Righthaven LLC v. Democratic Underground, LLC et al

[TalkingDog]

Source: RFC Express

Lawsuit Details ShareThis




RFC Case Number: C-R10-1356D
Court Case Number: 2:10-cv-01356
File Date: Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Plaintiff: Righthaven LLC

Plaintiff Counsel: Joseph C. Chu, Steven A. Gibson, John C. Coons of Righthaven LLC

Defendant: Democratic Underground, LLC
David Allen

Cause: 17:501 Copyright Infringement
Court: Nevada District Court
Judge: Unassigned




Read more: http://www.rfcexpress.com/lawsuit.asp?id=62249

[DoBotherMe]

1. So who's funding the lawsuit?

The Republican Party? I wonder what the complaint is. Dana ; )

[Tempest]

8. A copyright action of some kind

REPORT on the filing or determination of an action or appeal regarding a copyright. Mailed to the Register of Copyrights, Copyright Office.

I wonder what copyright is being contested.

[Phil The Cat]

113. Too Rich! They Sued Free Republic too!

I don't think they are necessarily political, just greedy a$$wipes trying to make money by crushing small to medium websites!

I bet they go running like scared dogs when someone stands up to them!

Crush them like a grape, Skinner!

[sinkingfeeling]

2. Righthaven is a copyright infringement trolling business set up by the owner of

Las Vegas Journal Review.


http://www.techdirt.com/blog.php?company=righthaven&edi...

[Hawkeye-X]

13. I hope that DU decides to countersue and win, and own Righthaven

and shut it down, while at the same time, own R-J

[Dulcinea]

33. Here's a list of victims to date:

http://righthavenvictims.blogspot.com/

[Retrograde]

98. buydogbeds.com?

We're in great company!

Seriously, it looks like they're looking for people they think won't fight back.

[RamboLiberal]

88. Here's List of Newspapers Stephens Media holds

http://www.stephensmedia.com/newspapers /

Most are podunk but might be a handy reference to check before posting.

Now he’s talking expansion. The Review-Journal’s publisher, Stephens Media in Las Vegas, runs over 70 other newspapers in nine states, and Gibson says he already has an agreement to expand his practice to cover those properties. (Stephens Media declined comment, and referred inquiries to Gibson.) Hundreds of lawsuits, he says, are already in the works by year’s end. “We perceive there to be millions, if not billions, of infringements out there,” he says.

http://onlygunsandmoney.blogspot.com/2010/07/stephens-m...

[RamboLiberal]

89. Publisher Sued For Reposting Article Based On His Own Research

Copyright enforcement outfit Righthaven has filed some questionable lawsuits in the past, but really outdid itself in a case against Anthony Curtis, publisher of the Las Vegas Advisor.

That lawsuit, one of several filed on Friday, alleges that Curtis infringed copyright by reposting an article from the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Problem is, that article was itself based on an annual survey conducted by Curtis of ticket prices for entertainment shows.

Yes, Curtis went to the trouble of fielding a survey and then shared his findings with the newspaper, only to find himself sued for posting portions of the ensuing article on his own blog.

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.show...

[Downwinder]

96. They own my local paper, I'll cancel. n/t

[MoonGlow]

127. Good link

[onehandle]

3. Read this ---> RightHaven Ramping Up Its Copyright Trolling Business.

We've written a couple of times about RightHaven, the new operation set up by the publisher of the Las Vegas Journal Review to shakedown any site that reposts its stories. There were some oddities in the way RightHaven was acting, starting with the fact that it gives no warning to sites and doesn't send a DMCA takedown. It goes straight to suing... and then quickly demands a settlement fee. Of course, most of the sites its suing aren't competitors to the LVJR at all. In fact, they're usually organizations or people written about by the newspaper, who want to post the publicity -- with links back to the original -- on their own sites. In many cases, it would seem that they have pretty strong fair use claims, but fighting a copyright infringement lawsuit in federal court is expensive, which is exactly what RightHaven is counting on.

Wired is now running a profile of Righthaven, where the company's CEO (who was or is the general counsel for LVJR) is pretty upfront that this has nothing, whatsoever, to do with stopping infringement. It's entirely a way to squeeze money out of people. And he's rapidly expanding. Apparently, he's filing new lawsuits every day, and the publisher of the LVJR has given him the right to sue on behalf of other newspapers he publishes, while they look to sign up other publishers as well. This is, clearly, a blatant abuse of copyright law, and not at all what the law intended to do. Between this and the shenanigans of US Copyright Group, is it really too much to ask that the courts or Congress recognize that copyright law is being blatantly abused in a quasi-shakedown system?

Along those lines, JC was the first of a few of you to point to a blogger who was just sued by Righthaven. Because of this, the blogger has taken down their entire blog, because it now represents too big a liability. Again, this is not what copyright law is supposed to be for.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100722/03152710320.s...

[Ian David]

32. The answer is an internet-wide cleansing of any and all links to LVJR.

Obviously, The Las Vegas Journal Review doesn't play well with others and doesn't believe in the internet.

It is time for the internet to stop beliving in The Las Vegas Journal Review.

Let's urge all webmasters, bloggers and new publishers to expunge any references and links to, or excerpts from, The Las Vegas Journal Review.

In other words, scrub them from the internet, including the Google cache and the Internet Archive history.

It will be as if they never existed.

The only way to find them will be to Google them, and there will be only one search result-- their own webpage.

[Sapphocrat]

84. I just did...

...partly because they should be isolated until the whole stinking operation goes under, and partly because I don't want to be targeted for quoting even one word.

I had linked to the LVR-J five or six times on two Web sites over the past seven years (NO posting of full articles, mind you), so searched all my sites, and wiped out all the links (replacing them with "Link deleted, because we won't link to the LVR-J any longer").

