We previously wrote about a Virginia federal magistrate judge’s report recommending dismissal of a declaratory judgment action brought by several radio stations asking the court to rule that webcasts limited in scope via geofencing technology to 150 miles from the site of the transmitter should be exempt from liability for
copyright
Music Publishers Bring Contributory Copyright Claims Against ISP for Infringing Activities of Subscribers
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
In a novel lawsuit that tests the bounds of service provider liability, two music publishers brought suit against an ISP for contributory copyright infringement for allegedly facilitating infringement by failing to terminate the accounts of broadband subscribers who were purportedly repeat infringers that had unlawfully downloaded copyrighted music from BitTorrent…
Landmark Oracle-Google Android Copyright Dispute May End Up In Supreme Court
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
While many smartphone users were gazing upon their new iPhone 6 Plus’s 5.5-inch screen with wonder, there was another notable development in the mobile/tech world – the ongoing software copyright dispute between Oracle and Google over the development of the Android mobile platform just heated up again.
This past week,…
Emerging Technology and Existing Law: Can Geofencing Provide Radio Webcasters a Workaround of Digital Performance Royalties?
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
New technology continues to generate business models that test the limits of intellectual property laws enacted before such technologies were ever contemplated. The latest example is the use of “geofencing” in an attempt to avoid certain obligations to pay certain digital performance royalties.
In February 2014, VerStandig Broadcasting, the owner…
Assignment of Copyright through Terms of Use: Does E-Sign Make It OK? A Tool for B2B Sites Dealing with Unauthorized Access to Their Content?
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
It is a common practice for Web site providers who accept submissions of user-generated content to include a license provision in their “Terms of Use” to obtain rights to use the content. Rather than relying on the uncertain scope of an implied license, the provider can clarify, and hopefully…
Videogame App Developer Breaks the Rules on Copyright Infringement
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
Desiree Golden, a recent college graduate, wanted to aim at the big money that can be made in app development. She decided to replicate the popular “Tetris” videogame that has been around since the late 1980s. After researching intellectual property law, she says, she set out to copy only those…
European Court of Justice Rules on Copyright Status of Computer Programming Languages and Functionality
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
In a jury room in San Francisco, jurors in Oracle, Inc. v. Google, Inc. have been toiling over complicated issues related to the copyrightability of the Java computer programming language, and they may well return a verdict before the ink is dry on this post. We’ll write more about that…
Free Software Foundation Files First Copyright Infringement Complaint to Enforce its GNU Licenses
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
The Free Software Foundation has filed a copyright infringement complaint against Cisco Systems. The complaint alleges that Cisco’s Linksys products contain certain works in which the FSF holds the copyright, but Cisco has not complied with the requirements of the licenses pursuant to which the FSF makes the works available.
This is the first copyright infringement action ever filed by the FSF, according to the press release announcing the filing of the action. The filing of the lawsuit follows on the ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit last August in Jacobsen v. Katzer that open source licenses are enforceable under copyright law.
Federal Circuit Says Open Source License Conditions are Enforceable as Copyright Condition
By Jeffrey Neuburger on
There are so few judicial opinions dealing with open source licenses that any single one is of great interest, but the pro-open source ruling of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Jacobsen v. Katzer, No. 2008-1001 (Fed. Cir. Aug. 13, 2008) easily goes to the top of the charts of this small category. This is a highly significant opinion that will greatly bolster the efforts of the open source community to control the use of open source software according to the terms set out in open source licenses.
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