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Monday, Nov. 22, 2010 | 2:10 a.m.
Sun archives
- Philadelphia man sued twice over alleged copyright infringements (11-19-2010)
- Two more website operators face Righthaven copyright lawsuits (11-18-2010)
- Righthaven settles with Sharron Angle over R-J story posting (11-17-2010)
- Righthaven seeks to dismiss suit over posting of R-J story (11-16-2010)
- Free speech group files counterclaim against copyright enforcement firm (10-30-2010)
- Righthaven gets legal win in copyright lawsuit campaign (10-28-2010)
- Righthaven files 2 copyright lawsuits, settles 3 (10-27-2010)
- Six more website operators facing Righthaven copyright lawsuits (10-21-2010)
- Righthaven defendant wins first lawsuit dismissal motion (10-20-2010)
- Righthaven files, settles more copyright lawsuits (10-13-2010)
- Sharron Angle signals interest in settling copyright lawsuit (10-9-2010)
- Attorneys accuse Righthaven of settlement shakedown (10-8-2010)
- Two more website operators sued for copyright infringement (10-7-2010)
- Seven more defendants settle Righthaven copyright lawsuits (10-6-2010)
- Group plans to sue over right to sell insurance to nonprofits (10-6-2010)
- Nevada Democratic Party settles copyright lawsuit (10-2-2010)
- Righthaven reaches another copyright settlement over R-J website content (9-30-2010)
- Amid new criticism, Righthaven sues additional website operators (9-29-2010)
- R-J owner faces counterclaim in copyright lawsuit campaign (9-28-2010)
- 5 more website operators sued over R-J copyrights (9-28-2010)
- Attorneys attack Review-Journal copyright suit arrangement (9-27-2010)
- Executive says suing over R-J copyrights worth the negative publicity (9-26-2010)
- Lawyers argue R-J stories on Web aren’t protected by copyright (9-25-2010)
- Attorney: Righthaven copyright suits a free speech threat (9-23-2010)
- Observers note uncertainty over future of Righthaven/R-J copyright suits (9-21-2010)
A federal judge in Las Vegas is examining whether another Righthaven online copyright infringement lawsuit should be dismissed on fair use grounds.
Righthaven LLC is the Las Vegas Review-Journal's copyright enforcement partner that since March has sued at least 172 website operators and bloggers throughout North America in federal court in Las Vegas, charging material from the Review-Journal was posted on their sites without authorization.
The Review-Journal and its owner, Stephens Media LLC, say the lawsuits, typically filed without warning, are necessary to deter infringements of Review-Journal material. Righthaven files the suits after detecting infringements and then obtaining copyrights to the stories at issue from Stephens Media.
Critics say the lawsuit campaign amounts to a settlement shakedown effort involving frivolous suits that are cheaper to settle than fight. They note most of the newspaper industry tries to resolve copyright problems out of court before resorting to litigation.
In one of the Righthaven lawsuits involving Realty One Group Inc., U.S. District Judge Larry Hicks on Oct. 19 dismissed the suit against defendant real estate agent Michael Nelson, saying his posting of the first eight sentences of a 30-sentence story amounted to fair use of the Review-Journal story.
Righthaven settled with Nelson so it can't appeal that ruling. But Righthaven expects a similar fair use ruling from Hicks involving codefendant Realty One Group, and plans at that time to appeal it to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
In the meantime, U.S. District Judge James Mahan has ordered Righthaven to show cause why another of its lawsuits shouldn't be dismissed on fair use grounds.
That case involves the Center for Intercultural Organizing of Portland, Ore., which was sued by Righthaven in August after an entire 33-paragraph Review-Journal story about Las Vegas immigrants from June 28 was posted on the center's website, crediting the Review-Journal.
The nonprofit says it was founded by Portland-area immigrants and refugees to combat widespread anti-Muslim sentiment after 9/11. It now works to strengthen immigrant and refugee communities through education, civic engagement, organizing and mobilization.
Mahan didn't elaborate in his show cause order on the fair use issue, and Righthaven hasn't yet responded to the order.
The order came as a surprise as it was Mahan, not the defendant, who directly raised the fair use issue.
Attorneys for the Center for Intercultural Organizing with the Las Vegas law firm of Olson, Cannon, Gormley & Desruisseaux have so far focused their defense on a jurisdictional issue. They say the Nevada court doesn't have jurisdiction in the dispute since the Center for Intercultural Organizing doesn't do business in Nevada and doesn't try to serve a Nevada audience with its website.
