3 Count: Playboy and CMI

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1: Playboy Slaps MediaTakeOut With Lawsuit Over Azealia Banks Nude Photos

First off today, Time Kenneally at The Wrap reports that Playboy Enterprises, the company behind Playboy Magazine, has filed a lawsuit against MediaTakeOut over the site’s publication of nude photos of rapper Azalea Banks.

According to the lawsuit, Playboy had exclusive rights to the images and published them in their April 2015 issue. However, in March, MediaTakeOut published the same images and, to make matters worse, placed their own watermark on them.

However, some of the images were not registered with the U.S. Copyright Office, meaning that Playboy is not eligible to collect statutory damages on them. So, for the images where a registration exists, Playboy is seeking up to $150,000 in damages but, for the ones where it doesn’t, they are suing for the removal of copyright management information and seeking up to $25,000 in damages.

2: ‘New Girl’ Copyright Suit Heats Up Anew With Fox & WME Claiming “Fabrication”

Next up today, Dominic Patten at Deadline Hollywood reports that the lawsuit over the TV show New Girl has taken an additional twist as the defendants, including Fox and WME, have hit back against allegations that the show’s producer, Elizabeth Meriwether, was forced to share writer credits on another film after Writers’ Guild arbitration.

The lawsuit was filed by Stephanie Counts and Shari Gold, who sued claiming that the series is based on a script they produced entitled Square One. The original lawsuit was tossed out but was refiled this year. The defendants recently filed a motion to dismiss the new case, alleging that there is insufficient evidence to move forward. The plaintiffs hit back alleging that Meriwether lacks credibility due to her previous dispute.

But Fox and WME are now claiming that such a previous dispute does not exist and there’s no evidence of it. They allege that, while Meriwether does share writer credit on the film at issue, it’s because of a treatment that Meriwether had nothing to do with.

3: Creator of ‘Hardest Super Mario World Level Ever’ Says Copyright Crackdown Gutted His YouTube Channel

Finally today, Patricia Hernandez at Kotaku reports that Nintendo has begun to clamp down on YouTubers who upload videos featuring modified versions of games or tool-assisted runs. In doing so, the company has removed nearly 80% of one prominent YouTuber’s videos and removed countless other videos from the site.

Nintendo has long had a tenuous relationship with YouTube. It recently required that those wishing to play Nintendo games on the site agree to join their Nintendo Creators Program, but that program forbids the use of modified, pirated or otherwise infringing games. Many in the speedrunning community, which are people who seek to play through a game as fast as possible, make use of ROMs and tools to assist in their attempts.

The move comes ahead of the release of Super Mario Maker, a game that lets users create and share their own Super Mario levels. However, as noted by several YouTubers, it will be difficult to share creations on YouTube or anywhere other than the Super Mario Maker network itself.

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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