It is Friday again and that means that it is time for another episode of the Copyright 2.0 Show.

This week, Patrick and I come back from two weeks off for the holidays to talk about all of the presents we got, what Christmas means to us as adults and the true joy of giving.

That and some copyright stuff too…

With so much time to cover we have to race to catch up. We have a lot of ground to cover including GoDaddy changing its stance on SOPA due to a boycott, a potential PROTECT IP vote in the Senate, an important medical diagnostic test removed due to a copyright claim, Atari going after knockoff apps in the iOS app store and much, much more!

So, come ring in the new year with us and get things started right with a mega dose of copyright news, views and abuse.

This week’s stories include:

• GoDaddy Backtracks on SOPA After Boycott
• PROTECT IP Vote Possible
• Mental State Test Removed Due to Copyright Claim
• Atari Removes “Hundreds” of Games From the iOS App Store
• The “Spanish Napster” Wins Big in Local Court
• ABC Settles Wipeout Lawsuit
• James Joyce Works Hit the Public Domain

You can download the MP3 file here (direct download). Those interested in subscribing to the show can do so via this feed.

Show Notes

About the Hosts

Jonathan Bailey

Jonathan Bailey (@plagiarismtoday) is the Webmaster and author of Plagiarism Today (Hint: You’re there now) and works as a copyright and plagiarism consultant. Though not an attorney, he has resolved over 700 cases of plagiarism involving his own work and has helped countless others protect their work and develop strategies for making their content work as hard as possible toward their goals.

Patrick O’Keefe

Patrick O’Keefe (@iFroggy) is the owner of the iFroggy Network, a network of websites covering various interests. He’s the author of the book “Managing Online Forums,” a practical guide to managing online communities and social spaces. He maintains a blog about online community management at ManagingCommunities.com and a personal blog at patrickokeefe.com.

Have any suggestions for the 3 Count? Let me know via Twitter @plagiarismtoday.

1: ABC Sports Says Pawlenty Misusing Olympics Footage

First off today, Presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty has drawn fire from ABC over his campaign’s use of footage from the 1980 Winter Olympics “Miracle on Ice” game. Pawlenty had used the footage in a commercial for his campaign prompting ABC to accuse him of copyright infringement and demand that he stop. Pawlenty’s campaign has said that they believe the use to be a fair one but respect ABC’s concerns and will respond to them.

2: Jammie Thomas Judgment Lowered from $1.5 million to $54,000

Next up today, Jammie Thomas, first sued by the RIAA for file sharing in 2006, has once again had her damages reduced, down from $1.5 million ($62,500 per song) to $54,000 ($2,250 per song). The judge in the case took the steps after a third jury awarded the record labels the massive damages, that in turn after a second jury also awarded high damages only to have those reduced by the judge as well. The RIAA has said that they are likely to appeal this case if the damages are drastically reduced.

3: U of C Says No to Copyright Collective

Finally today, the University of Calgary has announced that it is ending its relationship with Access Copyright, a copyright clearance group that ensures universities have permission to use various works on campus, and will instead go to managing their own copyright needs. According to the school, this means that professors will have to do more linking when referencing outside sources. The move comes after Access Copyright obtained the right to raise its tariff, which would have seen the school’s costs balloon from $27,500 to $1.2 million a year.

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.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Wednesday evening at 6 PM ET for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Friday right here on Plagiarism Today.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

Have any suggestions for the 3 Count? Let me know via Twitter @plagiarismtoday.

1: File-Sharer Sentenced To 3 Years Probation, Cognitive Therapy

First off today, Anne Muir, a 58-year-old woman from Scotland, has pleaded guilty to criminal file sharing and has been sentenced to three years probation and court-ordered therapy. Muir admitted to sharing files on Direct Connect where she downloaded and made available some 7,493 music files and 24,243 karaoke files. According to the court, Muir suffers from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, which prompted her to hoard the music files. The plea caps a 3-year investigation, which began in late 2007.

2: BT, TalkTalk to Appeal Against Digital Piracy Judgment

Next up today, two of the UK’s largest ISPs, BT and Talk Talk, are appealing their recent High Court loss over the Digital Economy Act. According to the ISPs, the act, which went into effect in June or 2010, was rushed through Parliament and is incompatible with EU law. However, the High Court disagreed, siding with the government and prompting the appeal. The DEA requires ISPs to identify and, after a series of warnings, cut off Internet access of repeat infringers.

