Righthaven, a Las Vegas company associated with Las Vegas Review-Journal, has filed six lawsuits against web sites that have reposted articles, or portions of them, from the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The suits were filed against thelobolair.com, majorwagner.com, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, Henderson real estate agent Matt Farnham, MoneyReign, and the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Newspapers executives have complained about infringement online, but copyright suits over news items are rare. When Gatehouse Media sued Boston.com or Dow Jones sued Briefing.com, it was under the circumstance of market harm since they were competing for readers. The Righthaven lawsuits, on the other hand, are against companies that are not in the news business.

According to Farnham, one of the defendants who posted portions of two articles on his blog, no one asked him to remove the material before suing. He said, “I thought it was a compliment to the paper that I wanted to get that information out,” and added that the posts included links back to the newspaper.

The author of the article writes that, “The DMCA does not require content owners to send publishers takedown demands before suing unless infringing content is uploaded by third-parties.” The web sites could argue fair use, but they would have to prove they added original commentary.

If Righthaven wins the case what will that mean for us? Will we no longer be able to post someone else’s articles on blogs like this one? We have sites such as Wikipedia which is made up information found all over the web, and then we see a case such as this one – Righthaven going against websites that aren’t even in the same market. The ruling will be something worth looking out for.

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=126721&passFuseAction=PublicationsSearch.showSearchReslts&art_searched=&page_number=0

Two brands that have defined the glamorous life of young girls and most likely to blame for the superficial nature of  this demographic have pitted against each other in court. Big toy industry, Mattel, the creator of Barbie charged MGA Entertainment, the creator of Bratz, since “the federal jury found that Carter Bryant, the creator of the multi-ethnic, big-headed dolls, had created their characters and the name while he was under contract as a Barbie designer at Mattel” (Reuters). He had taket those designs to MGA Entertainment and has started a booming business that appeals to the same crowd that Mattel targets. Because of this problem, the Bratz line has declined Mattel’s sales by 4%. Bratz earn about $1 billion in annual sales and licensing fees.

They have committed a crime against fair play and although it is perhaps their own design, they have broken contracts. The copyright was supposed to belong to Mattel, but even though it was his own design, he has encouraged a competing company to copy the design and face damages. However, Bratz does not directly look as similar as Barbie and has its own style. Bratz dolls has an even more abnormally large head and eyes, contrasting the scaled Barbie. Since it is not a direct copy, would damages not be as severe?

For more information, check this article:

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/mattel_inc/index.html?offset=10&s=newest

To give you all a little more on Miranda, since the presentation flew by…here’s a snippet of my paper!

For this paper and exploration of Fair Use, I am going to examine a Youtube sensation called “Miranda Sings”, a character created by comedian, Colleen Ballinger. I will examine if the character Ballinger has created could be sued for Copyright infringement or if Ballinger and her art would protected under Copyright law and Fair Use.
Youtube is a website that allows users to post any kind of digital media that be shared in a video form. One can post anything from music videos of recording artists, clips of television shows, video blogs, and a lot more. Created by three former PayPal employees in 2006, Youtube as revolutionized the World Wide Web. Youtube has become a medium that allows “the average Joe” to become a star. Users post themselves performing an artistic endeavor in the hopes that a talent scout, casting agent, or producer will discover the artist. Some are successful and some are not.
Colleen Ballinger was successful in the vein that she created a character named Miranda Sings. Colleen Ballinger is a twenty-something female from California. She is an aspiring comedian, actress, singer, and fame monster. Colleen began her journey to fame by studying at Azusa Pacific University, in Los Angeles, California. Like many struggling artists, in today’s society, Colleen turned to Youtube.
Miranda is a character that is quite special. Her mother has told Miranda, that she is in fact the greatest singer in the whole entire world. Miranda is a confident young woman who takes her self-proclaimed artistic abilities and remakes songs that are popular on today’s radio. Mirandasings08, is the name of her Youtube channel that holds over two million hits. Miranda covers everything from Lady GaGa to Glee to everything in between.Miranda’s character has truly evolved over the past two years, when Ballinger launched the Mirandasings08 Channel in 2009. Miranda went from doing A ccapella covers, meaning Miranda would sing without any sound, just that of her voice to creating full blown videos that portray the themes of that artist and the creative team designed for the music.
Miranda has become such a sensation that Ballinger has toured the world as Miranda selling out venues in New York City, Los Angeles, and London- just to name a few. Miranda has gotten the attention of many different celebrities, including those in the cast of “Rock of Ages” which is currently on Broadway. Ballinger has found a way to create a living off of this character. Ballinger is a truly genius comedian, but also a very talented singer. Ballinger is on Youtube performing as herself, where she belts out the works of Jason Robert Brown, Jonathan Larson and other greats of the musical theatre world.
Ballinger receives a lot of criticism for the character, because Miranda is a very over the top and almost offensive statement. Miranda is making a comment about how on Youtube self righteous aspiring performing artists post themselves singing, dancing, or acting, in the hope that they will get discovered. Not many people who have viewed the Miranda Sings page admire Ballinger for making the statement she is. In order to show the viewers that she in face aware of their feelings, Ballinger has Miranda make shout outs to “the haters” who think Miranda and Ballinger are uncalled for. However, by doing this, Ballinger is also following in the footsteps of the Youtube viewers who leave nasty comments on these self-proclaimed great artists’ pages. Ballinger and Miranda have generated a lot of buzz and received a lot of attention.
As I became more infatuated with Miranda and what she would do next, especially while taking this course, I began to wonder what would happen if Miranda were to get hit with a lawsuit about Copyright infringement? I began fantasize about a ridiculous case of Colleen Ballinger versus Beyonce Knowles. I thought it would be an interesting exploration to model the Campbell versus Acuff-Rose Music, Inc. case in order to examine if Ballinger’s work would be protected under the law.

