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

1: Apple’s iTunes Match (aka iMatch): The First Royalties Are In

First off today, Tunescore founder and CEO Jeff Price has publicly released information about the first royalty checks his label has received from iTunes Match: Specifically over $10,000 in the first two months. iTunes Match is a new service by Apple to let users synchronize their music via the cloud. Apple charges users $25 per year for that feature and pays a portion of that money as royalties to labels. Tunecore is an Internet-based label dedicated to helping unsigned and independent artists get their music on iTunes and similar stores. Price did not say how much of the royalties were going to his artists and how they would be divided up but said that it seemed like “magic money” that was not there before.

2: High Court Confirms Pubs’ Rights to Screen Football Matches

Next up today, in the UK a High Court judge has ruled that pubs in the country will be allowed to stream football (soccer) matches using foreign decoders as long as they do not charge an admission fee and only play the live game. The issue has been the center of two now-joined lawsuits that both featured pub owners using cheaper foreign decoders to access football matches. In both cases the FA Premier League (FAPL) sued the owners and one of the cases went before the European Court of Justice (ECJ), which found that, while it was legal to stream the games using a foreign decoder, it was still a public performance that the league had a right to control. However, the High Court in the UK, basing its ruling on the ECJ’s ruling, found that the FAPL had no such right when no admission is charged, opening up the opportunity for other pubs to do the same. This, if upheld, would put a severe limitation on the FAPL’s rights to restrict streaming of matches to pubs and other venues.

3: New York Times Busted for Violating Copyright Bill Keller Defended

Finally today, The Boston Phoenix is calling out The New York Times claiming that the newspaper published a PDF of a 1976 article from The Real Paper about the Death of Football. However, though The Real Paper is defunct its rights were bought by The Boston Phoenix’s publisher and that, according to the paper, makes the use a likely infringement. Though they have no plans on taking legal action, The Phoenix points out that the PDF appeared the same days as an op-ed by former NY Times Editor Bill Keller, who was advocating for stronger copyright enforcement and taking a strong pro-SOPA/PIPA stance.

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: High Court Day 2: iiNet Says AFACT Lawsuit Inevitable

First off today, yesterday was day 2 in the Australian High Court trial between AFACT and iiNet. AFACT, a consortium of copyright holders, had sued local ISP iiNet claiming they had not done enough to stop infringement. Though iiNet won in both of the lower courts, the appeals court ruling opened the door to a “three strikes” system in the country. AFACT appealed the case to the High Court. The second day focused more on iiNet’s ability to control its customers actions and on AFACTs demands, with iiNet claiming that nothing short of terminating suspected repeat infringers would have been adequate to avoid a lawsuit. The case enters its third day today and is likely to continue next week.

2: Copyright Corruption Scandal Surrounds Anti-Piracy Campaign

Next up today, the Dutch anti-piracy group BREIN has found itself in the center of a controversy as composer Melchior Rietveldt is claiming that the group used his song without permission on various DVDs for the anti-piracy warnings. According to Rietveldt, he was paid to compose a song for an anti-piracy ad to be played at a film festival. However, BREIN (or another party) went on to use the work for warnings distributed on DVDs without any compensation. To make matters worse, a board member of Buma/Stemra (a royalty collection agency), Jochem Gerrits, offered to help but only if he could collect 33% of the earnings. Gerrits has since said his words were misinterpreted but has offered a temporary resignation. That being said, according to BREIN director Tim Kuik, the contract dispute does not actually involve the organization as it is not the distributor nor the client involved.

3: EFF to Copyright Office: Let my Tablets, Consoles, and Phones Go!

Finally today, the EFF is preparing for the next round of Copyright Office hearings on DMCA exemptions and is hoping to expand on exemptions that it helped fight for in the last round. The DMCA prohibits the circumvention of DRM and other digital locks but provides exemptions where it is acceptable. To determine what exemptions are appropriate, the copyright office holds hearings every three years and rules on what new exemptions should be added. Last year, the EFF and other groups argued for an exemption to jailbreak phones and received it. However, the exemption didn’t cover the trafficking of the software to perform the jailbreak nor did it cover other commonly-jailbroken items such as tablets, video game consoles, etc. The EFF is hoping that, with this round, it can earn those exemptions as 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 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.