3: Is ABC’s “Wipeout” a Rip-Off?

Finally today, a lawsuit filed by Japan’s Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) against the U.S. TV network ABC over the ABC TV show “Wipeout”. According to the suit, TBS claims that Wipeout is an infringement of their shows “Takeshi’s Castle,” “Most Extreme Elimination Challenge”, “Sasuke” and “Ninja Warrior”. The shows are similar to “Wipeout” in that they have contestants compete in a series of extreme physical challenges but questions are raised over what are the protectable elements from a copyright standpoint. To make matters worse, an ABC memo has surfaced asking if it was “necessary or appropriate” to license foreign reality shows when making similar shows. “Wipeout” has been a major ratings success for ABC and is in its fourth season.

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.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Wednesday evening at 6 PM ET for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Friday right here on Plagiarism Today.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

Have any suggestions for the 3 Count? Let me know via Twitter @plagiarismtoday.

1: FilmOn Streaming TV Site Temporarily Shut Down by Court

First off today, streaming television site FilmOn, which was streaming live TV from the major broadcast networks in the U.S., has received a temporary restraining order barring it from streaming video from those networks, all four of which had sued the company. This news bodes poorly for competitor and also-defendant iviTV, both of which make similar arguments that their service is legal. However, FilmOn says that they are in negotiations with the networks and are hoping to have a “cooperative” business model some time in the near future.

2: Ray Charles’ Estate Sues His Son For Publishing Photo

Next up today, the estate of Ray Charles is suing the deceased musician’s son, Ray Charles Robinson Jr. for copyright infringement after Robinson used a photo of his father on the cover of his new book, “You Don’t Know Me: Reflections of My Father, Ray Charles” as well as some lyrics from some of his father’s songs. Also named in the suit is the book’s publisher, Random House.

3: The British Library releases 3 million bibliographic records into the public domain using CC0

Finally today, the British Library has released some 3 million records from the British National Bibliography into the public domain using Creative Commons’ CC0 waiver. This is part of the JISC OpenBibliography project, which hopes to make bibliographic data available without restrictions to the public.

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.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Wednesday evening at 6 PM ET for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Friday right here on Plagiarism Today.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

Have any suggestions for the 3 Count? Let me know via Twitter @plagiarismtoday.

1: Call of Duty: Black Ops Leaks To BitTorrent – Or Does it?

First off today, the latest game in the popular Call of Duty series has been leaked on Bittorrent, maybe. After several copies of the game “Call of Duty: Black Ops” were stolen from a pressing plant, the leak seemed inevitable and now a torrent has shown up but there is significant doubt if it is a real one. However, friends of the site IP Cybercrime, which is run by Rob Holmes, managed to get some of the copies back by simply tracking down those who had it and asking for it nicely, including asking one young boy’s mother. However, it seems possible that at least one copy of the game has leaked out on Bittorrent, two weeks before the November 9th official release.

2: ABC, NBC, CBS Block Google TV, Declare War

Next up today, the big three networks, ABC, NBC and CBS have all blocked access to their content from Google TV, preventing users from streaming their content. However, at least one of the networks, NBC, has apps available for other networks, including CNBC, available for the device. It’s also unclear if the ban is very effective as several users have reported being able to watch some or all of various shows before being blocked. The networks join Hulu as notable holdouts on Google TV. Though Viacom and Google are not blocking at this time, they may choose to do so later.

3: Message which brought hope now copyright of Chile miner

Finally today, in an example of world news and copyright news colliding, the Chilean miner who sent the now-famous note to the surface letting the world know that they were alive and trapped has now received an official copyright registration on the note. That note, which simply says, “Estamos bien en el refugio los 33″ (“We are okay in the refuge, the 33 of us”) appeared on t-shirts and mugs during the dramatic rescue. The miner who wrote it, Jose Ojeda, simply says he wants to ensure no one misuses the phrase and that the move was inspired by his President’s use of the phrase while overseas in Europe.

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.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Wednesday evening at 6 PM ET for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Friday right here on Plagiarism Today.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

Have any suggestions for the 3 Count? Let me know via Twitter @plagiarismtoday.

