Archive for the ‘communication to the public’ category

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Cablevision: How It and Its Doctrines Have Fared Around the World

April 8th, 2013

The annual Fordham IP law conference is, in my view, second to none. This year”s Fordham’s 21st Annual Conference on Intellectual Property Law and Policy was sensational. Great program and fabulous international faculty. IPkat reported on some of the sessions.

On Friday, I was on a panel Performance Rights in Copyright: Public, Private or “Digital”? The speakers and panelists with me were Profs. Tyler Ochoa (Santa Clara U. School of Law) and Jane Ginsburg (Columbia), David Ellen (GC Cablevision), Dr. Silke von Lewinski (Max Planck Institute for IP) and Janet Cullum (Cooley). It was a very timely panel, especially given the recent release of the opinion in WNET, Thirteen v. Aereo, Inc 2013 WL 1285591 (2nd.Cir.Apr, 1, 2013). Judge Chin who delivered the powerful dissent in the Aereo case was in the audience.

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Posted in communication to the public, Copyright, public perofmance

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Aereo legal for now in New York

April 2nd, 2013

The Second Circuit released an important opinion yesterday ruling that Aereo’s New York based Internet streaming service does not infringe the US public performance right. In WNET, Thirteen v. Aereo, Inc 2013 WL 1285591 (2nd.Cir.Apr, 1, 2013), by a two to one majority, the Court ruled that the technical architecture of the service which is based on “renting” mini-antennas and transcoders to members of the public that are used to stream over the air live broadcasts renders the service non-infringing.

Central to the Court’s ruling was it prior decision in the Cablevision case which according to the Court established the following: .

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Posted in communication to the public, Copyright, public perofmance

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Internet retransmission of broadcasts a communication to the public, rules the CJEU

March 8th, 2013

The European Court of Justice ruled yesterday that retransmitting broadcasts over the internet infringes the communication to the public right, if done without authorization. The case involved TV Catchup Limited which operated an internet based live streaming service of broadcast television programmes.

The UK High Court in ITV Broadcasting Ltd & Ors v TV Catchup Ltd [2011] EWHC 1874 (Pat) (18 July 2011) referred the case to the EU Court of Justice (the CJEU). The case involved answering two questions. First, whether grabbing the over the air broadcasts and retransmitting them over the Internet was a communication. Secondly, whether the transmissions were “to the public”. The court in Case C‑607/11 found both requirmeents were met.

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Copyright law 2012: the year in review in Canada and around the world

January 11th, 2013

Yesterday, I gave a talk at the Law Society of Upper Canada’s 17h Annual Intellectual Property Law: The Year in Review program. My talk canvassed developments in copyright in Canada and around the world in 2012. My slides are shown below. The associated paper prepared in collaboration with Glen Bloom, with the help of others, is available here.

The following copyright cases from Canada, the USA, UK and Ireland, Australia, and  Europe are dealt with in the paper and slides.

Canada

Adobe Systems Incorporated v. Dale Thompson DBAAppletree Solutions, 2012 FC 1219

Aga Khan v. Tajdin, 2012 FCA 12

This is a preview of Copyright law 2012: the year in review in Canada and around the world. Read full post.

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Posted in APIs, communication to the public, computer programs, Copyright, Fair Dealing, making available right, Presentations

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Copyright Board to construe the making available right

December 7th, 2012

In the ESA v. SOCAN, 2012 SCC 34 case, the Supreme Court decided by a 5 to 4 majority that the transmission of a copy of a musical work to members of the public is not a communication to the public within the meaning of Section 3(1)(f) of the Copyright Act. When the Copyright Modernization Act was enacted the communication to the public right was expanded to expressly confer on copyright holders making available rights required by the WIPO Treaties. This was accomplished, inter alia, by the inclusion of Section 2.4(1.1) which provides that:

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Posted in C-11, communication to the public, Copyright

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SOCAN sued for $15 million refund of ringtones payments

November 14th, 2012

Yesterday, Rogers, Telus, Bell and Quebecor commenced an action against the copyright collective SOCAN. In the Federal Court suit Canada’s leading carriers are claiming a refund of all royalties paid to SOCAN under its Tariff 24 (Ringtone) tariffs since November, 2006.

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Posted in communication to the public, Copyright, Online music services

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ivi copyright injunction in the public interest says US Appeals Court

August 28th, 2012

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals released its decision in the WPIX, INC., v ivi INC. 2012 WL 3645304, (2nd.Cir.Aug. 27, 2012) case yesterday. It dismissed ivi’s appeal from a preliminary injunction prohibiting Ivi from continuing to stream television programming over the Internet.

ivi’s defense was that it was a cable system entitled to a compulsory license under § 111 of the US Copyright Act. The US Second Circuit reviewed the statute’s legislative history, development, and purpose which indicated that Congress did not intend for § 111 licenses to extend to Internet retransmissions. This was consistent with the view of US Copyright Office’s interpretation of § 111 that Internet retransmission services do not constitute cable systems under § 111. The Court accordingly concluded that “the district court did not abuse its discretion in finding that plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the merits of the case.”

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Posted in communication to the public, Copyright, infringment, public perofmance

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Understanding Flava Works v myVidster: does inline linking infringe copyright?

August 8th, 2012

Last week, the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals released its opinion in the  Flava Works, Inc, v Gunter dba myVidster 2012 WL 3124826 (7th.Cir. Aug 2, 2012) case. The central issue was whether Flava Works, the owner of copyrights in videos, was entitled to a preliminary injunction against the social video bookmarking service myVidster. The injunction which had been granted by the District Court was vacated.

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Posted in communication to the public, contributory infringement, Copyright, hosting liability, hyperlinking liability, infringment, ISP Liability, making available right, public perofmance, WIPO Treaties

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The Supreme Court rules on copyright

July 12th, 2012

Earlier today, the Supreme Court released reasons in the five copyright appeals heard back to back on December 6 and 7, 2011 in the following cases:[i]

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Posted in communication to the public, Copyright, Fair Dealing, infringment, ISP Liability, making available right, public perofmance

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Supreme Court of Canada to release reasons in five copyright cases

July 9th, 2012

The copyright bar has been eagerly awaiting the release of the decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada in the five copyright appeals which were heard on December 6 and 7, 2011. The Court announced earlier today that the decisions will be released this Thursday, July 12, 2012.

The Court published case summaries.  I also summarized the main issues in the appeals here.  The webcasts of the arguments can also be accessed here.

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Posted in communication to the public, Copyright, Fair Dealing, infringment, Reproduction

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