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….

Today we’re releasing our newest report, “Captured: Systemic Bias at the U.S. Copyright Office.” This report examines the role of industry capture and the revolving door between the major entertainment industries and the Copyright Office, and the implications that capture has had on the policies the Office embraces. In the report, we investigate how the Copyright Office: Regularly contorts basic…

Brussels, BELGIUM — Today the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) delivered its judgment in the GS Media case (Case C-160/15). The case centered on the question whether hyperlinking to content that has been uploaded illegally constitutes a ‘communication to the public’ which is an exclusive right under EU copyright rules. The case can be considered as a follow-up…

Statewatch recently leaked a draft (PDF) of the European Commission’s Impact Assessment (IA) regarding its proposals to ‘modernise’ copyright in the EU. This leak was followed a few days later by a second: a draft directive mirroring the proposals recommended by the IA. Copyright reform is one part of the Commission’s efforts to develop a Digital Single Market (DSM) for…

Mozilla Campaign Pokes Fun At Europe’s Copyright Directive.The Next Web reports that Mozilla has launched a campaign to stop the EU’s copyright directive by using parody videos to poke fun at the proposal’s most absurd ideas like making the sharing of GIFs and memes illegal. The internet company is also encouraging users to “rebel” by posting selfies in front of…