1: Broadcasters Sue Ivi for Copyright Infringement

First off today, in a move that should surprise no one, several broadcasters including Fox, ABC and CBS have counter-sued the TV streaming service Ivi, claiming that they are infringing on their copyrights by rebroadcasting live television from their various channels. According to Ivi, the law allows them to rebroadcast such TV signals and, since they are Internet-only, they are exempt from FCC requirements in doing so. They received letters from these companies and others and even filed a proactive suit against them last week. According to an Ivi rep, this lawsuit is “not about copyright”, but instead is about “competition”.

2: The Pirate Bay Appeal Day 2: Lost Sales

Next up today, the second day of The Pirate Bay appeal has concluded and most of the day was spent with prosecutors and content industry representatives highlighting lost sales and damages they see as being caused by The Pirate Bay and painting the site as a commercial enterprise. The defense did testify some at the end of the day and argued that most of the torrents on the site did not point to copyright infringing works and that, according to them, the site is merely a search engine and not responsible for the content on it. Day three is expected to have more testimony from the defense as the trial is moving faster than expected.

3: The “Legal Blackmail” Business: Inside a P2P Settlement Factory

Finally today, as the leak of emails from the UK law firm ACS:Law continues to be poured over, a clearer picture of the operations of the company, which was famous for sending out “settlement letters” to alleged file sharers in the UK. Ars Technica has a lengthy article highlighting how the business worked, including the types of responses ACS:Law got to its demand letters and some of its business dealings with other companies, including the controversial U.S. Copyright Group.

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.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Wednesday evening at 6 PM ET for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Friday right here on Plagiarism Today.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

Specifically, several posts on the blog appeared to be lifted verbatim from various news sources, including several mainstream media sites including CNN, MSNBC, ABC News and Oprah as well as larger blogs, such as WalletPop among others. None of the articles included attribution though some did have very brief introductions before the copied content.

Likely as a result of these allegations, the blog is down at this time though, if you act quick, you can find some of the content in the Google Cache.

The allegations seem to be about as cut and dry as possible, using the cached copies and performing a few simple Google searches, I was able to quickly and easily find about four or five examples of content lifted directly from other sites. Going back through the dates, I was able to find examples of copied works as far back as July, as far as the cached copies reached.

Here’s just one of the example Google results.

And another one.

Though the evidence is about as clear-cut as you can get, it seems unlikely to me that Tesh himself was performing the plagiarism. Almost certainly it was someone under his employ that was managing the blog. However, since it was his blog it is ultimately his responsibility.

Tesh has not commented on the allegations and his blog is simply down at this time, listed merely as being a broken link.

Interestingly, the only original articles I could find were cross-posts from the regular tesh.com site, indicating that the author of the articles on the main site was using authentic work that was being brought into the blog.

Hopefully Tesh will provide some insight as to what happened and how it was able to continue for as long as it did.

In the end, it seems unlikely that any of the entities the blog plagiarized from will sue, especially given the quick action to remove the content, but the potential for a lawsuit is going to make it so that Tesh isn’t likely to say much or shed any light on the incident unless forced.

All in all, it’s just another example of how a plagiarist, if unchecked, can create serious problems for his or her employer and why it is important to verify all works posted for authenticity.

Have any suggestions for the 3 Count? Let me know via Twitter @plagiarismtoday.

1: Bill Would Give Justice Department Power to Shutter Piracy Sites Worldwide

First off today, a new bipartisan bill introduced into Congress seeks to give the Department of Justice the right to close sites it considers to be “pirates” via injunctions to be issued to either the domain’s registrar or the registry for the domain’s TLD, the latter of which are all U.S.-based. Once the injunction was issued, the site involved would return an error if anyone attempted to visit the domain. The act, entitled the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act, will likely have a rough road through Congress but is already being applauded by members of the copyright lobbies, including Bob Pisano, the chief executive of the Motion Picture Association of America.

2: iviTV Sues Major Media, Claiming Right To Internet TV

Next up today, iviTV, the “cable company” that hopes to stream live TV over the Internet for a monthly fee, all without rebroadcast rights, has sued several major media companies who had served the company with cease and desist letters recently. According to iviTV, as a cable company it doesn’t need republishing rights but, as an Internet-only company, it is not bound by the FCC and doesn’t have to pay the scheduled fees. According to iviTV, the lawsuit is a “a preemptive move to discourage needless litigation from big media.”

