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

1: Hollywood Force ISP To Use Child Abuse Filter Against File-Sharing Site

First off today, the Motion Picture Association (MPA) is before a UK high court in a bid to force the UK ISP BT to block access to Newzbin2, a Usenet service that rose from the ashes of the first Newzbin, which was closed after successful litigation by the MPA. According to the movie studios, they targeted BT because it is both the largest ISP and it already has the technology in place in the form of a child pornography filter the service has installed. If the MPA is successful in getting an injunction, it would be the first time in the UK that an ISP has been forced to use an internal filter to block a site for copyright purposes, an act that is already spawning a great deal of controversy.

2: No save data reset for Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D

Next up today, Capcom, the makers of the Resident Evil series of video games, including the recent release Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D for the Nintendo 3DS, have chosen an unusual DRM scheme for the title, preventing the same game file from being reset. This move is aimed primarily at devaluing used copies of the game, which will not be able to create a new saved game file, but it also means that original owners will not be able to play through the game twice. The systems has already sparked outrage among gamers but, in Japan where the game has already been released, has succeeded in driving down the price of used copies, as low as $6.

3: Harry Potter and the Direct, DRM-Free Sale

Finally today, author J.K. Rowling, the creator of the Harry Potter books, announced a new site entitled “Pottermore” that she hopes will offer a unique online reading experience. However, within that announcement was the news that the Harry Potter books will be available for the first time as eBooks, they will be available in any format desired and will be available DRM free. Also, the sale is a direct sale, meaning that it is not going through a publisher, opening the door for Rowling to receive more revenue from each sale.

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: Author Slams eBook Piracy, Son Outs Her As a Music Pirate

First off today, as part of a point/counterpoint on the issue of ebook piracy, the Norwegian publication Dagens Næringsliv ran an interview with author Anne B. Ragde, who slammed ebook piracy. However, during the interview, she admitted to buying counterfeit handbags and her son said that the two of them had a rather large pirated MP3 collection. Ragbe defended herself by saying the quotes were taken out of context, that the iPod on which the music is stored is “not representative of (her) relationship with the music industry” and that she will delete the songs when she arrives at the cottage where it’s stored during the holidays.

2: YouTube Extends Video Time, Promises Copyright Protection

Next up today, Google has announced that it will begin allowing some users to upload clips longer than 15 minutes to YouTube but it will only be doing so for those with a proven track record of complying with YouTube’s copyright policies. YouTube has also said that it will be rolling out the feature slowly and that it will continue to use the ContentID system to ensure that copyright infringing material is not uploaded to the service. However, many content creators, in particular the Independent Film & Television Alliance, are not wholly convinced of the power of the ContentID system.

3: Judge: Music Website Violated Beatles Copyrights

Finally today, a year after the service was forced to close due to a lawsuit, BlueBeat.com has been found liable for copyright infringement for selling the Beatles songs, over a year before they were legally available on the Web. The site famously sold the Beatles, along with other popular artists, for 25 cents per track. The company was shuttered by another industry lawsuit in 2009 but the case involving EMI over the Beatles tracks continued.

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: 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.

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

1: UFC Fights Illegal Online Streaming Via Subpoenas Served to Justin.tv, Ustream.tv

First off today, the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) has filed a series of subpoenas with streaming services Ustream and Justin.tv to determine the IP addresses of those who streamed a recent UFC pay-per-view event illegally over the service. UFC president and spokesperson Dana White said that he “can’t wait” to go after those sharing the content illegally. This move comes after the UFC settled some 500 file sharing lawsuits.

2: Mass BitTorrent Lawsuits Now Target Private Trackers

Next up today, adult movie company Lucas Entertainment has filed a lawsuit in against 65 alleged file sharers in Texas Northern District Court. While that isn’t wholly unusual, what is different is that the lawsuit targets users of Gay-Torrents.net, a private bittorrent tracker with some 235,000 members. The lawsuit raises questions about the role of private trackers in these lawsuits and what, if any, evidence the tracker may be able to provide as they do maintain some logs of user data to track sharing ratios.

3: Celebrated authors bypass publishing houses to sell ebooks via Amazon

Finally today, many well-known authors, including Philip Roth to Orhan Pamuk, Martin Amis and John Updike are bypassing their publishers and, instead, publishing their own eBooks on the Amazon Kindle and similar services. The reason is that many of these authors signed contracts before eBooks were in existence and their deals with publishers don’t cover the new format. Because of this, they have banded together through a new company called Odyssey Editions to release the books online. Newer authors, however, routinely sign contracts that cover all electronic forms of publications, including eBooks, making their participation impossible.

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.