As I was browsing through articles on copyright issues, I fell upon one related to Hitler. There was a film released in 2004 titled “Downfall” focusing on the last moments of Hitler’s rule. From this film there is one specific scene where the defeated Hitler was giving a passionate speech to his remaining staff. The article describes how this scene has been included in many spoof parodies on YouTube, whether associated with topics ranging from XBox to iPad. Because of the intense melodramatic scene, many people online are amused by these parodies, gathering more than millions of views.

However, Constantin Films, the owner of the original movie, have finally gotten YouTube to remove those videos claiming it is copyright infringement. The Jewish community has also been bothered by the parodies. The opponents of the parodies state that the Holocaust should not be a comical matter. Therefore YouTube, using ContentID was able to remove a lot of the clips according to the film company’s request. There is also another option for the copyright holder to let the clips remain and give a percentage of advertising profit to the holder.

Overall, is this not a fair use case? The Youtube clips took that film scene and transformed the purpose of it to portray another message. The film company also commented that the Youtube clips do not affect their sales, therefore it is not drawing away profit (or adding to it) from the original film. Even the film’s director enjoyed these parodies, commenting how people will remember history because of these clips. Therefore, I wonder what Youtube’s view is towards this case since many of its posted videos are parodies-was this one just to satisfy the film company?

More information found here: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/04/21/arts/AP-US-Hitler-YouTube-Meme.html?_r=1&scp=10&sq=copyright&st=cse

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/04/dmca-abuse-extends-to-twitter-posts.ars

Apparently, YouTube isn’t the only one who has been receiving notifications for the removal of content.   Someone posted a tweet that linked to a blog site where one could then follow more links to leaked songs from the music artist “The National.”  An anonymous person requested that the tweet be removed because it provided for infringing content.  But was Twitter the one that should have been targeted.  The tweet has been removed, but the blog containing the actual links remained.

I’m not familiar with Twitter’s terms and conditions as well as proper protocol for bloggers, but just how far can DMC go here?  How does someone go about “reporting” (and to whom?) infringing tweets made in 140 characters or less?  This is just baffling to me at how strict people are becoming and how fast information can be found and penalized.  The request to take down the twitter leak was most likely made by someone from The National’s record label, but what about the blog post….apparently the blogger discussed the leaked album and could possibly argue fair use, even though I’m not sure how that would apply there because you can’t argue fair use if you use work in its entirety.  Fair use seems to be thrown around a whole lot.

One of the comments on this article said,  ”I wonder how long it’ll be before I get a DMCA takedown notice for the portion of my brain holding the memory of this article.”  Funny, but because of the constant crack-down on information in a free internet, it seems we are not too far from it.