It is Friday 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 a lot of major stories taking place and some of the bigger ongoing dramas receiving updates. This episode has a decidedly international flavor with news from France, the UK, Spain, Australia and, closest to the U.S., Canada.

If you want to go all around the copyright world in an hour, this is definitely the podcast for you.

This week’s stories include:

• France’s Hadopi “Three Strikes” Law Ramps Up
• UK Law Firm Leaks Emails, Data on Alleged Pirates
• DDOS Targets Australian Anti-Piracy Group
• EU Parliament Seeks to Create Pan-EU Copyright Law
• Google Wins YouTube Case in Spain
• Are Royalties Keeping Streaming Music Out of Canada?

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: Music streaming service rejects Canada

First off today, music streaming service Pandora, which has become extremely popular in the United States, has announced it will not be expanding into Canada. The reason, according to the company’s founder Tim Westergren, is that the royalty rates in Canada are simply too high. According to him, Re:Sound, the group that collects royalties on behalf of record companies and performing artists, wants a royalty payment of 45% of the site’s revenue on top of other royalties. As a result, Pandora is scuttling any short-term expansion plans in Canada to see if the Copyright Royalty Board approves the rate.

2: Producer Sues BitTorrent Users, But Doesn’t ‘Own’ Copyright

Adult film producer Mick Haig’s lawsuit against 670 suspected file sharers seems to have hit a landmine. Haig, who sued over illegal downloads of his film Der Gute Onkel never registered the work with the U.S. Copyright Office, making it so that the court does not have jurisdiction over the issue. Haig could go back and file the registration but would only be eligible for actual damages, not the high statutory damages awards.

3: Judge Rules ‘Disturbia’ Didn’t Infringe on ‘Rear Window’

Finally today, a Manhattan judge ruled Stephen King’s movie “Disturbia” did not infringe upon the Cornell Woolrich short story “It Had to Be Murder,” which was published in 1942 and was the basis of the Alfred Hitchcock movie “Rear Window”. The Sheldon Abend Revocable Trust, which holds the right to the short story, had sued King and others involved with “Disturbia” saying that it copied the story however the judge found that the only elements that were the same were not copyrightable and no infringement took place. There is no word on the possibility of an appeal.

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: Anti-Piracy Failure Takes Down Creative Commons Videos

First off today, an error in the monitoring technology used by the German anti-piracy outfit GVU resulted in the takedown in several videos they did not have the rights to. The videos, hosted on the video sharing site Vimeo, included a series licensed under a Creative Common License. According to GVU, they contract out their monitoring to OpSpec Security and the software had an error in configuration that resulted in the false takedowns though some are less than sure about that explanation.

2: LimeWire Wants Trial Lawsuit With a Jury

LimeWire may have already lost its lawsuit against the record labels but it apparently plans to fight on in a second lawsuit against the National Music Publishers Association (NMPA), which sued the company after the labels. LimeWire has requested a jury trial in the case, indicating that they plan on fighting it and not settling, much as they did with the RIAA case. An injunction against LimeWire is widely expected in its case against the RIAA and damages could enter into the billions of dollars.

3: While Copyright Collectives Help, Royalties Issue Muddy

Finally today, even though royalty collection agencies have done a great deal to streamline the payment of royalties and the obtaining of permissions for radio stations, serious complexities remain as different rights are actually handled by different agencies requiring multiple licenses. Though the article is focused on Canada, it could also apply easily to the U.S. and most other nations in illustrating how kludgey obtaining permission can be.

