sharon sanders
Editor-in-Chief & President
MARCH 10, 2012 | BY KURT OPSAHL
Court Declares Newspaper Excerpt on Online Forum is a Non-Infringing Fair Use
Late Friday, the federal district court in Nevada issued a declaratory judgment that makes is harder for copyright holders to file lawsuits over excerpts of material and burden online forums and their users with nuisance lawsuits.
The judgment – part of the nuisance lawsuit avalanche started by copyright troll Righthaven – found that Democratic Underground did not infringe the copyright in a Las Vegas Review-Journal newspaper article when a user of the online political forum posted a five-sentence excerpt, with a link back to the newspaper's website.
Judge Roger Hunt’s judgment confirms that an online forum is not liable for its users’ posts, even if it was not protected by the safe harbors of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s notice and takedown provisions.
The decision also clarifies that a common practice on the Internet – excerpting a few sentences and linking to interesting articles elsewhere – is a fair use, not an infringement of copyright.
snip
Righthaven has filed hundreds of copyright cases based on its sham copyright ownership claims. Despite several attempts by Righthaven and Stephens Media to re-write their Strategic Alliance Agreement, eight judges have ruled against the scheme to turn copyright litigation into a business. Righthaven, which was founded by Las Vegas attorney Gibson exclusively to file lawsuits, has never won a single case, and has been held liable for several defendants’ attorneys fees.
snip
Meanwhile, Righthaven has continued to refuse to cooperate in the collection efforts against it, failing to pay judgments, provide documents about its assets or -- lately -- even show up at court hearings. Righthaven was ordered to show cause why it should not be held in contempt of court in another case, Righthaven v. DiBiase. EFF, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, and Chad Bowers represent Mr. DiBiase. A contempt hearing is set for March 20, where we will be seeking sanctions against Righthaven and CEO Gibson.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/...-excerpt-online-forum-non-infringing-fair-use
FluTrackers was the only forum to give an interview outlining the effect of these lawsuits upon speech on the internet.
When I gave that interview, I did not know if FluTrackers would become a focus of Righthaven et. al. as a result.
But sometimes in life you have to take a stand.
And our right to speak for ourselves individually, and as a group, was threatened by this business scheme.
I personally lost a lot of sleep over this issue. At the time of these lawsuits there were hundreds of thousands of posts on FluTrackers. As the Editor I was potentially sitting in a very bad place. There was no feasible way to retroactively amend all those posts to whatever the new standard for fair use might be as determined by a federal judge. We had to either close FluTrackers or stand and fight.
We believe that all creators of content have a right to be financially rewarded for their original work. Absolutely.
But we also believe that there is a public interest in some portions of works, as defined by fair use.
And we think we should be able to publicly discuss topics of interest to us.
Thank you to all of our supporters. Thank you to Harvard's Online Legal Media Network and the Berkman Center for taking us on a pro bono client.
Thank you to all of the viewers and participants here at FluTrackers for believing in us.
:yinyang:
Court Declares Newspaper Excerpt on Online Forum is a Non-Infringing Fair Use
Late Friday, the federal district court in Nevada issued a declaratory judgment that makes is harder for copyright holders to file lawsuits over excerpts of material and burden online forums and their users with nuisance lawsuits.
The judgment – part of the nuisance lawsuit avalanche started by copyright troll Righthaven – found that Democratic Underground did not infringe the copyright in a Las Vegas Review-Journal newspaper article when a user of the online political forum posted a five-sentence excerpt, with a link back to the newspaper's website.
Judge Roger Hunt’s judgment confirms that an online forum is not liable for its users’ posts, even if it was not protected by the safe harbors of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s notice and takedown provisions.
The decision also clarifies that a common practice on the Internet – excerpting a few sentences and linking to interesting articles elsewhere – is a fair use, not an infringement of copyright.
snip
Righthaven has filed hundreds of copyright cases based on its sham copyright ownership claims. Despite several attempts by Righthaven and Stephens Media to re-write their Strategic Alliance Agreement, eight judges have ruled against the scheme to turn copyright litigation into a business. Righthaven, which was founded by Las Vegas attorney Gibson exclusively to file lawsuits, has never won a single case, and has been held liable for several defendants’ attorneys fees.
snip
Meanwhile, Righthaven has continued to refuse to cooperate in the collection efforts against it, failing to pay judgments, provide documents about its assets or -- lately -- even show up at court hearings. Righthaven was ordered to show cause why it should not be held in contempt of court in another case, Righthaven v. DiBiase. EFF, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, and Chad Bowers represent Mr. DiBiase. A contempt hearing is set for March 20, where we will be seeking sanctions against Righthaven and CEO Gibson.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/...-excerpt-online-forum-non-infringing-fair-use
FluTrackers was the only forum to give an interview outlining the effect of these lawsuits upon speech on the internet.
When I gave that interview, I did not know if FluTrackers would become a focus of Righthaven et. al. as a result.
But sometimes in life you have to take a stand.
And our right to speak for ourselves individually, and as a group, was threatened by this business scheme.
I personally lost a lot of sleep over this issue. At the time of these lawsuits there were hundreds of thousands of posts on FluTrackers. As the Editor I was potentially sitting in a very bad place. There was no feasible way to retroactively amend all those posts to whatever the new standard for fair use might be as determined by a federal judge. We had to either close FluTrackers or stand and fight.
We believe that all creators of content have a right to be financially rewarded for their original work. Absolutely.
But we also believe that there is a public interest in some portions of works, as defined by fair use.
And we think we should be able to publicly discuss topics of interest to us.
Thank you to all of our supporters. Thank you to Harvard's Online Legal Media Network and the Berkman Center for taking us on a pro bono client.
Thank you to all of the viewers and participants here at FluTrackers for believing in us.
:yinyang: