I was honored to be asked to participate on the excellent Lawyer 2 Lawyer podcast on the topic of the recent stipulation entered into between Viacom and YouTube (Google) over user data that the Judge in that case ordered to be turned over to Viacom. My fellow guest was Lauren Gelman, the Executive Director of…
Category: Copyright
YouTomb: A Study of Copyright Infringement on YouTube
Be sure to check out YouTomb, a research project of MIT Free Culture. It monitors YouTube for videos that are taken down pursuant to DMCA takedown notices. The site shows a screenshot of the video and information about the takedown. You can sort by the entity providing the notice, for example you can see all…
The future of DRM
Over lunch today, I had a nice chat with a fellow lawyer about digital rights management (DRM), among other topics. Then, later on, I came across this nice article from The Guardian entitled “How Apple is Changing DRM.” DRM is a way for copyright owners to get around the rights the purchaser of a copy…
Slides from Copyright presentation
Here are my slides from the presentation I gave on April 1, 2008 at the Chicago Bar Association as part of the Internet Intellectual Property Issues for Small Businesses seminar. My presentation is entitled “Copyright Issues for Small Businesses.” Also presenting were Gina Durham and Paul McGrady.
Article on just what is “Intellectual Property”
Mike Masnick at Techdirt has written the latest in a series of posts which discuss the rationale and basis for what we think of as “Intellectual Property.” It’s a well written series, I’d recommend that you read it. I don’t agree with all he says, but it’s well reasoned. It’s of particular interest to me…
Will hacked iPhones become iBricks?
Jacqui Cheng’s article at Ars Technica points out the dilemma facing consumers who want to hack their iPhones so they are not tied to Apple’s exclusive service provider in the USA, AT&T. While hacks are available, they are quasi-legal at best. And, users who do it face the possibility that their $600/$400 iPhone could become…
Commentary: Google/YouTube sued by Viacom
It’s often been said that when Google, Inc. bought the YouTube service, it bought a lawsuit. There have been several, but the biggest one yet was filed on March 13, 2007. There are six counts, the first three are for infringements of the exclusive rights granted to copyright holders, and the remaining three are for…
YouTube received 100,000 takedown notices from Viacom
Here’s a link to a great discussion of the situation which has occurred recently when YouTube received 100,000 DMCA Takedown Notices from Viacom, claiming that all 100,000 videos infringed upon Viacom’s copyrights. The problem? A good number of the videos were legitimate. These users now face the burden of serving YouTube with written counter-notices asserting…
Article on DMCA Proposed Amendments
Lee Hollaar, writing at IPI.org, has written an article discussing proposed legislation that would amend the copyright act and would effectively gut the anticircumvention section, 1201. Also interesting to read is this article on Techdirt that critiques Hollaar’s article. I was curious, so I researched the bill discussed in the article. According to GovTrack, this…