Justia Copyright Opinion Summaries

Music Companies sued East Coat and Hudson for eight counts of copyright infringement, corresponding to the eight songs ASCAP's independent investigator heard publicly performed at the Long Beach Roscoe's House of Chicken and Waffles. East Coast and Hudson appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment to Music Companies for the eight counts of copyright infringement, as well as the district court's award of attorney's fees and costs to the Music Companies. The court held that the district court was correct to conclude that the investigator's uncontested declaration was sufficient to establish that no genuine issue of material fact existed as to whether copyright infringement occurred at the Long Beach Roscoe's. Because no genuine issue of material fact existed as to whether East Coast and Hudson controlled and derived financial benefit from the infringing performances, the district court properly held that Hudson and East Coast were liable for copyright infringement. Finally, the district court did not abuse its discretion in awarding fees and costs. Accordingly, the judgment was affirmed. View "Range Road Music, Inc., et al. v. East Coast Foods, Inc., et al." on Justia Law

The owner consulted with two architectural firms, T-Peg and VTW. T-Peg drew up a preliminary design then worked with the owner to refine the design. In 2001, T-Peg registered its design with the Copyright Office. Meanwhile, in 2000, the owner showed T-Peg's unregistered preliminary design to VTW, which began working on its own design. VTW completed its plan in 2002 with significant, minutely detailed input from the owner. Completed construction apparently reflected T-Peg's registered design. In a suit for copyright infringement, the court granted summary judgment for VTW and the owner, concluding that no reasonable jury could find that T-Peg's and VTW's designs were substantially similar. The First Circuit reversed and, following trial, the jury found in VTW's favor and rejected T-Peg's infringement claims. VTW sought fees of more than $200,000 under 17 U.S.C. 505. The district court granted VTW a fee award of $35,000. The First Circuit affirmed, finding that the district court adequately elaborated its reasoning. View "T-Peg, Inc. v. VT Timber Works, Inc." on Justia Law

Petitioners are orchestra conductors, musicians, publishers, and others who formerly enjoyed free access to literary and artistic works section 514 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA), 17 U.S.C. 104A, 109(a), removed from the public domain. Petitioners maintained that Congress, in passing section 514, exceeded its authority under the Constitution's Copyright and Patent Clause and violated the First Amendment rights of anyone who previously had access to such works. The Tenth Circuit ruled that section 514 was narrowly tailored to fit the important government aim of protecting U.S. copyright holders' interests abroad. In accord with the judgment of the Tenth Circuit, the Court concluded that section 514 did not transgress constitutional limitations on Congress' authority. The Court held that neither the text of the Copyright and Patent Clause, historical practice, or the Court's precedent excluded application of copyright protection to works in the public domain. The Court also held that nothing in the historical record, subsequent congressional practice, or the Court's jurisprudence warranted exceptional First Amendment solicitude for copyrighted works that were once in the public domain. View "Golan v. Holder" on Justia Law

UMG filed suit against Veoh for direct and secondary copyright infringement where users of Veoh's service have in the past been able, without UMG's authorization, to download videos containing songs for which UMG owned a copyright. The district court granted summary judgment to Veoh after determining that it was protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), 17 U.S.C. 512(c), "safe harbor" limiting service providers' liability for "infringement of copyright by reason of the storage at the direction of a user of material that resides on a system or network controlled or operated by or for the service provider." The court affirmed the district court's determination on summary judgment that Veoh was entitled to section 512(c) safe harbor protection where Veoh met all the section 512(c) requirements. The district court also affirmed the district court's dismissal of the claims of secondary liability against the Investor Defendants. The court further affirmed the district court's determination that, in this case, attorney's fees could not be awarded under Rule 68. The court remanded for the district court to consider in the first instance whether Veoh was entitled to Rule 68 costs excluding attorney's fees. View "UMG Recordings, Inc., et al. v. Shelter Capital Partners LLC, et al." on Justia Law

For about 15 years, defendant owned and operated a business that trained individuals to use the computer-aided design program CATIA, which was developed by plaintiff. Plaintiff owns the copyrights for CATIA software products and has registered the CATIA trademark with the USPTO. Plaintiff sought damages for copyright and trademark infringement, unfair competition, and Michigan Consumer Protection Act violations arising from allegedly unauthorized use of its name and software licenses to operate a for-profit training course. The district court ruled in favor of plaintiff. The Sixth Circuit reversed the district court's refusal to set aside default judgment against defendant, who was pro se, and likely confused rather than engaging in a strategy of delay and who raised a plausible defense. The court upheld the court's grant of plaintiff’s motion for leave to subpoena the FBI, which had seized defendant's computers; the information sought was not protected grand jury information. View "Dassault Systemes, SA v. Childress" on Justia Law