After just googling RIAA and MPAA looking for a different article, I ran across this one. I don’t know all the details about when these requests were made or how accurate this story is but i found it really interesting. According to the article the RIAA and MPAA are rallying to the US Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator to create monitoring software to be installed on people’s computers. The software would work like anti-virus software–scanning the computers for infringing works.
The RIAA and MPAA also are hoping to use border control to question people about infringement while traveling. This would also allow for access to check MP3 players and laptops. I think that this, as well as the scanning software, is kind of crazy. Like just imagine if these things were actually put in place. I’d truly be moving to Canada–where a court order is needed to check these things. Anyways, the last request of the associations was to create a joint task force between the FBI and Homeland Security to prevent the leakage of summer blockbusters. So your telling me I would be paying taxes so that they can force me to pay for something else? Ridiculous!!

http://www.osnews.com/story/23160/RIAA_MPAA_Want_Monitoring_Software_Border_Checks

Tell me what you think?

Sorry if the link doesnt work…I always have issues with that

I felt like I should share this parody (Tik Tok by the Midnight Beast) because it’s just so great.

The original (below) doesn’t compare. 

http://www.iviewtube.com/videos/114614/kesha-tik-tok-(official-music-video-debut)

Gregg Gillis, more widely known as Girl Talk, is an artist that creates mash-ups from sampling contemporary and classic music, ranging from all genres, including, but not limited to, hip-hop, rock, and pop. The finished product is a new work completely based on clever arrangements from a number of samples from a number of songs. (Sometimes samples from 20 songs go into 1 of Girl Talk’s songs.) Saxx featured Girl Talk’s musical endeavors as part of her sampling presentation, and explained that he claims that his new creative works are fair use.

Considering the blatant thievery and the fact that artists have been sued over far more trivial uses of samples, I left the room thinking, “why hasn’t Girl Talk been sued by any or many of the copyright holders for the theft of their works that Gillis features in his songs?” Of course, I believe that Girl Talk’s use of the works is fair, based on the fact that they are transformative, don’t harm the market in any way, and most importantly, promote creativity. At the same time, I also believed that N.W.A’s use of sampling in the Bridgeport Music v. Dimension Films case was fair use, but unfortunately that argument was not brought to fruition by the court.

As it turns out, some people believe that because of some previous landmark sampling cases that went in the original copyright holders’ favor, the music industry does not want to sue Girl Talk and lose, because of the new precedent that might be set after such an outcome. Says Peter Friedman, law professor at the University of Detroit, “I would advise [an artist] not to sue Girl Talk; Gillis’s argument that he has transformed the copyrighted materials sufficiently that his work constitutes non-infringing fair use is just too good. I’d go after someone I am more likely to beat. Otherwise, I’d lose all the leverage I have with the existence, as yet undisputed in case law, of the decisions in Grand Upright Music and Bridgeport Music.” Others are surprised at the fact he hasn’t been sued and are still waiting for it to happen, claiming that his music does not constitute fair use.

It is not like Girl Talk is flying under the radar and the music industry has not taken notice to him. He has received a lot of press, his songs, although not available on iTunes, are available for sale in the Amazon MP3 store, his concerts are sold out, and he sells merchandise. So it seems as though the music industry, whether musicians, publishers, etc., would have a reason for a lawsuit, or at least a cease-and-desist order, because he is profiting from the use of others’ copyrights. As a side note, if a suit does come at some point, I would recommend that he either insist on signing to a new label, or insist on his current label, Illegal Art, changing their name. The name might not look too good in a case where you are trying to argue legality.

http://idolator.com/5081637/girl-talk-is-not-fair-use

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090707/0237205466.shtml#comments

Sample of his music:

Ofcom, the regulator for the UK communications industries with responsibilities across television, radio, telecommunications, and wireless communications services, has revealed details of how it will oversee the implementation of measures put forward in the Digital Economy Bill about two weeks ago.  The Digital Economy Bill (DEB) sets a target to reduce internet piracy by 75%, as well as keep the government up to speed with its progress. 

The regulations of  Ofcom’s measures are as follows:

1. Internet service providers must let their customers know of any allegations of illegal file- sharing

2. Copyright holders will have to acquire a court order before starting legal proceedings

3. Subscribers must be provided with enough information to be able to challenge the basis under which they may receive a notification of infringement

4. Warning letters will be sent to file- sharers, however, if they do not work, the Secretary of State could ask individual internet service providers to adopt stricter penalties

5. Their deadline for the full Copyright Infringement Code of Practice has a deadline of eight months, but the final draft is due in May

Will this actually work? And could something like this be effective here in the states?