Rebecca Prince started a gaming channel on YouTube “just for fun” but within two months, she had more than 10,000 subscribers tuning in to get her gaming tips and reactions. Since first starting her own channel in August 2014, Prince has established two popular channels, Instagamrr and Becky Boop, with a combined 50,000 subscribers and 5 million views. As her…

“To make the EU’s single market fit for the digital age”, by “bringing down barriers to unlock online opportunities” was one of the priorities of the current European Commission. This objective would be reached by “improving access to digital goods and services”, creating “an environment where digital networks and services can proposer” and by “ensuring that Europe’s economy, industry and…

Today’s opening of the film Dirty 30 provides the latest example of the Internet helping grow the entertainment industry by providing new talent, distribution channels, and marketing opportunities. The film stars what has been called YouTube’s “Holy Trinity,” Mamrie Hart, Grace Helbig, and Hannah Hart, and it is being released through streaming sites as well as movie theatres. Hannah Hart…

For music copyright enthusiasts, the multimillion-dollar judgment issued in the “Blurred Lines” case was shocking, regardless of which side they take in the copyright debate. In the copyright infringement verdict against artists Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams, a jury found the music duo guilty of copying the “total concept and feel: of Marvin Gaye’s 1977 hit song, “Got to Give…

Last Friday, the federal district court overseeing the BMI consent decree rejected the Department of Justice’s interpretation, holding that it did not prohibit so-called “fractional licensing.” In an opinion with little meaningful analysis, the court dismissed DOJ’s reading of the plain language of the consent decree, calling the consent decree language merely “descriptive.” The following be attributed to Raza Panjwani,…

Today is “International Talk like a Pirate Day.” While it’s a lot of fun to act like a pirate, drink rum and catch up on Errol Flynn movies, piracy is also a serious issue with real economic and legal significance. As electronic devices become an increasingly ubiquitous part of our lives, the content we consume has moved from analog to…

Yesterday, the Songwriters of North America (SONA), a songwriter advocacy group, sued the Department of Justice over its interpretation of the antitrust consent decrees governing ASCAP and BMI, the two largest U.S. performance rights organizations (PROs). The lawsuit alleges that the DoJ has, by simply reading the the words of consent decrees, unconstitutionally seized their property. While heavy on rhetoric,…

Brussels, BELGIUM — The European Commission issued its proposals on Telecoms and Copyright today as part of the Digital Single Market Framework. Both proposals will impact Internet users, online services and more generally, most businesses using the Internet. TELECOM LEGISLATION The European Commission announced a revision of the EU’s telecoms rules that appears to contradict some of the previous goals…

DisCo readers may remember that, last February, my colleagues Matt Schruers and Jakob Kucharczyk explained that Europe’s highest court, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), would have to rule on a case about hyperlinks that could decide the fate of the World Wide Web in Europe. They were not joking around. Well, yesterday the CJEU published its…

Today, Public Knowledge released a report examining the role of regulatory capture—both its sources and its consequences—at the U.S. Copyright Office. You can download the report, “Captured: Systemic Bias at the U.S. Copyright Office,” here. Regulatory capture occurs when a government agency is consistently or repeatedly directed away from the public interest and toward the interests of the regulated industry….