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

1: Register of Copyrights: Without SOPA, Copyright “Will Ultimately Fail”

First off today, the Register of Copyrights, Maria Pallante, testified before Congress yesterday regarding the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and gave unabashed support for the bill, even saying that without it copyright would “ultimately fail”. The act, which enables U.S. rightsholders to get court orders to block “rogue” websites as well as order payment providers, advertisers and others to stop supplying funds to them, has been the subject of great controversy in recent weeks. Pallante herself had, previously, indicated she was opposed to efforts that might “unnecessarily jeopardize the efficient operation of the Internet” but gave her full support for this bill. More hearings are scheduled today.

2: Streaming Service Reproduces Copyrighted Films in Memory Buffers, High Court Rules

Next up today, in the UK, a high court has ruled that a streaming service does not violate copyright for the portions of the copyrighted work it stores in its servers. The case deals with the site TVCatchup.com, which rebroadcasts transmissions from various TV stations in the country via the Web. Broadcasters sued the site claiming copyright infringement but the judge, on advice from a European Court, has ruled that the amounts stored in the server for transmission are not, in and of themselves, an infringement as they are temporary and incidental. However, if the European Court finds that the broadcast equals transmission to the public, the site will still be in violation of copyright. The UK court has asked the European Court to rule on that matter.

3: 20th Century Fox Abandons $12 million Pre-Release Movie Script Lawsuit

Finally today, 20th Century Fox has dropped its lawsuit against P.J. McIlvaine, a woman they alleged posted scripts from some 80 movies and TV shows on her site. Fox sued McIlvaine for some $12 million even though she was not the original uploader of the script and, instead, compiled scripts she found elsewhere online. Fox did not provide any insight as to why it dropped the year-old lawsuit.

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 5 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: Photobucket Easily Rebuffs A Copyright Lawsuit

First off today, Photobucket has fended off a pro se lawsuit filed by an artist, Sheila Wolk, who claimed that the company was not doing enough to keep her work off of their site. However, Photobucket, according to the court, qualified for safe harbor protection under the DMCA as it promptly removes works when notified and has completed all other formalities under the law. Wolk had wanted Photobucket to remove works preemptively or filter out infringing content but the judge, in issue the injunction, said that Photobucket had no such obligation.

2: Baidu CEO Seeks Win-Win Business Model in Copyright Dispute

Next up today, Robin Li, the Chariman and CEO of the Chinese search engine Baidu has issued an apology to authors who are upset about infringement on Baidu’s books and documents search tools. Talks between authors and the search engine broke down last week, leading Li to issue his statement, his first on the dispute. He went on to say that he is hoping to find a “win-win” business model that works for both side.

3: Anonymous Launches New DDoS Attack Against RIAA

Finally today, Anonymous has launched another DDOS attack against the RIAA’s site, this time in response to the RIAA’s ongoing case against Limewire, where the organization mentioned damages against the company could reach as high as $75 trillion. The judge denied those high damages, saying that the RIAA could only collect statutory damages once per work, rather than per download as the RIAA had claimed. The RIAA site has been up and down since the DDOS attack began.

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: Pirate Bay Founders Lose Appeal Against Jail Sentences

First off today, three of the four founders of The Pirate Bay have lost their appeal and had their convictions for aiding in copyright infringement upheld. Though the three men, Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundstrom, had their sentences reduced from one year to 10, 8 and 4 months respectively, their total damages owed was increased to £4.1million. The fourth member of the group, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, could not be tried due to illness and will be tried separately at a later date.

2: U.S. Government Seizes BitTorrent Search Engine Domain and More

Next up today, U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has seized the domains of some 70+ sites that it says were either trading in copyrighted goods or counterfeit merchandise. The seizures come without any warning or court action, causing many to worry that the action violated due process. The seizures were also performed without the need for the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act, which would have created a court process for such seizures but died when Congress adjourned earlier this month. ICE has commented saying that this is an ongoing investigation, hinting that more seizures may be forthcoming.

