3 Count: French Victory

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1: Most Jurors Sided With Google on APIs and ‘Fair Use’

First off today, James Niccolai at PC World reports that jurors in the Oracle/Google case mostly sided with Google on the issue of fair use but were still unable to reach a verdict on the matter. The lawsuit started when Oracle sued Google claiming that the versin of JAVA Google created for its Android mobile operating system violated both their copyrights and their patents. The trial was broken up into two parts, one for copyrights and one for the patent claims and though Google largely won on both, the jury did find that Google had infringed copyright on some 37 JAVA APIs but was unable to reach a verdict on the issue of fair use. However, according to the jury foreman, 9 of the 12 jurors believed the copied APIs were a fair use, considering the use transformative but three did not and, without a unanimous verdict, no ruling could be passed. The judge still needs to rule if APIs are copyrightable at all and, if he agrees with Oracle that they are, the case will likely head to appeal before going back before another jury on the fair use issues.

2: Google Wants Greater French Acceptance After Winning TF1 Copyright Case

Next up today, Robert Andrews at Paid Content writes that Google won a major court decision in France. They had been sued by the largest TV network in the country, TF1, over alleged infringement on their YouTube site. However, the French court dismissed those claims paving the way for Google to reach out to French content creators on their blog saying that, “The verdict demonstrates how the Internet is enriching French culture. Over the past year, we have signed contracts with five French collecting societies to pay royalties to French writers, musicians, and other artists.” A joint defendant in the case, Dailymotion, is set to have their case decided in September.

3: Jay Leno Stole a Guy’s YouTube Video and Then Got It Banned

Finally today, Kyle Wagner at Gizmodo writes that Brian Kamerer made a low-budget, comical campaign commercial for a friend in 2007 and the video made an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. However, a recent copyright sweep, likely by YouTube’s Content ID system, resulted in the original video being pulled. Kramerer has written an “open letter” lampooning the takedown and has asked NBC, the owner of the copyright, to help him restore the video. The video, however, appears to still be down as of this writing.

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.

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