3 Count: One Fish, Sue Fish

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

1: Judge Advances Suit Over Seuss-Star Trek Mashup Comic

First off today, Blanca Bruno at Courthouse News Services reports that a district court judge has advanced the lawsuit against ComicMix saying that she can not decide “as a matter of law” that the company’s use of Dr. Suess’ work was a fair use.

ComicMix launched a Kickstarter campaign to create the book Oh, the Places You’ll Boldy Go, a mashup of Dr. Suess’ classic Oh, the Places You’ll Go! with Star Trek themes and elements. Dr. Suess Enterprises, an organization set up to manage the rights in Suess’ works, filed a lawsuit against ComicMix saying that the work was a copyright infringement.

ComicMix said that their use was a clear fair use and asked for the lawsuit to be dismissed. The Suess estate disagreed, noting that there is a licensing program in place for such mashups and that the ComicMix work could cause real harm to the market for their work. The judge has, for now, sided with the Suess estate saying that the evidence is not clear enough on the fair use issues to be a nominative fair use, setting the stage for a possible trial.

2: YouTuber Convicted For Publishing Video Piracy ‘Tutorials’

Next up today, Andy at Torrentfreak writes that a YouTuber in Brazil has been found liable for posting videos that teach users how to illegally access content using “fully loaded” Kodi boxes.

The YouTuber in question, Marcelo Otto Nascimento, was targeted by the local TV trade group Associação Brasileira de Televisões por Assinatura. which took legal action against Nascimento after he posted a series of videos that showed users how to set up Kodi boxes and access copyright infringing material.

Nascimento argued that he didn’t engage in any infringement but, instead, was only commenting on Kodi and similar devices. However, the court sided with the plaintiffs and issued an injunction against Nascimento and ordered him to pay the equivalent of $7,600 in moral damages in addition to legal costs.

3: Winter Park Paper Company Says Wal-Mart, Others Stole Design

Finally today, Paul Brinkmann at the Orland Sentinel reports that Rifle Paper, a Florida-based stationery company, has filed a lawsuit against Walmart and the Canadian importer Beco Industries over a series of products that Rifle says infringes their copyrights.

According to the lawsuit, Walmart has been selling sheets, blankets, throws and bed pillows under their “Mainstays” line that feature the Rifle Spanish Rose design. The suit also names some of the manufacturers involved but doesn’t include them as defendants.

Rifle says it sent a letter to Walmart asking them to cease sales but the retailer never complied. As such, Rifle felt it had no choice other than to file a 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.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.