3: Movie Studio Sues Struggling Screenwriter for £9.6million for Posting Scripts Online

Finally today, screenwriter and Long Island native Patricia ‘PJ’ McIlvaine has been sued by 20th Century Fox for her site, where she posted the scripts to various Hollywood movies in a bid to help other screenwriters see how the movies were made. Though most of the movies were classics, such as Aliens and Edward Scissorhands, at least one of the movies, Deadpool, was unreleased. Fox is suing for $15 million. Court papers list some 79 scripts with only Deadpool being unreleased.

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: 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.

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.

1: Game Over for Mac Clone Maker Psystar

First off today, Mac clone maker Psystar has now been given a permanent injunction against selling computers with Apple’s OSX operating system pre-installed, finalizing a temporary one handed down earlier and putting an end to this case, or at least this element of it.

Psystar was sued for making and selling “hackintosh” systems that included OSX but were not official Apple products, something Apple’s license with OSX prohibits. The two had reached a partial settlement more recently where Psystar agreed to stop selling computers with OSX preinstalled but, with this injunction filed, it appears the issue was moot.

However, the case is not totally resolved. Psystar still distributes a product called Rebel EFI that customers can use to install OSX on their computer. It is unclear if this is covered by the injunction, the judge, however, indicated that Psystar is in a gray area with it saying that “Whether Rebel EFI violates the terms of the injunction set forth in this order is a factual issue more appropriate for a contempt action.”

Psystar had stopped selling computers with OSX sometime earlier this month, switching instead to selling plain systems with Rebel EFI. Psystar, however still has until December 31 to comply with the order.

2: Vimeo Accused Of Copyright Infringement For Encouraging Lip Dubs

Video-sharing site Vimeo is on the receiving end of a lawsuit from the record label EMI, which accuses the site of encouraging users to make “lip dub” videos where they pretend to sing popular songs, including those by EMI artists. EMI alleges that Vimeo not only hosts the lip dub videos, but encourages and instructs its users on how to make them.

The legal issues are murky in this case. Though safe harbor protection normally prevents sites such as Vimeo from being held responsible for infringement by users, if it can be showed they had “actual knowledge” of the infringement, they can lose those protections. Likewise, the Grokster ruling says that companies who “induce” infringement can be held liable.

However, there is also an issue as to whether or not lip dub videos are infringing or are a fair use.

Vimeo has not responded but you can rest assured I will be following this lawsuit very carefully.

3: FBI Makes Arrest in ‘Wolverine’ Uploading Case

Finally today, the FBI, after a lengthy investigation, has made an arrest in the leak of the latest Wolverine movie, which was leaked onto file sharing networks and viewed some 4.1 million times before reaching theaters.

Gilberto Sanchez, from Bronx, NY, was arrested Wednesday morning. An unsealed grand jury indictment accuses Sanchez of uploading the video to the site Megaupload under the names “theSkilled1″ and “SkillyGilly” but it is unclear how he obtained a copy of the film and if he was the source of the leak.

If convicted, Sanchez faces up to three years in prison and a fine up to $250,000 or two times the gross gain or loss, whichever is greater.

Wolverine went on to do very well at the box office, grossing almost $375 million in ticket sales. Fox, the studio behind the film, has expressed support for the actions of the FBI and the FBI Los Angeles field office, which is leading the investigation, has not ruled out more arrests.

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: Fox News Entertainment Columnist in Hot Water for Column About Pirated “Wolverine”

First off this week, in what is now the second entry on the new Copyright Fail Web site, a freelance reporter for Fox News’ Web site committed both career and copyright suicide by downloading and then reviewing the leaked copy of Wolverine, which is owned by Fox News’ parent company Fox.

Fox has already gotten the FBI involved in the chase for the person who leaked the film, including shutting down at least one datacenter, and was very prompt in firing the reporter. The reporter, Roger Friedman, has not been available for comment but one can only wonder what he was thinking when he gleefully described both how easy piracy was and wonderful it was, all the while committing infringement over a film owned, quite literally, by the people who sign his paycheck.