3: Stevie Wonder Lobbies UN Over Audiobooks for the Visually Impaired

Finally today, musician Stevie Wonder, in a speech to the World Intellectual Property Organization, pushed for called for unified rules to improve access to audiobooks and text-to-speech conversion of ebooks for the visually impaired. He also promised to come back and play a celebration concert if WIPO took appropriate action in the next twelve months but also threatened to “write a song about what you didn’t do” if they failed to do anything.

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.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Wednesday evening at 6 PM ET for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Friday right here on Plagiarism Today.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

With that being said, several new stories have cropped up that deserve mention as the issues they raise do pertain directly to ones handled by those posting their works on line. If this column is popular, I might move it to Friday’s and make it a regular event.

So, without further ado, here’s a look at some of the stories that have been impacting copyright on the Web.

False DMCA Notice Results in YouTube Takedown

Mashable reported that a fifteen-year-old teen from Australia filed a false DMCA notice against YouTube as a prank. In the notice, he pretended to be a representative from the Australian Broadcasting Company (ABC) and requested the removal of hundreds of clips from the show “Chaser’s War on Everything”.

However, ABC has repeatedly stated that they support users uploading clips of the show to YouTube and elsewhere. Nonetheless, the notice resulted in the removal of hundreds of videos and many YouTube users that had posted the clips were sent stern warnings about violating copyright.

ABC, in a statement, said the following:

Everyone does dumb stuff when they are 15. But what was of concern to us was the fact that YouTube was sending copyright infringement notices to people who have been uploading Chaser clips to YouTube, threatening to shut down their access to YouTube if they persist that’s what was worrying to us.

The DMCA worked exactly as designed. A notice was filed, the works were removed and they can now be put back. However, what is scary, and what the prankster probably did not think about, is that he has opened himself up to legal action.

As per the DMCA, he had to swear, under the penalty of perjury, that the information was accurate when it obviously was not. False DMCA cases in the past, including the Michael Crook case and the Diebold case, dealt harsh penalties to the party abusing the DMCA.

However, the sheer geography of this matter makes such a suit unlikely. Still, if one of the parties that were the subject of the takedown had the ability and the desire to do so, they could easily file suit against either the prankster or his guardians, possibly to a very unsightly end.

Premature Mob Justice

Earlier this month, several reports on the Web surfaces saying that GSC Game World’s recently released shooter S.T.A.L.K.E.R. ripped much of its artwork from other commercial games including Doom 3 and Half-Life 2. The story took off almost immediately, even hitting the front page of Digg, and even prompted a comment from Todd Hollshead, the CEO of Id Software, the makers of the Doom series.

I’ve seen a post on a web forum that claims DOOM3 assets are used in another game, but we’ve been working hard on Enemy Territory: Quake Wars as well as our own internal project and have not had the time to fully investigate or otherwise verify that the claim is true. Only from what I’ve seen on the Web, it’s concerning. However, it may turn out to be nothing. Nevertheless, it would be improper to make any decision about a course of action until we find out whether the claim is true, and what assets from DOOM3, if any, have potentially been used.

However, the fury was for nothing. It was almost immediately discovered that the artwork was actually purchased from a third party, Marlin Studios, which makes texture packs specifically for video games and movies. The use was both licensed and for the exact purpose it was intended.

All in all, it is just another example of why mob justice is generally a bad idea. Often times, the full story is not known until after the snap decisions are made.

Strong Bad Does Copyright

Finally, on a lighter note, the most recent Strong Bad Email on Homestar Runner pokes fun at the current copyright climate.

In the episode, Strong Bad and his cohort/lawyer The Cheat threaten to “sue” the email submitter for violating their “copyrights” by producing a comic strip of them. They also relive a time they used water balloons to file a similar “suit” against Homestar himself when he attempted sell Strong Bad flavored water.

It’s great fun for anyone interested in copyright humor, however, it does make me want to consider enlisting the Cheat’s services in my consulting practice. A briefcase full of water balloons might make a great deterrent to scrapers…