

Massachusetts U.S. District Court Judge Nancy Gertner issued an order permitting the webcast of a scheduled in-court motion hearing in the RIAA/Tenenbaumcopyright downloading case.  The RIAA challenged the order, arguing that a federal rule prohibits the webcast.  Here is yesterday’s audio of the First Circuit oral argument, with Harvard Law Prof. Charles Nesson arguing for

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"Copyright in the Age of YouTube"

April 8, 2009

Great article by Steven Seidenberg in the February 2009 ABA Journal on the legal tensions between user-generated content sites (UGC, in the lingo) and the content owners under the “notice and take down” regime established by the DMCA. Interesting fact from the article: On YouTube alone ten hours of video content are put online every

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