2: URAA Held Unconstitutional

The Uruguay Round Agreements Act was a rather unusual beast in that it took certain foreign works that were in the public domain int he United States and removed them from it. However, the question was unanswered as to how this affected people who had already exploited works in the public domain but had had that right revoked.

Well, a the District Court in Colorado ruled that the URAA, insofar as it impacted those who had legitimately exploited public domain works previously, was unconstitutional and was a violation of free speech. Though this only directly affects a very small subset of people, namely those who used the works removed from the public domain by the URAA while they were available for use, it is the first time a court has ruled a copyright extension to be unconstitutional and tied copyright term with free speech.

Clearly, those elements could have larger implications in the future, especially if higher courts offer similar opinions.

3: Radiohead to Testify Against the RIAA

Just when you thought that the Tenenbaum case could not get any stranger, Radiohead now plans to testify on behalf of the defense and against the RIAA.

In a case already marked by strange legal theories, personal emails being published and a circus-like atmosphere, it is unclear what Radiohead will bring to this case, other than another strange dimension to it.

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: DoJ supports RIAA in Sony v. Tenenbaum three-ring circus

First off today, the Obama administration’s Department of Justice, in its first public copyright-related act, has sided with the RIAA and others on the issue of statutory damages, saying that damages awarded by copyright law, which can be many thousands of times higher than the actual damages.

Recent Supreme Court rulings have called this into doubt, even though the damages awarded under copyright are written into the law itself, but the DOJ, in an RIAA file sharing case, filed a brief in support of such high damages, citing circuit court rulings.

This has caused a great deal of controversy among Obama supporters, many of whom had hoped the new administration would bring a new position on copyright.

2: Fox Breathes New Life Into Redlasso

Redlasso, the video sharing service that let viewers clip out portions of TV shows and embed them into their site, has inked a limited deal with Fox to allow Redlasso to stream their video.

Fox and NBC, two partners in Hulu, had sued Redlasso in July of last year, forcing them to shut down their public-facing service. However, now Redlasso has announced that they have “settled all pending lawsuits with the television networks” and the deal with Fox seems to indicate that a new service is not far away.

3: Sinking China’s Video Pirates

Finally today, a new company named Vobile is hoping to bring the fingerprinting and automated content detection technology we see on YouTube to Chinese video sharing sites. These sites, as YouTube has clamped down on copyright infringement, have become leading sources for copyrighted videos all over the world.

As part of their new deal with 56.com and Pomoho, Vobile will provide fingerprinting technology similar to what is used on YouTube to detect infringing material before it goes online and help copyright holders request removal.

This marks the first time that major Chinese video sharing sites have taken such direct action against copyright infringement and will undoubtedly be a welcome change for copyright holders, many of whom have seen infringement that once took place on YouTube or Google Video simply shift east to China.

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: CBS Interactive: “Well Within Our Rights To Stream Hulu Content”

CBS, the owners of TV.com, say that the contract they have with Hulu allows them to stream Hulu videos and that the recent move by Hulu, which gets most of its content from NBC and Fox, is a violation of those terms.

Though there is no word as to what, if any, action CBS plans to take at this time, it seems pretty clear that this one is not over and will be a dispute for some time to come, especially considering that TV.com now matches Hulu in functionality and has grown, according to some estimates, larger than Hulu in terms of traffic.

2: Oh, the humanity: Windows 7′s draconian DRM?

Second, in an article on Ars Technica, Peter Bright takes a serious look at the upcoming DRM on Windows 7 and finds that it isn’t nearly as bad as people actually think it is. In fact, he concludes that most people won’t even notice it at all.

He also works to quell some of the alarm around other articles pertaining to Windows 7 DRM and works to answer some of the question raised by them.

3: xkcd – Music DRM

Finally today, the popular Webcomic xkcd took on the issue of music DRM explaining that we “won” the DRM wars and taking a quick stab at why the argument still continues.

Anyone who enjoys talking/thinking about these issues will almost certainly get at least a chuckle.

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.