Today, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that copyright holders must consider fair use before sending Digital Millennium Copyright Act takedown notices in Lenz v. Universal. In a suit often called “the dancing baby case,” Universal Music sent a takedown notice to YouTube claiming that Stephanie Lenz’s home video featuring her toddler dancing to a Prince song…

On September 14, 2015, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in Lenz v. Universal Music that “copyright holders must consider fair use before sending a takedown notification, and that failure to do so raises a triable issue as to whether the copyright holder formed a subjective good faith belief that the use was not authorized by law.” This…

  On Wednesday, we filed an amicus brief in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, asking the court to overturn a district court decision for Flo & Eddie against Pandora. Flo & Eddie, the company that owns the rights to The Turtles’ albums, has sued streaming service Pandora, saying that Pandora needed to get a license to play their records….

U.S. Copyright Office Online Registration System Is Working Again. After 9 long days, the U.S. Copyright Office online registration system was up and running again Sunday evening. In Copyright and other Library of Congress computer systems are working again by the Washington Post’s Peggy McGlone on Sept. 8, Library of Congress officials confirmed the news while at the same time…

Online Copyright Registration System Failure Underscores Need For Copyright Office Modernization. The Copyright Office’s online registration system — eCO — has been unexpectedly down for days with no end in sight, according to Politico’s Alex Byers. In the September 1 Copyright Office online system down after technical snafu (subscription required), Byers reports on the shutdown since Sunday evening: “’As result,…

Washington — Following 20 hearings on copyright reform, the House Judiciary Committee could see substantive copyright reform legislation introduced before the end of the year.  In advance of the renewed copyright reform conversation, the Computer & Communications Industry Association, which has testified on the subject, released its latest whitepaper Tuesday “Copyright Reform For a Digital Economy” along with a webinar…

Harry Potter Alliance Of Fan Fiction Activists Joins Re:Create. The Harry Potter Alliance, an activist group that leverages themes from Harry Potter, The Hunger Games and other popular media to encourage social change has joined the Re:Create coalition. As first reported in Politico’s Morning Tech today, “Along with the group’s Fan Works Are Fair Use campaign, Harry Potter Alliance Campaign…

New York Times Magazine In Depth Look At The Creative Economy. Be sure to take time to read the August 19 New York Times Magazine story “The Creative Apocalypse That Wasn’t” by Steven Johnson. In the extensive piece on the digital economy, Johnson focuses on data analysis to answer the question: “How is today’s creative class faring compared with its…

This post is the third installment of #CopyrightwithCourtney, a series from Courtney Duffy on the copyright challenges faced by artists in various disciplines. Courtney, who is the Robert W. Deutsch Arts & Technology Policy Fellow at Public Knowledge, focused on authorship in her first post. In the post below, she continues her three-part series on filmmaking. You can read Part…

When it comes to the nexus between competition and regulation, competition is all too often cursed with fair-weather friends.  For today’s example, we’ll take a trip down the copyright regulation rabbit hole. It begins with a Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) proceeding for setting webcaster rates under a statutory license in Section 114 of the Copyright Act.  The process, called “Web…