A federal judge ruled that Photobucket.com, Kodab’s photo-sharing website, does not have to examine some 9 billion images for possible copyright infringement. -db From the Courthouse News Service, January 5, 2012, by Adam Klasfeld. Full story
The Electronic Freedom Foundation takes on what it says are distortions of the positions taken by those opposing the online piracy legislation recently introduced in both houses of Congress. While acknowledging that the tech industry recognizes the importance of copyright as it applies to the Internet, writes Trevor Timm for EFF, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act already allows copyright holders to direct websites to remove copyrighted content. The new legislation overreaches, says Timm, adversely affecting
Congressional critics of the entertainment industry-backed online piracy law have introduced a bill that would change existing trade laws to reflect that illegally downloading copyright content from foreign-owned web sites would constitute foreign imports. That would allow the International Trade Commission the power to decide if the imports violated intellectual property rights. The critics say this approach would avoid the problems of the proposed online piracy acts which give the government and industry too much
Righthaven’s methods in pursuing copyright violations turned out to be bogus and unfair resulting in its bankruptcy, but, says Jeffrey D. Neuburger in MediaShift, it would be too bad if the company did not survive long enough to pursue appeals lest newspapers lose ground in receiving just compensation for their work. -db From a commentary for MediaShift, December 1, 2011, by Jeffrey D. Neuburger. Full story
Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Lamar Smith R-Texas, expressed concerns over the scope of the Stop Online Piracy Act by saying that he was uncertain whether the Justice Department should be allowed to obtain court orders demanding that ISPs prevent users from visiting blacklisted websites, websites accused of infringing on intellectual property. Under intense fire from the technology sector, it now appears that the bill will be amended. -db From a commentary in