The attorneys for the Center for Intercultural Organizing, in their responses, have also been critical of Righthaven's litigation strategy.
"Plaintiff was solely established to operate under a business model in which it trolls the Internet to locate articles it believes originated from the Las Vegas Review-Journal website without the express consent of the copyright holder," attorneys James Olson and Michael Stoberski wrote in a September filing. "In most cases, the complaints are filed against people or organizations who do not profit in any way from posting such articles, that are already offered for free on the Las Vegas Review-Journal website. Rather than issue any type of cease and desist letters, plaintiffs immediately file suit and attempt to extract settlements from the defendants."
Noting the Center for Intercultural Organizing is a nonprofit that does not charge subscription fees or derive any income from its website; and the center's efforts are directed solely at Portland residents, the attorneys wrote: "To subject a nonprofit organization to the jurisdiction of Nevada under these facts would be unreasonable."
They also argued the Review-Journal "allows articles to be copied and pasted easily from its website."
"Moreover, it encourages its readers to send articles to third parties. Through these actions, the original holder has granted its readers an implicit license to re-publish its articles," the center's attorneys wrote.
Righthaven attorneys, however, insisted in a court filing that the court in Nevada has jurisdiction as: "The defendants committed blatant copyright infringement of a Righthaven-owned literary work which clearly derives from a Nevada-based daily publication and is of specific concern to Nevada residents."
Hicks' ruling in the Realty One case didn't set a binding precedent for the other Nevada federal judges presiding over Righthaven cases. But Righthaven observer Eric Goldman said Mahan's order to show cause in the Intercultural Organizing case likely resulted from Mahan becoming aware of Hicks' ruling.
"It could be that the judge already assumes the defendants made a fair use and is wondering if Righthaven has anything persuasive to convince him otherwise. More likely, the judge is aware of the Realty One opinion and wants Righthaven to help explain how this case differs. Either way, this is not a good development for Righthaven; but if it's the latter, it's not necessarily bad as Righthaven can distinguish the situations on several grounds," said Goldman, associate professor at the Santa Clara University School of Law in California and director of the High Tech Law Institute there.
"Even so, the fact the judge raised this issue unprompted is a sign that judges want to clear their dockets of low-merit cases, even if they have to jumpstart that inquiry themselves," Goldman added.
Maybe the judge found fair use in the fact that they are non profit and "educational"? Despite a 100% duplication of an article, the judge may have seen past that. This is potentially big news.
The evil incarnation of Shermy & Steven Gibson...
Righthaven is about to lose their legal footing.
Maybe Glen Lerner can file a slip & fall for the poor boys...
Funny again.....they have a news story that lays out why the Sun has no claim of copyright for its own articles.
Good article. Thanks for keeping us abreast on how the Federal Courts are handling this docket-clogging excursion into "free enterprise" by the Review-Journal through its' "high-technology company" Righthaven.
"Righthaven files the suits after detecting infringements and then obtaining copyrights to the stories at issue from Stephens Media."
I guess the question I would have is that if Righthaven obtains the copyright AFTER they find the infringement, how is it they are the damaged party. Would not the Las Vegas Review-Journal be the injured party and therefore the plaintiff?
Remember when conservatives claimed to be against frivolous lawsuits?
It's like the loony teabaggers have taken over the entire GOP/right-wing.
I have a feeling this brewing fiasco is more what prompted the management shakeup at the RJ than any of it's leanings be they right or left. You've done it again Gibby.
The business model is based on Nobleman of Europe, they used to draw and quarter peasants who caught game on their estates.
I predict Sherm and the Cowboy Hat will be gone all together within a year.
They will have to go on Obamacare because of their pre-existing medical conditions, once their "Cobra" runs out.
Chunky says:
Any victory small or large over Righthaven and their "shakedown" business model makes him happy!
Again, Chunky, an Intellectual Property author and owner himself fully supports the protection of one's work. He's had to fight his own battles large and small protecting his work.
What Chunky despises though are the strong-arm shakedown tactics of Righthaven.
That's what Chunky thinks!
Perhaps it was not such a good idea for Sherm and Tommy to have the R-J sue its readers and customers through their strawman shamsters.
And perhaps it was not such a good idea to use faulty polls in support of the losing Senate candidate.
i swear that i will never read that disgusting excuse of a newspaper again. i will never ever go to their website. i hope the RJ dies a slow, painful, high priced death. and God, if you are listening, take wronghaven with them.
