Free for a Fee

The trial in the dispute between Oracle and Google over the use of Java technology in the Android operating system is over, and the greatly anticipated ruling on copyright in the Java Application Programming Interface (API) has issued. The court ruled that the elements of the Java API, including the structure, sequence and organization, are not protected by copyright. It is important to note that the court did not rule that no elements of an API may be protected by copyright. Although broad in its implications, the opinion is fact-specific to the Java API.

As appropriate to a dispute that presiding judge William Alsup referred to as “the World Series of technology litigation,” the API ruling is world-class.  The opinion will quickly make its way into technology law textbooks, not only for the clarity of the court’s discussion of how the Java programming language functions, but for its mini-treatise on software copyright law.

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The content in this post was found at http://newmedialaw.proskauer.com/2012/06/06/oracle-v-google-judge-writes-the-book-on-software-programming-copyright-for-now-anyway/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NewMediaAndTechnologyLaw+%28New+Media+and+Technology+Law%29 and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

Megaupload

• Kim Dotcom lampoons New Zealand MP in his new rap song
• Government trying to deny Megaupload fair legal representation
• Judge not impressed with government’s arguments against preserving Megaupload data
• Carpathia blasts government for hypocrisy on Megaupload servers
• Raid of Dotcom mansion was videotaped, footage nowhere to be found

The Motion Picture Association of America filed a response on Tuesday, addressing a motion to return the Megaupload users’ files locked up in the United States v. Kim Dotcom case. In an Eastern Virginia District Court, the MPAA asked that if the court grants users the ability to retrieve their files from the locked-down servers, that no illegally downloaded copyrighted material be let free in the process.

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The content in this post was found at http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/06/the-mpaa-would-be-ok-seeing-legit-meagupload-files-restored/ and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

Posted by Peggy Hoon on April 28, 2011

collectanea

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Transformative Uses As Fair Uses

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The content in this post was found at http://www-apps.umuc.edu/blog/collectanea/2011/04/making-sense-of-derivative-wor.html and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

By Andrew Goldberg

May 10, 2011,

Google is prohibited from publishing snippets of, or even linking to, articles and photos from Belgian newspaper websites, a Belgian appeals court ruled this week.

The decision, which upholds a lower court’s 2007 copyright ruling forcing Google to remove all content and links from French-and-German-language newspapers in Belgium, is surely a setback for the search giant, but is also potentially an even bigger blow to innovation in Europe.

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The content in this post was found at http://thepriorart.typepad.com/the_prior_art/2011/05/google-is-prohibited-from-publishing-snippets-of-or-even-linking-to-articles-and-photos-from-belgian-newspaper-websites-a.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ThePriorArt+%28The+Prior+Art%29 and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

By Eric Goldman

This weekend I presented on “Hot Topics in Internet Law” at the San Francisco IP Law Association’s Spring Seminar in Healdsburg. My talk slides. A few photos from the trip. As I’ve mentioned before, I find “hot topics” talks unusually challenging to prepare–they take much more time than normal talks, they are hard to organize, and they have a high risk of preemption by prior speakers. In addition to quick coverage of a number of topics, I focused on 5 broader topics (I only addressed 3 in the time I had):

* intermediary deputization
* consumer reviews
* social media account disputes
* trolling
* new gTLDs

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The content in this post was found at http://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2012/06/hot_topics_in_i.htm and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

June 14, 2011

A Las Vegas federal judge threatened to sanction copyright troll Righthaven, calling its litigation efforts Tuesday “disingenuous, if not outright deceitful.”

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The content in this post was found at http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/06/judge-copyright-troll-righthaven-has-no-standing-to-sue/ and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

By Tyler Ochoa (see some of Tyler’s other posts) with comments from Eric

Oracle America, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 3:10-cv-03561-WHA (N.D. Cal. May 31, 2012).

On Thursday, Judge William Alsup concluded the district court phase of the Oracle v. Google Java-Android trial by holding that the structure, sequence, and organization of the 37 APIs copied by Google is not protected by copyright.

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Other reactions to the ruling:

* SCU’s incoming new law professor Brian Love was quoted in the San Jose Mercury News as saying: “This is now effectively a total loss for Oracle, across the board…It’s absolutely the best possible case for Google.”

* EFF: No Copyrights on APIs: Judge Defends Interoperability and Innovation

The content in this post was found at http://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2012/06/oracles_apis_ar.htm and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

July, 11, 2011

American Internet users, get ready for three strikes “six strikes.” Major US Internet providers—including AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Cablevision, and Time Warner Cable—have just signed on to a voluntary agreement with the movie and music businesses to crack down on online copyright infringers. But they will protect subscriber privacy and they won’t filter or monitor their own networks for infringement. And after the sixth “strike,” you won’t necessarily be “out.”

Much of the scheme mirrors what ISPs do now. Copyright holders will scan the ‘Net for infringement, grabbing suspect IP addresses from peer-to-peer file-sharing networks. If they see your IP address participating in a swarm for, say, Transformers, they will look up that IP address to see which ISP controls it, then fire off a message.

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The content in this post was found at http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/07/major-isps-agree-to-six-strikes-copyright-enforcement-plan/ and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

July 7, 2011

The White House likes the newly announced “six strikes” voluntary agreement announced today between major copyright holders and Internet access providers. That’s no surprise—the US administration helped to broker the deal.

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The content in this post was found at http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/07/white-house-we-win-the-future-by-making-isps-into-copyright-enforcers/ and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.

The Recording Industry Association of America has appealed a judge’s decision to slash the damages award levied against Jammie Thomas-Rasset for copyright infringement from $1.5 million to $54,000 one month ago. The reduction in the amount of the award spurred the RIAA to question whether certain terms in the Copyright Act were misinterpreted and need further examination—specifically, the word “distribution.”

coverage on reduction

Thomas-Rasset and the RIAA have been fighting the same copyright battle since 2007 over 24 songs she shared over the KaZaA P2P network. At first Thomas-Rasset was ordered by a jury to pay $1.92 million, or $222,000 per song. A second trial ended up with a $1.5 million verdict, which federal judge Michael Davis then slashed to $54,000 total one month ago, saying the higher amount was unconstitutional.

Now the RIAA is appealing the case in the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in St. Louis, saying that the court’s failure to classify Thomas-Rasset’s actions as a “distribution” under 106(3) of the Copyright Act wouldn’t deter her (and others, presumably) from repeating her actions and violating the Copyright Act again. The RIAA is hoping to vacate the jury’s verdict based on the interpretation of “distribution,” which would result in a third trial.

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The content in this post was found at http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/08/its-not-over-yet-jammie-thomas-riaa-files-an-appeal/ and was not authored by the moderators of freeforafee.com. Clicking the title link will take you to the source of the post.