According to the LasVegasSun.com “the copyright enforcement company Righthaven LLC is now suing individual message-board posters, not just website operators.”
According to the story “Righthaven filed seven infringement lawsuits Tuesday and Wednesday in U.S. District Court for Nevada, lifting its lawsuit total since March to at least 203.”
“Among the defendants sued Monday were message board posters identified as James Higgins and Wayne Hoehn.”
“Higgins, according to Righthaven, posts as Jim_Higgins on a Google Groups message board. Records indicate that on Nov. 21 he posted a Review-Journal column about Transportation Security Administration pat downs of the elderly and disabled at Reno-Tahoe International Airport. The post credited columnist John L. Smith but didn’t credit the Review-Journal, records show.”
“Righthaven said Hoehn posts as “Dogs that Bark” on the website madjacksports.com, where Righthaven says that since 1999 Hoehn has posted about 18,000 items. Among those, the lawsuit says, was an unauthorized copy of a Review-Journal column called “Public employee pensions — we can’t afford them.”
“Whenever there is a direct infringement claim against an individual who is a user or a poster on a ‘service provider,’ as described in the DMCA, a ‘takedown’ notice is not required to file suit,” said Shawn Mangano, a Las Vegas attorney representing Righthaven in the litigation.
“As usual in its lawsuits, Righthaven demands $150,000 in damages from both Higgins and Hoehn.”
Yesterday RightHaven also sued several sites including:
businessinsider.com
yuku.com
americanarchaeologist.com
RightHaven has suits pending against other major sites including the Drudge Report.
So be on notice Righthaven is not only coming after sites but after commentators as well
Its shit like this that really reinforces my decision to move outside the us. Bali may have it’s own third world issues but nobody is getting sued for $150k over some harmless bs they posted on a forum here. How could they possibly prove these damages?
@jp 504(c)(2): “(2) In a case where the copyright owner
sustains the burden of proving, and the court finds, that
infringement was committed willfully, the court in its discretion
may increase the award of statutory damages to a sum of not more
than $150,000.” They don’t have to prove up $150K in damages. When
a figures are written into the statute, they are called “statutory
damages.” The exact number is discretionary with the court. It’s
like the “up to $100k” in the ACPA. The court can award any amount
up to that figure. What happens is that primarily the most
egregious cases tend to make it to a decision, so you typically see
the meter being pegged. I have a suspicion that when IP enforcement
becomes its own racket, we might see some exercise of judicial
discretion in the future. For example a federal judge in
Massachusetts in Sony v. Tenenbaum found that a statutory/actual
damage ration of more than 500:1 was an unconstitutional penalty:
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/infolaw/2010/07/09/tenenbaum-case-finds-copyright-statutory-damages-unconstitutional/
based on reasoning developed in punitive/actual damage cases
generally. Lawyers tend to be pretty good at pushing this stuff to
the breaking point.
Who the hell is paying WrongHaven this money to enforce such a menial article owner’s rights?
Also, did either of these guys make any money off these copied postings, or does it even matter since alleged harm was done by the copying?
Hello Mike,
I guess the CONTENT that domainers and bloggers put out is being noticed AYE! To listen to their front of stage admonishments of the crappy quality of our content you would think they need not bother NOT!
Attoneys know because they are contacted by the RUPERTS and others of the same ilk, trying to figure out how to stop our crappy CONTENT!
Gratefully, Jeff Schneider (Contact Group) / (Metal Tiger)
Hello Mike,
They cannot stem the flow of free speech on the internet. They will have thousands of targets to wear them out. My advice is to keep plugging and feel the fear and do it anyway! Uoh I fear I just violated a trademark !
Next they will start lawsuits for using words to communicate!
Jeff Schneider, (Contact Group) (Metal Tiger)
The main intent is to give credit to the rightful owner, which is what many learned in college. Authors tend to feel the heat too when they borrow content from another author without crediting them as the rightful author.
IMO, the suits demonstrate that failing to credit the original author may have cause them to lose money because they didn’t receive publicity. In any case, a person that writes an article that harms another party, then a company make take action.
When people use “in my opinion,” then that reduces the instance there will be action taken. However, when authors write a story that fails to credit all parties, and they write about issues that may factor into a company losing revenue, then they’re all taking away publicity from the original author(s).
Posters that leave controversial messages, and that mention issues that can harm a business will attract unwanted attention. In my opinion, if you have all your facts in order, credit the right people, and use your own perception with no intent to harm a company, then you shouldn’t worry.
The main intent is to give credit to the rightful owner, which is what many learned in college. Authors tend to feel the heat too, when they borrow content from another author without crediting them as the rightful author.