Apple brought this action against Psystar for copyright infringement because Psystar was using Apple's software on Psystar computers. The district court held that Psystar was infringing Apple's federally registered copyrights in its operating software, Mac OS X, because Psystar was copying the software for use in Psystar's computers. Psystar subsequently appealed the district court's rejection of Psystar's copyright misuse defense, the district court's order enjoining Psystar's continuing infringement, and the district court's grant of Apple's motions to seal documents on grounds of maintaining confidentiality. The court held that Psystar's misuse defense failed because it was an attempt to apply the first sale doctrine to a valid licensing agreement. The court affirmed the district court's order enjoining Psystar's continuing infringement and Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), 17 U.S.C. 1203(b)(1), violations and held that the district court properly applied the Supreme Court's four eBay Inc. v MercExchange, L.L.C. factors. The court held, however, that there was no adequate basis on the record to support the sealing of any Apple records on grounds of confidentiality and applied the presumption in favor of access, vacating the district court's sealing orders. View "Apple Inc. v. Psystar Corp." on Justia Law

Pleased with the results of their first collaboration, the author and musician co-authored and recorded a second song. The relationship collapsed and the musician signed as a recording artist with unrelated recording and management companies. Accusations and altercations followed, and the author filed suit, alleging a "novel" claim of copyright infringement against the musician and others for preventing the author from commercially exploiting the two songs through threats contained in cease-and-desist letters and requests to music retailers that the songs not be offered for sale. The district court dismissed for failure to state a claim of copyright infringement. The Sixth Circuit affirmed dismissal of the copyright infringement claim, but reversed dismissal of a declaratory judgment claim. The author's allegation that the musician transferred an interest in the first song, which she did not own, is not the same thing as creating an improper copy of the song and such transfer does not constitute infringement under the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. 106. The cease-and-desist letters on which the declaratory judgment action was based essentially challenge the authorship and ownership of the songs, implicating federal law, so its dismissal as a state law claim was improper. View "Severe Records, LLC, v. Rich" on Justia Law

This case was brought pursuant to the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA), 15 U.S.C. 1125(d)(1) over the registered domain name "gopets.com." The main issue on appeal was whether the term "registration" applied only to the initial registration of the domain name, or whether it also applied to a re-registration of a currently registered domain name by a new registrant. The court concluded that such re-registration was not a "registration" within the meaning of section 1125(d)(1). Therefore, the court held that, because Edward Hise registered gopets.com in 1999, long before GoPets Ltd. registered its service mark, Digital Overture's re-registration and continued ownership of gopets.com did not violate section 1125(d)(1). The court held, however, that the Hises violated the ACPA in registering the additional domains because the Hises acted in bad faith and the court affirmed the district court's award for each of those registrations. The court also affirmed the district court's conclusion that the Hises' use of gopets.com violated the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1051 et seq., and remanded for determination of any relief that the district court might find appropriate for that violation. The court finally vacated the district court's award of attorney's fees and remanded for reconsideration by the district court. View "GoPets Ltd. v. Hise, et al." on Justia Law

Recording companies sought statutory damages and injunctive relief under the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. 101, claiming willful infringement of copyrights of music recordings by using file-sharing software to download and distribute recordings without authorization. The jury found that the infringement was willful and awarded statutory damages of $22,500 for each infringed recording, an award within the statutory range of $750 to $150,000 per infringement. The judge reduced the damages by a factor of ten, reasoning that the award was excessive in violation of defendant's due process rights. The First Circuit affirmed the finding of liability, but reinstated the original damage award. The district court erred in considering the constitutional issue without first addressing defendant's motion for remittitur. The court noted a number of issues concerning application of the Copyright Act that "Congress may wish to examine." View "United Statesl v. Tenenbaum" on Justia Law

In 1979, plaintiff began developing proprietary aircraft maintenance tracking software; it has continually modified the source code for the software. Source code is the original version of a computer program that is written in human-readable words and symbols and must be compiled into machine-readable object code before a computer can read and execute the software. A program in source code format can be modified by a programmer, whereas a program in object code format cannot be easily modified. Plaintiff began licensing the software to defendant in 1986, limited to use in object code format, and registered four versions of the source code with the U.S. Copyright Office in 2003. After discovering unlicensed versions on defendant's computers, plaintiff brought an infringement action. The district court entered summary judgment for defendant. The First Circuit affirmed. Plaintiff, by comparing what was found on defendant's computers to the 2009 version of its source code, did not produce sufficient evidence of "substantial similarity" between the copyrighted material and the allegedly infringing material. View "Airframe Sys., Inc. v. L-3 Commc'n Corp." on Justia Law