Rightscorp has been awarded a patent by the Australian Patent Office which should protect it from competitors looking to muscle in on its business model Down Under. The patent protects a system which helps Rightscorp identify repeat infringers, individuals it is now targeting in the United States with settlement demands and lawsuits.
Source: Rightscorp Granted Australian Patent to Chase Pirates – TorrentFreak
Those are OUR random blotches of ink, says photo library
Source: Hacker mag 2600 laughs off Getty Images inkspots copyright claim • The Register
WordPress.com is taking a strong stance against rightsholders who abuse its takedown process. The company maintains a “hall of shame” which recently expanded with the addition of Subaru. The car manufacturer tried to take down a blog which was created in response to one of Subaru’s own contests.
Source: WordPress Adds Subaru to Takedown “Hall of Shame” – TorrentFreak
Three years ago now, EFF’s client Kyle Goodwin, a sports videographer, asked the court to allow him to retrieve the files he stored in an account on the cloud storage site Megaupload. When the government seized Megaupload’s assets and servers in January 2012, Mr. Goodwin lost access to video files containing months of his professional work.
Source: Once Again, Megaupload User Asks Court for His Files Back | Electronic Frontier Foundation
Plaintiff repeatedly voices consternation in his pleadings about defendant’s distribution of the publication that displayed his work on its cover for profit, but of the many licenses available to choose from, plaintiff selected the one that specifically authorized commercial use. So the only issue before the Court in Count I is whether defendant – which gave plaintiff full credit for the work it displayed on the cover of its publication – complied with the technical terms of the license under which plaintiff published the work. The Court finds that it did.
The U.S. Government has informed the Court of Appeals that the civil forfeiture case against Megaupload and Kim Dotcom was launched as a last resort. The authorities feared that Dotcom and his colleagues would regain possession of the millions in seized assets and argue that they are properly labeled as “fugitives.”
Source: U.S. Government Grabbed Dotcom’s Millions “As a Last Resort” – TorrentFreak
Today Jerome Larkin, Administrator of the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission of the Supreme Court of Illinois, via Counsel Wendy J. Muchman and Marita C. Sullivan, filed a seven-count, 14,000-word complaint against Prenda’s John Steele alleging massive professional misconduct and fraud on the Court (the word “fraud” is used 17 times throughout the document).
“Piercing the corporate veil” of Paul Hansmeier’s law firm was justified.
Source: Appeals court: Prenda lawyer who drained cash from his law firm must pay up | Ars Technica
A recording of Kim Dotcom and several Universal Music executives captured two days before the Megaupload raids has revealed the label planning to do a deal with the entrepreneur. Amid discussion of ‘taxing’ Google by diverting its ad revenue to the label, the execs offered to downgrade Dotcom from “evil” to “neutral” in return for dropping legal action over the “Mega Song”.
Source: Universal Music and Kim Dotcom Prepared a Deal to Tax Google – TorrentFreak
