Fair Use Victory in the Courts!

Lawrence Lessig - professor and author of several readings for this class - sued Liberation Media, the Australian music label that owns the rights to French band Phoenix' song “Lisztomania," and won! Here is the story, via Ars Technica: 

Last summer, Liberation had a video of one of Lessig's lectures (called "Open," which is embedded above) taken down when the company found that he had used video clips with Phoenix's music in it. Lessig, in collaboration with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, challenged the takedown and sued Liberation, arguing that he was well within his right to use Phoenix's music under fair use policies. (Phoenix, for its part, wrote that it was happy to have its music remixed under fair use principles.) 

Lessig teamed up with the Electronic Frontier Foundation to extract damages from Liberation under the DMCA's section 512(f), which requires copyright holders to pay damages if they overstep their bounds in issuing a takedown. As Ars noted last summer, hardly any copyright holders have ever had to pay damages under 512(f). 

Lessig's and EFF's original complaint against Liberation ran down a long list of reasons why the Phoenix clips in Lessig's lecture should be considered fair use. Ars wrote at the time: “[Lessig] used a small proportion of the song, his lecture doesn't compete with the market for the song in any way, and the lecture is an entirely new creation. Phoenix wanted its song to entertain and make money; Lessig's lecture was educational, and neither he nor Creative Commons, the sponsor, made any profit."

What is the significance of this ruling? Hopefully music labels will think twice before being over zealous in their take-down requests.  

Update on the Aereo Case

From the NYT:

Aereo, the start-up that uses tiny antennas to stream the free signals of TV stations to its customers’ Internet-connected devices for a fee, is stealing from the broadcast networks on a giant scale, the broadcasters asserted in a filing with the Supreme Court on Monday.  

“The Copyright Act does not tolerate business models premised on the unauthorized exploitation of the copyrighted works of others,” said the brief, which was filed by broadcasters including ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox. 

On April 22, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear American Broadcasting Companies v. Aereo, a case that has significant implications for a television industry undergoing profound changes, as well as challenges from upstart competitors like Netflix and Amazon.

While Aereo is technically operating within the rule of law, the Court has acted in the past to try and preserve the broadcaster business model (see Turner Broadcasting v. Federal Communications Commission 1994). What do you think they will do with this case?

Copyright in the News: "Paramount Shoots Down 'Top Gun' Twitter Account"

Interesting/fun story about Twitter shutting down a Twitter account for its unauthorized sharing of screenshots of the movie "Top Gun." From Mashable: 

"Twitter user @555uhz decided that his love for Tom Cruise and fighter jets was best expressed by tweeting each scene of the movie, frame by frame. With each tweet, the entire plot was eventually revealed on the account's feed. Top Gun distributor Paramount Pictures issued a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DCMA) letter to Twitter, which resulted in the account's suspension. The account, created in January, had gained more than 6,000 followers by the time it was taken down. The date and time of the suspension is unclear, but it most likely occurred within the last 24 hours."

Seems a bit drastic, no? It is just as likely that the unauthorized use of the material increased market demand for the actual movie itself, at least from a marketing perspective. What do you think? Should Twitter have complied with Paramount's request?