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: P2P plaintiffs to get just 28 Time Warner IPs each month

First off today, Time Warner Cable has won a victory in its dispute with the U.S. Copyright Group. The company will only have to turn over 28 IP addresses per month instead of turning over all 800+ at once. The U.S. Copyright Group, which is operating on behalf of several independent film makes to file massive lawsuits against suspected file sharers, had demanded all the addresses be turned over at once but Time Warner said that it was not possible with their current resources. The court has agreed and now it will take over 2 years for the U.S. Copyright Group to receive all of the information from just one of their lawsuits. Time Warner, along with various public interest groups had hoped to break the massive lawsuit up into individual cases, but the judge has, so far, declined to do that.

2: TalkTalk and BT launch challenge to Digital Economy Act

Next up today, BT and TalkTalk, two of the UK’s biggest ISPs are asking for a judicial review of the Digital Economy Act to ensure that no “fundamental rights” are being trampled upon by the new law. According to the ISPs, the act, which will require ISPs to shut off access to those repeatedly accused of piracy, not only raises serious privacy concerns, but also was passed in a worrisome manner and, puts larger ISPs at a disadvantage to smaller ones as the act only applies to ISPs with more than 400,000 subscribers. The portions of the law that result in disconnection do not take effect until at least next year.

3: Don Johnson Awarded $23.2m Nash Bridges Profits

Finally today, in an update to the Nash Bridges story covered earlier, Don Johnson, the star and creator of the show, has been awarded over $23 million in profits from the show’s production company, Rysher Entertainment. According to Rysher, no royalties had been paid because the show still had not recouped all of its cost. However, the jury disagreed and awarded the star, best known for his work on Miami Vice what it viewed as owed royalties. Two other companies, Qualia Capital and 2929 Entertainment, were also successfully sued by Johnson.

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.

1: Ofcom Creates Piracy Havens at Small ISPs

First off today, as the Digital Economy Act begins to ramp up, Ofcom, the agency charged with making many of the policies and decisions regarding the new act, has decided that only hardline ISPs with greater than 400,000 subscribers will be obligated to follow the act’s requirements, including sending warning letters to accused file sharers. Many worry that this could cause smaller ISPs and mobile broadband ISPs to become pirate havens, which in turn has led others to worry that Ofcom could broaden the scope down the road.

2: Did EFF Lawyer Cross Line in LimeWire Case?

Next up today, EFF lead attorney Fred Von Lohman received an admonishment in the recent LimeWire ruling, which found the service liable for infringement committed by its users. According to the judge, Lohman provided advice to LimeWire that resulted in them destroying evidence required for the case. Lohman has denied any wrongdoing and the EFF has requested that the judge rewrite that part of the judgment. At issue specifically is a document that should have illustrated LimeWire was aware of the need to provide filtering services.

3: Aussie Rightsholders Make Sweating to Oldies More Expensive

Finally today, in Australia, musicians have secured a 15x royalty increase from fitness clubs from the country’s copyright royalty board after successfully arguing that their music was crucial to the success of the clubs and they were not being paid adequately. The new royalties come up to AU$15 per class or AU$1 per attendee, up from just 96.8¢ per class. Several fitness clubs have already said they will not pay the new royalties, instead saying they will seek covers that fall outside of collection agency’s authority.

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.

1: Pink Floyd Win Court Battle with EMI

First off today, just a day after we first reported on the lawsuit, Pink Floyd has emerged victorious in their battle against their label EMI. EMI will have to pay back royalties to the band as well as cover their legal expenses, estimated at £60,000 ($90,000) for selling the band’s tracks individuallly on iTunes, even though their contract only allowed whole-album sales. The exact amount of the royalties have been kept secret.

2: European Parliament Slams Digital Copyright Treaty

Next up today, the EU Parliament has passed a resolution 633-13 to compel those negotiating the ACTA treaty to publicly disclose the details of the treaty and threaten legal action if the disclosure is not adequate. The ACTA treaty, which includes the U.S., EU, Japan and other nations has been swamped in secrecy, as are most international treaties, but has been the subject of several leaks and increased public scrutiny due to the potential changes in copyright law for some participating nations.

