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

It was a busy week for copyright news with several major updates to ongoing cases including the Harry Potter plagiarism allegations, which will now make it to a full trial and Gene Simmons going to war against Anonymous. There were also new stories including another lawsuit round by Blizzard against suspected cheaters and a trademark dispute between two different anti-piracy law firms.

This week’s stories include:

• Harry Potter Plagiarism Case May Head to Court
• Blizzard Sues World of Warcraft Hackers
• Republican Candidates Accused of Copyright Infringement
• Porn Studios Launch Litigation Campaign
• Gene Simmons Has Round Two With Anonymous
• U.S. Anti-Piracy Firms Now Threatening Each Other

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: Blizzard Sues Group Selling StarCraft 2 Hacks

First off today, video game publisher Blizzard has sued ten “Does” that it accuses of making and selling cheating applications for the company’s new and popular Starcraft 2 game. According to the complaint, the cheats not only violate the game’s terms of service but are also copyright infringements as they involve making copies of the game, creating derivative works and coping game portions into system RAM while playing, all outside the scope of their license. This follows closely a similar pattern Blizzard followed with World of Warcraft, where they targeted bot makers and private hosts.

2: Porn Studio a Step Closer to Revealing Pirates’ IDs

Next up today, porn studio Third World Media has file a new lawsuit, this time naming some 1,500 “Does” that it accuses of illegally downloading and sharing one of its films. This lawsuit comes after a similar complaint sought to reveal the identities of some 1,200 accused file sharers. Most likely the studio is seeking a subpoena for the names for the defendants, of which it only has IP addresses at this time, and send them demand letters, following closely the method of the U.S. Copyright Group and others.

3: Movie Rental Outfit Hacked, Emails Leaked, Redirected to The Pirate Bay

Finally today, in a move that is eerily similar to what happened to ACS:Law, Portuguese movie rental firm ACAPOR, which had lobbied for stronger copyright laws within the nation, had their server hacked and their emails leaked on The Pirate Bay. The leak seems to be not as major as the ACS:Law one as the firm was of a lower profile and the emails are in Portuguese, however, many are eager to see what information is contained within that file.

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: Massive Judgment In World of Warcraft Copyright Infringement Case

First off today, Blizzard, the company behind the popular World of Warcraft roleplaying game, won a major judgment against Scapegaming, a company that Blizzard said was running an unauthorized World of Warcraft server. The judge in the case seemed to agree, awarding Blizzard, over $3 million in profits, a bit over $65,000 in attorney fees and $85 million in statutory damages. Scapegaming did not defend the lawsuit, which may indicate collecting the damages will prove nearly impossible.

2: Radio, RIAA: Mandatory FM Radio in Cell Phones is the Future

Next up today, though the RIAA and the National Association of Broadcasters may not agree on whether radio stations should pay royalties to labels, they are both backing a plan to require the installation of FM chips in all cell phones and other handheld electronic devices. According to the organizations, this gives consumers more legitimate choices for listening to music and aids in public safety as emergency broadcasts are sent out over FM frequencies. The Consumer Electronic Association, which represents manufacturers of such devices, opposed the idea.

3: AP Decides Not to LOL

Finally today, the Associated Press, apparently was in negotiations with Pet Holdings Inc. the owners of the I Can Has Cheezburger blog network, to bring the network into their fold. Negotiations supposedly began to break down after Ben Huh, the owner of Pet Holdings, had issues with the wording in the contract and the AP finally walked away after stating concerns about its integrity. Digital deals are becoming more common for the AP, including Yahoo, Google and the Huffington Post among others.

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.

However, there are a lot of other great copyright stories including several candidates for “Weird Story of the Week”.

Remember, as usual, this week’s linkroll is a “raw” link list. Some stories are duplicated, some do not point to their original sources and some may not be accurate. A great deal of refining goes into producing the show notes for the Copyright 2.0 Show.

This week, something amazing happens as we both Chris and I are on the podcast. We’re even talking at the same time!

However, it was a good week to get back together as we had a lot of “hard” news to go over including updates on the Universal Music lawsuit, the YouTube/Viacom case and a series of rulings on everything from Unixware to Bratz Dolls.

All in all, there were sixteen stories this week including news from all over the copyright world including our “Weird Story of the Week”.

This week’s stories include:

• Universal Claims DMCA Notices can Ignore Fair Use
• YouTube and Viacom Work to Protect Privacy
• SCO Has to Pay Big
• Violating a EULA Becomes a Copyright Infringement
• Leecher Disputes Movie Industry Claims
• And Many more…

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

Show Notes

This week, in the time since we recorded the podcast, some very important information came to light regarding one of the stories, the issue of cease and desist and copyright. I covered the issue in more detail above as part of my Blog Herald work and would encourage anyone to read that before listening to the podcast as the article is much more up to date.

Otherwise, it was a normal week as I sat down with Chris Matthieu from Numly to discuss the past week in copyright news, views and abuse. This week was probably the most complicated week I’ve seen so far, bringing to the table a total of sixteen stories.

This week’s stories include.

• Scientology is Under Attack
• Cease and Desist Letters Allegedly Retain Copyright Protection
• Warner Music Sues Seeqpod
• Starlite Goes Dark
• Author Claims Pirated eBooks Can Help Sales
• And Many more…

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

Show Notes

[audio:http://media.libsyn.com/media/plagiarismtoday/copyright20eps43.mp3]