As I’ve discussed previously on the blog, there are many cases currently pending involving the filesharing of copyright-protected videos involving BitTorrent. Many of the potential defendants in these cases first receive notice of the lawsuit when they receive a letter from their ISP that their identity will be disclosed to the Plaintiff by a certain…
Category: Copyright
Court awards $214 Million for DMCA Circumvention
The recent decision by the United States District Court for the Southern District of California in the Echostar Satellite LLC v. Viewtech case, Civil Case No. 07cv1273 BEN (WVG), 2011 WL 1522409 (S.D.Cal.), is interesting mainly for the amount of statutory damages awarded. The defendants had been manufacturing receivers that circumvented the copy protection in…
Reactions to Lessig’s Keynote Speech at ABA Techshow 2011
I was pleased to be in the room (alright, the second row) when Professor Larry Lessig gave the keynote speech for ABA Techshow 2011. In the speech, entitled “Code is Law: Does Anyone Get This Yet?“, Lessig discusses some of the problems with copyright law’s application to regulate the digital world. I can’t adequately summarize…
“John Doe” Filesharing Lawsuits
As I wrote in a post on our firm blog back in December, I have been answering lots of questions from those receiving notices from their ISP relating to lawsuits over the filesharing of copyrighted material with the BitTorrent protocol. For those seeking more information, the EFF has a great page of subpoena defense resources…
Is Copyright law not working for the RIAA?
In the talk I gave on Monday for IICLE on the Viacom v. Google case, one question I posed was how hypothetically to counsel clients in light of the decision and before the appeal is briefed. I posed two hypotheticals: one being a service provider like YouTube, and the other being a content provider. For…
Awarding of Attorneys Fees for Copyright Cases Not Automatic
In addition to their costs, the prevailing party in a copyright case may also seek recovery of their attorneys fees, provided that the requirements of the Act are otherwise met. See 17 U.S.C. Section 505, which provides as follows: § 505. Remedies for infringement: Costs and attorney’s fees In any civil action under this title,…
Why I’m thankful for Section 230
It’s recent events like the Italian trial of the Google employees which makes me quite thankful that in the United States we have an established principle like Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Still, even that may not protect the employees from criminal liability like what occurred in the Google matter. Briefly, Section 230(c)(1)…
Slides from DMCA presentation – and Thanks!
I’ve been meaning to put these up for a while, here are the slides from the presentation I gave to the Chicago Bar Association’s seminar on website operator liability on May 15, 2009. My presentation focused on the DMCA and discussed four recent cases. thompson-presentation-2009-05-15-10-years-of-the-dmca I’d also like to thank those who submitted pictures for…
Fan Generated Content on the Internet
Here are the slides from my presentation to the Chicago Bar Association’s Cyber Law and Data Privacy committee on February 17, 2009 entitled “Fan Generated Content on the Internet.” I talked about the Harry Potter Lexicon case, including the changes to the book which were made in order for it to be publishable. Then, we…
Professor Lessig on copyright reform
Here’s a link to a great article by Professor Lessig on the need for copyright reform. Despite the article’s title, he’s really not defending piracy per se, but merely noting that the law criminalizes certain behaviors that he believes should instead be encouraged. It’s well worth a read. Posting here on the blog has been…