 |
MPAA Misleads in Response to ReplayTV Lawsuit |
|
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
Yesterday, as LawMeme noted (ReplayTV Owners Sue Entertainment Oligopoly), the EFF is representing ReplayTV owners in a lawsuit against Hollywood that will seek to declare that skipping commercials is not a crime. Most of the movie studios would not respond to journalists, but the MPAA had the following statement: [via BoingBoing]
This suit is nothing more than a publicity stunt. This complaint mischaracterizes the nature of the case against SonicBlue and ReplayTV. Our lawsuit is against SonicBlue and ReplayTV - not individual users. We have never indicated any desire or intent to bring legal action against individual consumers for use of this device.
SonicBlue and ReplayTV were aware that they were stepping over the line of legality when they made and marketed this device. Any complaint that consumers may have is with SonicBlue and Replay.
This statement is deliberately misleading. It is true that the original lawsuit is not against individual users, but in order to succeed in their lawsuit against SONICblue the Entertainment Oligopoly must claim that consumer's use of ReplayTV is illegal.
Hollywood is claiming that SONICblue is guilty of contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. Hollywood's argument is that SONICblue is not violating copyrights itself, but encouraging and assisting others in doing so. In order to make this argument stick, Hollywood must argue that using ReplayTV is itself a crime. Unsurprisingly, the claim is clear in the original complaint:
Use of the ReplayTV 4000 to copy and distribute plaintiffs’ copyrighted works without authorization is a violation of plaintiffs’ exclusive rights under 17 U.S.C. § 106. Among other things, and without limitation, this conduct amounts to (a) unauthorized reproduction of plaintiffs’ copyrighted works and (b) unauthorized distribution of copies of plaintiffs’ copyrighted works to the public.
Gee, sounds as if consumer use of ReplayTV is illegal, according to the Entertainment Oligopoly.
It doesn't matter if Hollywood intended to sue individual users, they are claiming in court that consumers are violating the law. Moreover, under Sony v. Universal (the Betamax case) a manufacturer of recording devices will only be liable for contributory infringement if the device is not "capable of commercially significant noninfringing uses." In other words, Hollywood must claim that any legitimate uses of ReplayTV are insignificant. In other words, the vast majority of users of ReplayTV are morally impaired criminals.
|
|
 |
| |
 |
Login |
 |
 |
Don't have an account yet? You can create one. As registered user you have some advantages like theme manager, comments configuration and post comments with your name. |
|
 |
 |
Related Links |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
Article Rating |
 |
 |
Average Score: 4.5 Votes: 2

|
|
 |
 |
Options |
 |
"User's Login" | Login/Create an Account | 7 comments |
| The comments are owned by the poster. We aren't responsible for their content. |
|
|
Re: MPAA Misleads in Response to ReplayTV Lawsuit (Score: 0) by Anonymous (Name Withheld on Advice of Counsel) on Friday, June 07 @ 10:02:16 EDT | "there can be no contributory infringement by a defendant without direct infringement by another" - Religious Tech. Ctr. v. Netcom On-Line.
This is an interesting case. Unlike the Felton case, it seems that the ReplayTV owners actually do have standing. And unlike the Napster case, it seems that the ReplayTV owners actually do have a legitimate defense.
Of course, this will be a scary scary world if the EFF actually loses this case (as opposed to only a scary world if the case is thrown out, such as for lack of standing). |
[ Reply to This ]
Re: MPAA Misleads in Response to ReplayTV Lawsuit (Score: 0) by Anonymous (Name Withheld on Advice of Counsel) on Friday, June 07 @ 12:49:49 EDT | In order to have standing for a DJ action the consumers must show they had reasonable apprehension of being sued by MPAA for this copyright infringement (not just that MPAA had stated consumers are infringing MPAA copyrights.)
MPAA's request that SonicBLUE collect data on individual users, coupled with MPAA's claim that individual users violate copyright, may be enough to create a reasonable apprehension of litigation, but it is not the strongest case in the world.
Even if reasonable apprehension were found, a district court still has discretion whether to hear the case, and could toss the suit based on the implicit fact that the sonicblue suit will resolve the legal issues brought by the DJ, such that the DJ plaintiffs will not be harmed by having to wait for the sonicblue suit to be resolved.
I'm not saying I like this outcome, but given the heavy caseload of most district courts, its pretty likely.
|
[ Reply to This ]
Re: MPAA Misleads in Response to ReplayTV Lawsuit (Score: 0) by Anonymous (Name Withheld on Advice of Counsel) on Monday, June 10 @ 12:22:34 EDT | intervenor ?
interpleader ? |
[ Reply to This ]
|
Leges
humanae nascuntur, vivunt, moriuntur
Human laws are born, live, and die
All stories, comments and submissions copyright their respective posters. Everything Else
Copyright (c) 2002 by the Information Society Project.
This material may be distributed only subject to the terms and conditions set
forth in the Open Publication License, v1.0 or later
(the latest version is presently available at http://www.opencontent.org/openpub/).
You can syndicate our news using the file backend.php
|