IMO, the suits demonstrate that failing to credit the original author may have cause them to lose money because they didn’t receive publicity. In any case, a person that writes an article that harms another party (controversial issues), a company make take action.
When people use “in my opinion,” then that reduces the instance there will be action taken. However, when authors write a story that fails to credit all parties, and they write about issues that may factor into a company losing revenue, then they’re taking away publicity from the original author(s).
Posters that leave controversial messages, and that mention issues that can harm a business will attract unwanted attention. In my opinion, if you have all your facts in order, credit the right people, and use your own perception with no intent to harm a company, then you shouldn’t worry.
the lawyers will be happy 🙂
As a writer I can agree that proper credit is always due, but their lawsuit against Anthony Curtis was really a slap in the face: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=131043
In the case of one of the defendants- Colleen Lynn at LynnMedia for dogbites.org- ugh I hope Righthaven sues the kaka out of that lying, fearmongering miscreant. I am sorry she was attacked by a dog. I was also the victim of a dog attack, so I know how scary it is (only in my case the dog was a Great Dane of 175 lbs, and it mauled my face, when I was a young teen). However, this woman takes statistics she did indeed steal from the paper (see Rolling Stones and Oasis and what media infringement is all about) and turns a most incredible and deceitful twist “informing the public” with the information she stole then abuses. One Sun article says she used the information for her website that ” promotes banning the breeding of pit bulls, mandatory spaying and neutering of the dogs, requiring pit bulls to be implanted with microchip identification devices, requiring pit bull owners to carry at least $300,000 in liability insurance and prohibiting felons from owning pit bulls.” Well, ok but that’s where the truthfulness of both stories ends She goes on to INCORRECTLY malign any large breed of dog she feels even LOOKS like a pit bull and spends pages fearmongering making statements like “taking your child to the home of a friend with a Rottweiler puts the child’s life in danger. JUST DON’T DO IT”. Actually more Cocker Spaniels bite children each year than Rottweilers or Pit Bulls but that doesn’t matter to Colleen. Go to your friend’s houses with Dalmatians but watch out for dogs that don’t even have a history of violence! EVERY Rottweiler, pit bull and mastiff breed is now ready to turn Cujo at any second. That’s ok were it just her opinion, but it’s not. It’s presented in such a way as to lead a casual reader to believe her site is an official and expert organization. That’s NOT the worst of it. What is worse is her very nicely designed site has apparently confused googlers that it is also TRUTHFUL and entirely factual, when indeed it does not. I can’t decide if this vengeful beast (Lynn, not the dogs) wants to scare every American in to fearing all dogs larger than 30 pounds (who are less aggressive than dogs under 30 lbs) or if she wants to place so much fear of risk in the hearts and minds of present dog owners that we all run to the pound for a quick gas chambering of our beloved dogs short-haird, short nosed dogs that don’t meet with her biased set of criteria. Her site is NOT a public action site. It is a personal vendetta. While she is spreading fear under the guise of making herself feel better, she’s also stealing to do it. I for one don’t want my befuddled- enough State Representatives quoting from her bog of fabricated bullcrap when considering new or changes to legislation. It’s already happened, and I hope this exposes her as an unscrupulous self server so it doesn’t happen again.
ps- just in case that quote regarding the intent of her site was from the LV Sun… and I’m not sure if she said it, or they said it, but they printed it 😉
If you post an article and comment on it, isn’t that “fair use”?
Rob
Guess that will be decided by the courts
—“takes statistics she did indeed steal from the paper”
Hahaha, you CANNOT steal statistics. She may have taken entire chunks along with statistics but you can’t commit copyright infringement if you say “TheDomains.com did a study that showed that 87% of the online comments are stupid .” I, for the record, have never been at that blog but I hate people that unleash bulldogs in the park as I’m walking and say “Oh, don’t worry, he will not bite you.” Yeah, OK.
—“If you post an article and comment on it, isn’t that “fair use”?”
There’s a whole test for it, IIRC. How much you copy, what part do you copy, is it more than absolutely necessary to make your point, how much do you comment on it etc etc.
But pretty much it’s obvious when it’s infringement…and when it’s not.
Does anyone know for how long are login records (who had this IP at this time) are kept by your ISP? That might rain on their parade, email addresses alone can easily lead to dead ends.
@Kay
“Actually more Cocker Spaniels bite children each year than Rottweilers or Pit Bulls but that doesn’t matter to Colleen.”
I’ve been bitten by both. Trust me, there’s a difference between a Cocker Spaniel and a Pit Bull…
Classic marketing and reputation building strategy: Make noise, a lot of it, and people will notice you and pay you to make noise on their behalf.
Filings cost almost nothing for them, and they get free publicity from thedomains.com and other sites, with the remote but real possibility of actually winning something from the cases.
WIN-WIN situation.