3: Net Giants Rail Against Law to Block File-Sharing Sites

Finally today, a proposed amendment to the Digital Britain Bill in the UK that would allow copyright holders to demand ISPs block access to sites that are allegedly infringing is being protested by many prominent Web companies including Google, Facebook and others who signed a letter to the effect. Some celebrities, including Stephen Fry, have also signed onto the letter of protest.

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: Google Books Plan Still in Limbo as Judge Delays Ruling

First off today, the Google Book Search hearing took place as scheduled yesterday with some 21 opposed parties using their allotted five minutes to make their case against the settlement, which would allow google to scan, print and sell copies of in-copyright but out-of-print books. Those opposed outnumbered those in favor 3-to-1. The judge, however, said he would issue a written ruling and that has left the case in continued limbo as we await his decision.

2: Copyright Staff Get More Than They Give to Authors and Artists

Next up today, in Australia, The Copyright Agency Limited, which was formed in 1989 to disperse royalties to authors in artists, spent more money on its own staff than it did on the royalties it was supposed to be passing out. The agency spent an estimated $9.4 million on salaries and gave out an estimated $9.1 million in royalties. Its salaries included some 21 people with salaries higher than $250,000. The organization has drawn a great deal of fire over this and universities are particularly upset as some 80% of the money collected by the group comes from schools.

3: Feds Can Search, Seize P2P Files Without Warrant

Finally today, though this case isn’t a copyright one, the copyright implications are obvious. A court has ruled that law enforcement can look at and download content from a publicly shared folder in P2P software without a warrant. The case involves a man arrested on child pornography charges who claimed he though he had turned off the “share” feature of Limewire and that the government’s search of his shared folder was unlaw. The court, disagreed.

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: Reports: Google to Launch Online Bookstore

First off today, Google has made a stunning announcement at the Frankfurt Book Fair, saying that it is preparing to launch Google Editions, an online bookstore where the books will be available to anyone via a Web browser. This will enable readers to access their books on an Internet-connected device, including phones, netbooks and computers.

This move comes at a difficult time for Google in its book scanning project. It’s settlement with the Author’s Guild and various publishers has been sent back to the drawing board after concerns from the Department of justice and that was before the announcement of the bookstore. Previously Google was to simply display books, including in-copyright but out of print works, and make print on demand copies available.

It is unclear how this will fit in with existing book scanning projects but Google has said that they have no plan to launch a standalone reader for this project, instead focusing on making the books available via the Web.

2: AFACT: Our Evidence Not 100% Reliable

Next up today, the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft’s (AFACT) trial against iiNet has found itself in the news again. This time as an AFACT representative admitted that the evidence collection techniques it uses are not 100% reliable.

AFACT, which represents various copyright industries in Australia, sued iiNet, an ISP for, in its view, not doing enough to stop copyright infringement by its subscribers. iiNet, in turn, has claimed that there was nothing more it could have done.

According to testimony, the evidence gathered by AFACT is not completely reliable because many of the public records are out sometimes of date. This casts some doubt on the evidence of infringement presented by AFACT though records provided by iiNet do show that at least some infringement occurred, though there are discrepencies between the lists, which caused iiNet to accuse AFACT of exaggerating its claims.

The trial is ongoing and is expected to last into next week.

3: Court Rules That Phones Ringing in Public Don’t Infringe Copyright

Finally today, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is reporting that a judge has ruled in the ASCAP v. Verizon case that playing a ringtone in public does not require the payment of a performance royalty. According to the court, all public playing of music without the expectation of a profit does not require such a royalty and that also protects families singing Happy Birthday, cars playing music loudly and taking a stereo to the park.

The American Society of Composers Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) collects those royalties for distribution had claimed such plays did require payment and even pushed Verizon into paying a $5 million interim license fee. Verizon petitioned the court to determine what a reasonable licensing fee would be and the court has now come back saying that one is not necessary.

The carriers already pay a mechanical royalty for the selling of the actual copy, making the potential ASCAP royalty a “double dip” by which carriers would pay two separate fees.

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.