3 Count: Book Appeal

Jonathan BaileyApril 14, 2014

2 minutes read

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1: Authors Guild Hits Back at Google Ruling

First off today, Jim Milliot at Publishers Weekly reports that the Authors Guild has filed an appeal in its case against Google over the Google Book Search project. It is asking the appeals court to overturn a lower court ruling in favor of Google which effectively ended its long-standing lawsuit against the search giant.

The Authors Guild sued Google claiming that Google Book Search, a project which involves the scanning and indexing of millions of books, was an infringement of the rights of authors. The two sides originally tried to hammer out a pair of settlements but those were tossed for being too broad, forcing the two sides to litigate.

Google recently won a summary judgment that ruled the project to be a fair use, something the Authors Guild contests in its appeal saying that the ruling was an “unprecedented, expansive and erroneous interpretation of the fair use doctrine,” noting that Google began the project for a profit motive, to compete with Amazon, and the case “dwarfs that of any prior fair use case.”

2: Ryushare File-Host Owner Arrested- Cash, Cars, Motorcycles Seized

Next up today, Andy at Torrentfreak writes that the owner of Ryushare, a file hosting site that was popular with the software piracy community, have been arrested, had their site shuttered and had much of their property seized.

It’s a move that reminiscent of Megaupload, which was shuttered in a police action in January of 2012. It saw its founder, Kim Dotcom, arrested and many of his assets seized. Dotcom is currently fighting extradition to the United States from his native New Zealand.

Authorities in Vietnam say that they have arrested Nguyen Duc Nhat, the owner of Ryushare, along with three others and have also seized two cars, three motorcycles, five laptops and around $355,000 in cash. The site is estimated to have made some $6.2 million in its lifetime. The site remains offline.

3: Universal Responds to James Bond Lawsuit: No Green Light for ‘Section 6’ Yet

Finally today, Eriq Gardner at The Hollywood Reporter Esquire reports that Universal has responded to MGM’s lawsuit over the upcoming film “Section 6”, saying that the film in question has not been “green lit” and there has been no decision about actually making the work.

MGM sued Universal saying that the film bore a close resemblance to the James Bond franchise, which it owns. MGM asked the court to expedite discovery, pointing to several known similarities between “Section 6” and the Bond movies.

However, Universal is fighting that request saying that the film has not been approved and that it is wary of sharing confidential information on works in progress with a competitor. Universal also said that it is “substantially changing” the screenplay to remove any potentially infringing material but that the rewriting process won’t be finished for a few more months.

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.