3 Count: Making Arguments

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

1: Court: Hosting A Pirate Site Doesn’t Equal Copyright Infringement

First off today, Ernesto at Torrentfreak writes that U.S. web host Steadfast has won the dismissal of a lawsuit filed against them over their role in hosting the site Imagebam.

The lawsuit featured the adult content provider ALS Scan sued Steadfast along with CloudFlare, JuicyAds and other hosting providers alleging that they were committing copyright infringement for their role in hosting the site. Steadfast quickly sought a motion to dismiss saying that there was no evidence in the complaint that Steadfast had done anything illegal.

The court, in a tentative ruling, has a greed. It granted Steadfast’s motion to dismiss saying that merely hosting a pirate site is not, by itself, evidence of copyright infringement. There is no word about the other defendants in the case.

2: Supreme Court Urged To Stay Out Of Copyright Battle Over ‘Golden Oldies’

Next up today, Wendy Davis at MediaPost reports that Vimeo is urging the Supreme Court to not hear the appeal filed by Capitol Records in the case over pre-1972 sound recordings that were hosted on the site.

Capitol Records sued Vimeo for copyright infringement alleging, in part, that the site didn’t qualify for safe harbor protection on unlawful pre-1972 sound recordings uploaded by users. Pre-1972 sound recordings are not protected by federal copyright law, but instead are covered under state common law. Capitol argued, unsuccessfully, that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which protects hosts from being liable when users upload infringing content, did not apply since it was a federal act.

Capitol has lost both in district court and on appeal with that argument. However, they are now asking the Supreme Court to look at the case, with Vimeo now making it’s argument as to why it shouldn’t.

3: Copyright Alliance Backs Oracle Appeal

Finally today, John Eggerton at Multichannel News reports that the Copyright Alliance, an organization representing a wide range of content creators, has filed a brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit asking it to overturn a lower court ruling that found Google’s use of Java APIs to be non-infringing.

Oracle sued Google claiming that, when creating the Android mobile operating system, Google used Java’s APIs to make it compatible with Java programs. Initially the court ruled that such APIs could not be copyright protected but that decision was overturned. Then back at the lower court the jury found that the use was a fair use and not infringing.

That is the issue now on appeal and the Copyright Alliance is backing Oracle, claiming that the lower court ruling allowed a predatory business practice to continue.

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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