COPYCENSE

“The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday declined to consider an emergency appeal by Research In Motion to review a long-running patent suit that could shut down RIM’s BlackBerry service in the United States.

“U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts, who handles last-minute appeals, did not comment on the rejection of RIM’s emergency application. The company asked the high court on Monday to halt a decision by a lower court that could enforce a 2-year old injunction.”

Michael Singer. Supreme Court Won’t Hear RIM Suit. News.com. Oct. 26, 2005.

CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.

“What are the stumbling blocks to digitization? Is copyright law a major barrier? Is it easier to negotiate with some types of publishers than with others? To what extent does the age of the material influence permission decisions?

“This report, by Denise Troll Covey, principal librarian for special projects at Carnegie Mellon University, responds to many of these questions. It begins with a brief, cogent overview of U.S. copyright laws, licensing practices, and technological developments in publishing that serve as the backdrop for the current environment. It then recounts in detail three efforts undertaken at Carnegie-Mellon University to secure copyright permission to digitize and provide open access to books with scholarly content.”

Denise T. Covey. Acquiring Copyright Permission to Digitize and Provide Open Access to Books. (.pdf, 6.8 MB) Council on Library and Information Resources. November 2005.

See also:

Denise Troll Covey. Copyright Permission: Turning to Dust or Digital. International Journal of the Book. 2003

(Attribution: This information was bought to our attention by Jill Hurst-Wahl, a digitization expert and the author of Digitization 101.)

CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.

“A U.S. court has ordered a Web site that bills itself as ‘Napster’s Number One Replacement Software’ to stop promising customers that they won’t face copyright lawsuits when they download songs for free, the Federal Trade Commission said Wednesday.

“A U.S. court in California ordered MP3DownloadCity.com to temporarily remove its claims as it considers the FTC’s request for a permanent ban.”

Reuters. Music Web Site Ordered to Change Tune. CNN.com. Oct. 19, 2005.

See also:

Federal Trade Commission. FTC Clamps Down on File-sharing Service Site. (Press release) Oct. 19, 2005.

United States District Court, Central District of California. Federal Trade Commission vs. Cashier Myricks Jr. d/b/a MP3DOWNLOADCITY.COM.

Updates:

Eric J. Sinrod. Perspective: Nothing But the Online Truth–Or Else. News.com. Oct. 26, 2005.

CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.

“In the wake of lawsuits filed against Google, Microsoft said on Tuesday that it would join a competing and less controversial library book digitization project sponsored by Yahoo and Internet Archive.

“Google faces two lawsuits alleging that the search giant is violating copyright law by scanning and digitizing all or parts of the collections at the libraries at universities such as Harvard, Stanford, Oxford and Michigan, plus The New York Public Library. Last month, the Authors Guild filed suit against Google, and last week, the Association of American Publishers also sued.”

Elinor Mills. Microsoft to Offer Book Search. News.com. Oct. 25, 2005.

See also:

Open Content Alliance. MSN Search Announces MSN Book Search. (Press release.) (.pdf, 76 KB) Oct. 25, 2005.

Elinor Mills. Google’s Battle Over Library Books. News.com. Oct. 24, 2005.

“A Hong Kong man has been convicted of copyright infringement using the BitTorrent service, in what is believed to be the first case of its kind.

“Chan Nai-Ming was found guilty of distributing three Hollywood films using BitTorrent’s peer-to-peer file-sharing technology, according to Taiwanese English-language newspaper The China Post.”

Karen Gomm. BitTorrent User Convicted Over Movie Sharing. News.com. Oct. 25, 2005.

See also:

The China Post. HK Computer User Convicted in BitTorrent Piracy Case. Oct. 26, 2005.

Susan B. Shor. Expert: BitTorrent Conviction Unlikely to Be Copied in U.S. TechNewsWorld. Oct. 26, 2005.

CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.

“On September 20, 2005, the Authors Guild and several individual authors filed a complaint in federal district court in New York alleging that Google is engaging in ‘massive copyright infringement’ through the Google Print Library Project. This culminated months of publisher condemnation of the initiative, which involves scanning the collections of five major research libraries and making the full text of the books searchable on Google.

“Despite the allegations of infringement, libraries, users, and some authors have welcomed the Project, insisting that it will actually stimulate demand for books by helping readers identify books that contain the information they seek. Publishers and authors should carefully study precisely what Google intends to do and understand the relevant copyright issues before supporting the Authors Guild’s lawsuit.”

Jonathan Band. The Authors Guild v. The Google Print Library Project. LLRX.com. Oct. 15, 2005.

See also:

United States District Court, Southern District of New York. Authors Guild, et al. vs. Google, Inc. (Complaint) (.pdf, 104 KB). Sept. 20, 2005.

Jonathan Band. The Google Print Library Project: A Copyright Analysis. (.pdf, 132 KB) August 2005.

CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the intersection of business, law and technology. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.