Author Archives: Elliot Zimmerman

Is parody a viable defense to claimed copyright infringement of a purely musical composition by the author of the initial work? Copyright infringement can be proved circumstantially by showing similarity and access. A musical composition (without lyrics) created solely to be melodically similar to the initial copyrighted work will almost always infringe that work by definition (unless it is solely a parody of the music alone). An example of a permissible parody of a musical Continue reading Parody of a Musical Composition→

According to Cal. Lab. Code §2855, “a contract to render personal service…may not be enforced against the employee beyond seven years from the commencement of service under it.” Lab. Code §2855(a). This statute fuels artists’ contentions that record contracts are unenforceable after seven years.

ELLISON v. AOL, No. 02-55797 (9th Cir. February 10, 2004) Summary judgment to Defendant, in a contributory copyright infringement claim for short stories posted on a P2P file sharing network accessed through Defendant’s service, was improperly granted because there were triable issues of fact as to whether Defendant complied with the requirements under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act for safe harbor. To read the full text of this opinion, click here for pdf file.

The DMCA limits liability of web site owners who are unaware that infringing material is contained within or being uploaded to their web site. 17 U.S.C. 512 et seq. provides safe harbors to web site owners who comply with the statute. The statute’s requirements include designating an agent to accept notice of copyright infringement, providing a good address, email and phone number of that agent at the web site, filing a form with the U.S. Continue reading Safe Harbors, DMCA Protects Web Site Owners→

Fred Von Lohmann, Senior Staff Attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), was quoted as saying “MGM v. Grokster is about whether copyright owners have the right to veto new technologies and stifle innovation … Innovators have a great deal at stake in the conflict over peer-to-peer (P2P) software.” EFF represents defendant Streamcast, maker of Morpheus P2P software, in the Grokster litigation. EFF contends that Streamcast has no control over the Gnutella Network, Morpheus has Continue reading Grokster Appeal Day (2-3-4)→

It is technically possible for hackers to feign an IP address. A while back, Intel branded all Pentium 4 (and better) chips with a unique code in order to identify the computer at an IP address. AMD does not brand its processors with such a code.Is this a possible defense to a claim of copyright infringement (i.e. although it appears that the infringer’s IP address was involved in the infringing activity, how do we know Continue reading Possible Technical Defense Against P2P Infringement Claims→

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and 21 other consumer and privacy groups today sided with Charter Communications, Inc., in its struggle to protect customer privacy. The groups urged a federal court in St. Louis, Missouri, to prevent the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) from forcing Internet Service Provider Charter Communications to identify customers the RIAA has accused of offering infringing music o­n a peer-to-peer system. In December 2003, a federal appeals court in Washington, Continue reading Extending Verizon to RIAA v. Charter Communications→

Rock veterans Peter Gabriel and Brian Eno are launching a provocative new musicians’ alliance that would cut against the industry grain by letting artists sell their music o­nline instead of o­nly through record labels. With the Internet transforming how people buy and listen to songs, musicians need to act now to claim digital music’s future, Gabriel and Eno argued as they handed out a slim red manifesto at a huge dealmaking music conference known as Continue reading Musicians’ Alliance Proposes Direct Sales of Music Online→

The Recording Industry Association of America launched its largest wave of file-swapping lawsuits, filing new copyright infringement suits against 532 currently unnamed individuals. The suits are the industry group’s first since an appeals court in December blocked its original strategy of identifying alleged file swappers before filing lawsuits by sending subpoenas to their Internet service providers. Click here to read the CNET article.

A group of technology experts issued a statement to the U.S. Congress o­n 1.13.04 expressing the opinion that P2P software provider Sharman Networks has the ability to prevent copyrighted material from being sent around the KaZaA network. This is in direct conflict with the trial court’s findings in the Grokster case I discussed at EASL’s Dangerous Entertainment Seminar, and was in fact the main reason the trial court denied plaintiffs’ motion for a premlinary injunction Continue reading Report to Congress – Kazaa can block access to copyrighted works.→