3 Count: Jail Standard

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1: U.S. Court Sides With Photographer in Fight Over Andy Warhol Art

First off today, the Associated Press reports that the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled against the estate of Andy Warhol and said that a famous series the artist created is not transformative and is a copyright infringement of a photographer’s earlier work.

The lawsuit was originally filed by photographer Lynn Goldsmith, who claimed that Warhol, before his death, created a series of 16 works based on a 1981 photograph of Prince that she took. Though the artwork had been known for decades, the dispute rose in 2016 after Prince’s death and, according to Goldsmith, the estate licensed Warhol’s work to various publications, harming her (and other photographer’s) ability to license their work.

The lower court sided with the Warhol estate, saying that the paintings were transformative in nature. However, the Appeals Court has overturned that, ruling that the work was not transformative and cannot overcome its copyright obligations. As such, the court sent the case back to the lower court for further litigation. The Warhol estate has said they plan to appeal the decision.

2: TuneIn Loses Appeal Against Judgment in Sony and Warner Copyright Infringement Lawsuit in the UK

Next up today, Murray Stassen Music Business Worldwide reports that a court of Appeal in England and Wales has upheld a lower court decision against the digital radio service TuneIn. The ruling makes the service liable for stations that it digitally streams in the UK that are either not licensed at all or only licensed elsewhere.

Sony and Warner sued TuneIn for alleged copyright infringement and unlicensed streaming of songs they own the rights to. The lower court sided with TuneIn on their streaming of radio stations legally licensed in the UK but sided with the labels on other stations that were either unlicensed or only available in other markets.

Both sides opted to appeal the lower court ruling and now the Court of Appeals has upheld that ruling in full, saying that decision was the correct one. The case now goes back to the lower court to continue litigation there.

3: Judge Orders Release of Utah Jail Standards, Ruling Copyright is Not a Blanket Protection

Finally today, Mark Shenefelt at the Standard-Examiner reports that a judge has ruled that Davis County, Utah must release their jail standards document to two civil liberties groups although, according to the county, the documents have their copyright owned by a third party.

The case was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Utah and the Disability Law Center as they asked the court to overturn the county’s refusal to turn over those records. The county, however, claimed that they were owned and controlled by their creator, Deland and Associates, a consulting firm that, as part of its services, drafts such regulations for governments.

The judge in the case ruled that the county had failed to prove that Deland was the copyright holder to the work in question and that the release of the documents to the civil liberties organizations amounted to a fair use of the work. To make the argument, the judge in the case cited several other disputes, including a U.S. Appeals Court ruling that held excluding material from release on copyright grounds, “would allow an agency to mask its processes or functions from public scrutiny.”

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