Sgt. Rock, you need to stick to things you actually know about like, well I'm sure there is something. All this case says is that the right to reproduce in limited distribution for educational or informational purposes is protected. It has nothing to do with ownership of a copyright. I'm sure you have heard this before, but the next time I want to hear the opinion of a know-nothing NCO, I'll tell it to him.
Mr. Rag: "All this case says is that the right to reproduce in limited distribution for educational or informational purposes is protected."
You are pretty clueless about the law.
Yes, there is an aspect that is true to your statement but it still does not give one to right to copy and paste on the Internet at will other people's work.
First your statement "reproduce in limited distribution " directly conflicts with the notion of posting on the Internet. There is certainity nothing in limited distribution concept when one post on the world wide web.
So you should first bone up on some copyright law before acting like a 2 year-old Mr. Rag.
> You are pretty clueless about the law.
speaking of clueless --- Just today you linked, erm, I mean Sherm linked to material that is in obvious violation of NBC's stated copyrights. What's up with that? One can steal NBC's content but not the RJ's?
do as I say not as I do, Sherm?, erm --- i mean Sarge?
LMAO.
> I predict Sherm and the Cowboy Hat will be gone all together within a year.
they're gone now --- their bodies just haven't hit the ground yet.
"speaking of clueless --- Just today you linked, erm, I mean Sherm linked to material that is in obvious violation of NBC's stated copyrights. What's up with that? One can steal NBC's content but not the RJ's?"
I think you hit the jackpot on being clueless.
There is no copyright infringement when one links to a story. One can even list a few paragraphs from the story and give the headline, cite the paper and the writer. All that is not copyright infringement. However, if one copy's and paste all or a significant portion of another story then that would both unethical and copyright infringement.
You should go directly to clown town to collect your jackpot winnings.
There is certainity nothing in limited distribution concept when one post on the world wide web.
I thought the RJ does just that POST on the World Wide Web.
They do but they get people coming to their web site to read their stories who they pay people to write for them. Companies pay money to LVRJ to advertise and LVRJ gets more money for that when more people come to their website.
If a person copies and pastes their stories then there is no need for a reader to go to the LVRJ to read that story. The readers don't read the same story twice.
> I think you hit the jackpot on being clueless.
think so, huh? If you knowingly link to STOLEN content you're no different than the original content thief. And there's NO WAY that you, erm, I mean Sherm, wouldn't of known that was stolen content given that it was not hosted on a NBC server. (you do read the news, right?)
I'd add in the hypocrisy of it all, but you right wing nuts don't care about that, or at least that I've ever seen.
You, erm I mean Sherm, were wrong --- and as we see now not man enough to admit it. That's why you, erm, Sherm, are so concerned about pat downs --- someone other than the readers you got would soon figure out there's no "junk" to check.
BWWWWAAAAAAHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAA.
That's right, Tom..
..Rightklaven's and RJ's mission statement "Don't touch our junk!"
Sarge, My FL Bar # is 68749. Once you pass the bar, come back and explain the law to me. If the use was non-commercial and properly attributed, fair use is a rebuttable presumption. However, that's not what you said. You said the Sun "has no claim of copyright for its own articles." Fair use does not address the right, it is a defense against damages for violating the right. And now, I am telling you your opinion, Sargeant.
vegas_tom......you no freaking clue what you are talking about. You are saying linking is stealing. There is nothing in the law or case history that supports that.
Mr. Rag, non-commerical use plays a factor in fair use. Properly attributed article playes a factor.
Copying and pasting the whole damn article also plays a factor.
Just because one is a non-profit organization does not give one the free right to steal and use other work at will.
It is one thing to copy an article for a class or for your own use.
It is another to copy an article and post it on your site in attempt to draw traffic to your site.
Sarge: "It is another to copy an article and post it on your site in attempt to draw traffic to your site." And this does just what, if the site is non-commercial or free?
"It is one thing to copy an article for a class or for your own use." So, making 20 or 30 copies for a class is alright, but posting on a non-commercial, non-profit website that gets 20 or 30 page views is not?
And, have you wondered, Sarge, if this issue had anything to do with Sherm's "retirement?" Now that Righthaven has to pony up funds in defense of countersuits, and the RJ has found it's $300k invested in Righthaven, at least for the moment, pretty much gone...well, even you, a Sherm clone, or Sherm himself, has to get the idea.
But maybe not...I wonder if Sherm will collect unemployment, once his contract runs out.
It's simply a shakedown scam. The judges know it, they'll do what they can to squash it. They have non-frivolous business to attend to.