Righthaven ‘chilling effect’ prompts nonprofit to adjust - FluTrackers interview

[sharon sanders]

Righthaven ?chilling effect? prompts nonprofit to adjust

By Steve Green (contact)

Monday
20 June 2011
2:01 a.m.


Depending on one?s point of view, Las Vegas copyright enforcer Righthaven LLC has either succeeded in deterring infringements of newspaper industry content ? or its no-warning lawsuits have unfairly spread fear throughout the Internet.

In talking to Sharon Sanders, both of those viewpoints are validated.

In dismissing a Righthaven copyright infringement lawsuit on fair use grounds in April, a federal judge in Las Vegas found Righthaven?s litigation strategy ? now involving 274 lawsuits ? ?has a chilling effect? on the fair use by others of content Righthaven claims to own.

more.....

http://vegasinc.com/business/legal/2011/jun/20/righthaven-chilling-effect-prompts-nonprofit-adjus/

 

[mixin]

Re: Righthaven ‘chilling effect’ prompts nonprofit to adjust - FluTrackers interview

Re: Righthaven ‘chilling effect’ prompts nonprofit to adjust - FluTrackers interview

Nice write-up :applause:

I like that this point was made

Wall Street analysts, in the meantime, have not identified the types of infringements Righthaven sues over as affecting newspaper revenue one way or another — keeping in mind that many of these sites actually drive traffic to the source newspaper.

The news usually hits enough sources that I tend to avoid any associated with the Righthaven bunch.

I have emailed news sources a couple of times in the past for permission to post their articles. If I remember correctly Medical News Today was one of them; I got quick approval emails detailing how to give credit.

It seems like if most sources had a real problem with infringements, they would put a warning at the top of an article instead of a link in fine print at the very bottom of a page :magnify:. Maybe they could put an "open access" or "prohibited from reprint" icon on the articles.

 

[Emily]

Re: Righthaven ?chilling effect? prompts nonprofit to adjust - FluTrackers interview

Re: Righthaven ?chilling effect? prompts nonprofit to adjust - FluTrackers interview

Excellent article. If Righthaven is concerned with a "parasitic business model" - why offensively sue non-profits, including hobby bloggers? I could understand it if there was a lack of response to a valid infringement even in those cases, but it sounds like no requests for removal are made prior to the lawsuits.

 

[sharon sanders]

Righthaven was later smashed in federal court. They lost major court cases, their domain name, their cash, and their equipment:


Federal Judge Strips Righthaven of Rights to 278 Copyrights & Its Trademark - 2012

Federal Court Declares Newspaper Excerpt on Online Forum is a Non-Infringing Fair Use in Righthaven lawsuit - 2012

Court tosses Righthaven fair use appeal - 2013


FluTrackers was the first discussion forum on the internet to publicly come out against Righthaven and the obvious attempt by "the powers that be" to control the internet utilizing the federal copyright laws.

FluTrackers is independent and we firmly believe in our human right of free expression.

 

[sharon sanders]

A reminder.

FAFO