1: Court Reduces ‘Shocking’ File Sharing Award

First off today U.S. Federal Judge Michael Davis has drastically reduced the damages award in the Jammie Thomas case, down to $54,000. This comes after the single mother was found liable for sharing some 24 songs and was first hit with a $220,000 judgment against her and then, in a retrial, a $1.92 million verdict. The judge has also said that the record labels may face a retrial if they do not accept the new award but Thomas has said that she can not afford to pay even the reduced amount.

2: Apple Pulls App After Competitor’s Copyright Infringement Claim

Next up Apple has found itself in a bit of a copyright pickle. After receiving a notice of copyright infringement from the developers of AppBox, a multi-application app for the iPhone, that the competing product AppVault had violated their rights, they removed the newcomer from the store, creating a controversy. According to the makers of AppVault, their application was not an infringement, but merely a similar app and has started a petition drive to have the app returned to the store.

3: O’Reilly Drops eBook DRM, Sees 104% Increase in Sales

Finally today, tech publisher O’Reilly has seen an increase of over 100% in the eighteen months since it dropped DRM from its eBooks, further damaging the notion that DRM is useful tool to increase sales. Though most of this increase is likely due to increased traction in the eBook market in general, it is very interesting to see a DRM-free eBook publisher doing so well.

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 Saturday morning for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Monday morning right here on Plagiarism Today.

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

1: MySpace/Imeem Deal Leaves Thousands of Artists Unpaid

First off today, Myspace’s purchase of Imeem has left a bad taste in many independent artist’s mouth. Many who sold music through Imeem’s storefront widgets, which were very common on Myspace at one point, are likely to never see the money they earned.

Imeem had gone as much as a year in some cases without paying artists due to financial difficulties but, when Myspace supposedly purchased the company earlier this year, there was supposedly a glimmer of hope. However, that too has been dashed as now it has come out that Myspace didn’t actually buy Imeem, just some of its assets. As such, Myspace did not acquire Imeem’s debt and has no obligation to pay the unpaid artists.

While these types of deals are not uncommon, especially considering that Imeem was in foreclosure at the time of the deal, it has understandably left a lot of artists upset about the deal and feel a bit burned.

Hopefully though, this incident won’t discourage the budding independent direct-to-consumer music sale business as it does have a great deal of potential for artists and businesses alike.

2: Apple Says Audiobooks Must Have DRM

Next up today, want to distribute your audiobook via Apple and Audible but don’t want to include DRM? That might be trickier than you think. As author Cory Doctorow found out, Apple and Audible both insist upon DRM for audiobooks, even as Apple has done away with DRM in the rest of their iTunes store.

The saga started out when Doctorow tried to distribute an audio version of his book “Little Brother” without DRM over iTunes. The result was that Audible, the only authorized bookseller for iTunes, refused to allow it even though both he and his publisher were prepared to try. By the time his next book came out, “Makers” Audible was comfortable with it but Apple was not. However, even attempting to sell the book directly through Audible seemed to be an empty gesture as Audible has a EULA that functions like a DRM.

Doctorow did heap praise upon his publisher for being flexible and hardworking in trying to distribute the book without DRM, but he wishes Apple and Audible could do the same.

3: Copyright Owners Fight Plan to Release E-Books for the Blind

Finally today, various copyright groups including the RIAA, MPAA, book publishers and even the Chamber of Commerce are filing objections with a proposed WIPO treaty being discussed today by the 180 member nations. The goal of the treaty is to allow the import and export of DRM-protected works that are accessible to the visually impaired.

Currently many nations, including the U.S., provide a copyright exemption for non-profits, including the Library of Congress, to make copies of copyrighted works so they can be accessible to the visually impaired. However, the largest catalog by far is in the U.S. and current treaties prohibit the import and export of those works, limiting access to them globally. The new treaty, if passed, would change that.

The only U.S. corporation to come on the side of the treaty was Google, who has expressed concerns that this is another case of the copyright industries blindly opposing any loosening of copyright law, no matter how much public benefit may be derived.

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 Saturday morning for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Monday morning right here on Plagiarism Today.

1: Taylor Wessing Global Intellectual Property Index 2009

The law firm Taylor Wessing has released its 2009 Global Intellectual Property Index, which it says “provides an assessment of the best and worst jurisdictions to obtain, exploit, enforce and attack particular types of IP”. The results were not very surprising this year with the United Kingdom taking the top spot, followed by Germany (which moved up one spot) and the United States (which Germany bumped down).

At the bottom of the 24-country list was Brazil, India and China, with China being the worst.

