Category: Digital Copyright Wars

Papers by James Boyle, Cory Doctorow, Pamela Samuelson, Jessica Litman, and Others: The Past and Future of The Internet: A Symposium for John Perry Barlow

The Duke Law & Technology Review has published a special issue: The Past and Future of The Internet: A Symposium for John Perry Barlow (entire issue file).

Here's an excerpt from the introduction by James Boyle:

John Perry Barlow passed away on Feb 7th, 2018. John Perry's name is generally followed by a long list of qualities: poet, lyricist, rancher, civil libertarian, co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, teller-of-stories, organizer of parties, bringer of light. Good friend. Certainly he was all of these. The picture above gives you some sense of his personality. But he was also the author of two influential essays in the very early days of the World Wide Web—A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace and Selling Wine Without Bottles: The Economy of Mind on the Global Net. . . .

Rather than offer a simple Festschrift for Barlow, this symposium uses those two essays as the jumping off point for a reflection on the current state of the digital world.

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"The CASE Act: The Road to Copyright Trolling is Paved with Good Intentions"

Stan Adams has published "The CASE Act: The Road to Copyright Trolling is Paved with Good Intentions " in the Center for Democracy & Technology Blog.

Here's an excerpt:

The bill would establish a Copyright Claims Board (CCB) in the Copyright Office. This would not be a court and would be entirely separated from the court system. The only option to appeal any of the CCB's determinations, based on the CCB's legal interpretation, would be to ask the Register of Copyrights to review the decision. It would be theoretically possible to ask a federal court to review the determination, but only on the grounds that the CCB's determination was "issued as a result of fraud, corruption, misrepresentation, or other misconduct" or if the CCB exceeded its authority. So if you disagree with the CCB's legal interpretation, or even its competence to make a decision, you are out of luck. This raises red flags about potential due process and separation of powers problems under the Constitution.

The "small claims" part of the bill is also troubling, in that the CCB can award damages up to $30,000 per proceeding. This amount is only considered small in the context of copyright statutory damages, which range between $750-30,000 per work infringed, unless the infringement was willful, in which case, damages can be $150,000 per work. The $30K cap is a 2x-10x multiple of the maximum awards for small claims courts in 49 of 50 states. . . .

Even though the Supreme Court recently ruled that the registration process must be completed (either the Copyright Office granted or denied the application for registration) before filing infringement claims, registration is not required to bring an action under the CASE Act. This leaves everyone (other than the original author/photographer) with no guaranteed way to determine who holds the rights to unregistered works. Even if you identified someone as a potential rightsholder, it could be difficult or impossible to verify their claim of ownership without the official recognition by the Copyright Office. So even if you are acting in good faith and attempt to obtain permission before using a work, you may not be able to do so and there is no guarantee that you will have obtained permission from the correct party, leaving you exposed to claims via the CASE Act.

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CASE Act: "Life-Altering Copyright Lawsuits Could Come to Regular Internet Users Under a New Law Moving in the Senate"

The EFF has released "Life-Altering Copyright Lawsuits Could Come to Regular Internet Users Under a New Law Moving in the Senate."

Here's an excerpt:

In short, the bill would supercharge a "copyright troll" industry dedicated to filing as many "small claims" on as many Internet users as possible in order to make money through the bill’s statutory damages provisions. Every single person who uses the Internet and regularly interacts with copyrighted works (that's everyone) should contact their Senators to oppose this bill.

Making it so easy to sue Internet users for allegedly infringing a copyrighted work that an infringement claim comes to resemble a traffic ticket is a terrible idea. This bill creates a situation where Internet users could easily be on the hook for multiple $5,000 copyright infringement judgments without many of the traditional legal safeguards or rights of appeal our justice system provides.

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European Parliament Approves Controversial Copyright Directive

The European Parliament has approved the controversial Copyright Directive, including Article's 11 and 13.

Here's a quick news roundup.