3 Count: Dead Lawsuit Walking

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1: Lil’ Kim Sued Over Zombie Makeup Photo

First off today, Eriq Gardner at The Hollywood Reporter Esquire reports that Canadian artist Samantha Ravndahl has gone through with earlier threats and filed a lawsuit against musician Lil’ Kim over the rapper’s alleged use of her artwork as the cover art for new new single.

Ravndahl had created a tutorial on how to do zombie makeup and had posted the steps and the finished product on her various presences online. Some time later, Lil’ Kim revealed the cover of her new single “Dead Gal Walking” and used the photo, having removed Ravndahl’s watermark. Ravndahl had attempted to resolve the issue with Lil’ Kim’s camp but claims she was unable to get a serious response.

The lawsuit seeks damages for copyright infringement, violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act for removing copyright management information and violations of the Visual Artists Rights Act for denying her credit for her work. The lawsuit seeks profits, statutory damages and attorneys’ fees for the infringement.

2: Premier League Targets Cardiff and Swansea Pubs Over Illegal Screenings

Next up today, Paul Martin at the BBC reports that the UK Premier League has filed a lawsuit with area pubs over their alleged airing of league matches using subscriptions to foreign channels, which are often significantly cheaper than ones in the UK.

A recent court case in the UK found that it was legal for pubs to use foreign receivers to get channels outside of the UK. However, is a pub uses such a subscription to show the matches, they can still land in trouble if they show the logos or play the anthems owned by the league, making it almost impossible to actually play such matches publicly.

The league says it plans to bring some 100 such cases over the course of the season after visiting and investigating nearly 200. The league said it did attempt to work with the pubs, offering them a chance to get rid of the foreign systems but many have refused to comply.

3: Three Strikes Law Does Nothing to Curb Piracy, Research Finds

Finally today, Ernesto at Torrentfreak writes that a survey of 2,000 French Internet users found that the nation’s “three strikes” rule has done little, if anything, to curb or reduce piracy in the country.

The study, conducted by French and U.S. researchers, found that people did not believe that they would get caught under the system, making it ineffective as a deterrent. Another factor is that such systems only track peer-to-peer infringement and not other types of file sharing, such as direct downloading, and many simply switch to other methods.

The study comes as the United State is ramping up its graduated response system, known as the Copyright Alert System, and other nations, including France and South Korea, have been reevaluating their established systems.

Suggestions

That’s it for the three count today. We will be back tomorrow with three more copyright links. If you have a link that you want to suggest a link for the column or have any proposals to make it better. Feel free to leave a comment or send me an email. I hope to hear from you.

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