What is most interesting is that most of the countries on the list improved their “rating” since the first study last year, but the United States dropped 11 points, largely due to a “slip” in the patent index. down to 751. Still, that puts it well above China who, despite a 43 point improvement still only had a score of 491. The U.S. is also number one in the copyright index of the study.

2: RealNetworks accuses MPAA of antitrust violations

Next up, the fight between Real and the MPAA has gotten even dirtier as Real has now filed an antitrust complaint against the MPAA. As most probably already know the MPAA sued Real over its RealDVD product, which allowed users to rip DVDs and store them to their hard drives.

According to Real, the MPAA, which is made up of several different studios, conspired to boycott Real after the launch of the RealDVD project, which is currently not available for sale due to a restraining order. The company believes that the MPAA’s members engaed in a “horizontal conspiracy” to blacklist RealNetworks and other Real properties.

Whether this will pan out or not remains to be seen, but others have tried antitrust allegations as part of copyright lawsuits and, typically, have failed. Still, if Real is able to prove a conspiracy, that could change.

3: A Book Author Wonders How to Fight Piracy

Finally today, author Peter Wayner has posted an article on the New York Times site about book piracy and the problems it creates. He feels, as the author of technical textbooks, that the widespread piracy of textbooks has had an overwhelmingly negative impact and cautions that technical books are the “canary” warning other genres since they are typically pirated first.

One interesting point he makes, in a direct attempt to answer Cory Doctorow, is that obscurity is not his enemy. Once his books were pirated, his sales did not go up in any meaningful way. Whether this is unique to him or a broad trend will need more study but it seems to reason that, while piracy may help some authors, for those that write technical books, who are usually obscure even when their books are purchased, it might not.

He also points out that, even as other types of book publishing have seen growth, the tech publishing industry shrank by 8% last year. What exactly this means for books as it relates to piracy remains to be seen.

Suggestions

That’s it for the three count today, we’ll 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 Saturday morning for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Monday morning right here on Plagiarism Today.

1: New Kindle Audio Feature Causes a Stir

Publishers are expressing concern that a new feature of the Kindle 2, which reads eBooks aloud using a text-to-speech converter may be infringing. According to Paul Aiken, executive director of the Authors Guild, the new feature is a derivative work under copyright law and that “They (Amazon) don’t have the right to read a book out loud.”

Others have been quick to point out that the new Kindle does not actually make a new copy of the work to read it aloud, just simply presents the information in audio format, similar to what screen readers do now on the Web for the visually impaired. Others have asked questions about whether or not a person reading a book aloud to themselves could be considered an infringement.

It is unclear what, if any, action the Authors Guild plans on taking over the Kindle at this time.

2: Shepard Fairey: OBEY my lawyers

In a story that has been somewhat slow to trickle out, accusations are that Fairey has been somewhat hypocritical on his views of copyright have begun to trickle out. The embattled artist, still embroiled in a legal tangle with the Associated Press over his Obama “Hope” poster, allegedly sent a cease and desist letter to at least one artist, Baxter Orr, who tried to repurpose Fairey’s work.

Orr had made a parody of Fairey’s famous “Obey” giant poster by putting a SARS mask over the mouth and writing “Protect Yourself” underneath it. Fairey responded, according to Orr, by having his legal team send a cease and desist letter.

Though this may not affect the legal issues in his current battle, this has caused many to question whether Fairey is as pure-intentioned as some have been lead to believe.

3: DRM’s demise clears way for home audio innovation

Finally today, gadget gurus are hoping that the demise of DRM on music may herald a new renaissance for home audio, especially “whole home” audio systems that allow listeners to hear music in any room and control it with a remote.

Since the systems required both a networked home, something an increasing number of homes are becoming, and access to the music, the removal of DRM may mean that the final barrier of entry is gone, paving the way for innovation and freeing users from the hassle of blaring a stereo in one room just to hear it in another.

Suggestions

That’s it for the three count today, we’ll 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 below or send me an email using the contact form above. I hope to hear from you.

Want the Full Story?

Tune in every Saturday morning for the live recording of the Copyright 2.0 Show or wait and get the edited version Monday morning right here on Plagiarism Today.

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]

The invite-only group is targeted at published authors to discuss “how authors and publishers can prevent electronic publications from being freely distributed by software pirates and pirate Web sites.”

If you wish to join this group, you need to contact Maria and introduce yourself, being sure to include your most recently published work. Other than those requirements, membership is free.

Also, be sure to take a look at her post about ebooks, which contains the information about the group in the callout as well as some background information on the problem.

If you are a blogger or Webmaster and wanting to discuss legal issues faced by them, be sure to visit the Performancing Legal Issues Forum where I am offering assistance for free.