That was the easy (if time-consuming) part -- and this is the part my fellow Webmasters may want to heed (warning: geek talk coming):

To remove a page from Google's cache, you'll need to 1) add a "noarchive" meta tag to your head tags, 2) claim your Web site with Google, and then 3) put in a request for each page whose URL you want removed.

Easier than it sounds:

http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?...

(It would seem worth it to check Yahoo's caches, too, but then, one can't hunt down cached copies from every single search engine on the Web -- and since a large number of search engines pick up their results from Google, I believe the caches elsewhere will disappear not long after they're removed from Google.)

I have no idea how Bing handles its caches -- the site is not helpful. (Does anyone know?)

Webmasters may also want to check The Wayback Machine -- http://www.archive.org/web/web.php -- to see if any "offending" pages have been archived there.

It's simple to block archives from Wayback with robots.txt (although you may end up blocking access to the entire site instead of just a page):

http://www.archive.org/about/exclude.php

[Downwinder]

100. Have they served any of the search engines?

Perhaps their links should be removed from the index sites.

[cosmicone]

104. Of course not ... they won't attack anything that can furiously bite back.

They pick soft targets.

[Downwinder]

106. Napster was an index engine.

Based on the Napster decision there should not be any Copyrighted material on the index sites.

The Web Site Administrator has control over what documents and directories are available to the search bots. If he allows the indexing of Copyrighted material, it should absolve the Copyright.

[Sapphocrat]

110. Not that I'm aware of.

What cosmicone said -- they're not going after anybody who has the money or the means to beat them. (I'd like to see them go up against News Corporation and their lawyers!)

The little guys have been giving in and scrambling to raise settlements of $4K-$5K (even though the standard demand has been $75K + forfeiture of domain names -- can you imagine that punk getting hold of democraticunderground.com?!*) -- although the owner of a Second Amendment site has started contacting up other defendants in an attempt to fight back en masse.

IANAL, but one of the more interesting arguments I've heard is: These moneygrubbers did not obtain the copyrights to any of the material until after they discovered it reproduced elsewhere (and some of this stuff has been online for up to six years). Might help. Don't know.

There's a Las Vegas law firm taking them on, and inviting defendants to contact them.

If nothing else, this might have a positive end result: some sort of legislative action. Copyright law was never meant to be misused in this way.

And if there was ever an issue both sides of the aisle could agree on, it's this one -- and not because they're bullying left and right sites alike, but because this is the epitome of "frivolous lawsuits" that right-wingers complain are clogging our courts.

Not that they can't win -- but they shouldn't win like this.



* Doubtful, however, as long as DU is considered a "safe harbor" -- which entails registering with the fed as such, and which absolves DU of anything a DUer might post. Theoretically, anyway.

[kestrel91316]

125. [phone] 000. And I for one will NEVER go to their website again.

I have never linked to them on my blog because they don't write anything intelligent that pertains to my blog, but I certainly never will.

SHUN THEM.

[Downwinder]

126. Might be beneficial to check the list of subsidiaries linked in post 88.

[Blue_Tires]

45. so it's a shakedown, plain and simple...

what a bunch of assclowns...

FFS -- this is the ONE time I wish the dark forces at 4chan would exact some innernette vigilante justice...

[Uncle Joe]

66. I wonder if they're tied to organized crime?

The M.O. seems to be extortion based.

[movonne]

4. What's this all about????

[sinkingfeeling]

5. Somebody posted something from one of the papers represented by Righthaven. Could have been the

Las Vegas Journal or one of the Stephens' papers or some other. Follow the links above and read what is going on.

[Turborama]

48. I'm getting told I have to pay to read anything on there...

http://www.rfcexpress.com/lawsuit-documents.asp?id=6227...

[sinkingfeeling]

62. The link in post #2 or #3.

[Turborama]

65. Thanks, found it.

I'm paranoid about posting the actual link to the news story I found now.

[Downwinder]

6. Who is included in the et al?

I don't consider a link to for pay site to be a service.

I have been recognized as a pauper by SCOTUS.

[sixmile]

7. From Vegas Sun yesterday

http://m.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/aug/10/5-more-websit... /

'Righthaven, which has now filed 96 copyright infringement lawsuits since March, also sued on Monday:

--Fred Pruitt, who has a website called www.rantburg.com . That site allegedly displayed a July 9 R-J editorial about President Obama visiting Las Vegas called "Welcome back, Mr. President. Your economic policies suck."

Court records show a website user, "Beavis," posted the editorial at www.rantburg.com .

--Dan Cirucci, a Pennsylvania and New Jersey public relations executive, was sued for posting the same "Welcome back, Mr. President" editorial. Cirucci on his website says he's the former president of the Philadelphia Public Relations Association.

Court records indicate that in posting the editorial to his website, Cirucci commended the Review-Journal, writing: "If only newspapers in places like Philadelphia and Boston would have the good, decent, common sense to run an editorial like this. Still, it's nice to discover that newspapers in some big cities know how to hit the mark, editorially speaking."

--Stephen Meenehan, whom Righthaven says is the registrant of the Internet domain name www.informationliberation.com . That website allegedly displayed under its "tyranny/police state" category a June 14 R-J story and an R-J photo about a man who was shot and killed by a Las Vegas police detective serving a drug warrant. The R-J was credited as the source of the story and photo, court records show.

--Thomas DiBiase, whom Righthaven says is the owner of the www.nobodycases.com website. That site allegedly displayed a June 11 R-J story about a retired teacher receiving the death penalty for killing his wife. The victim's body was never recovered, but her DNA was found in a Las Vegas hotel room, the story says. Records indicate the story posted on DiBiase's website credited the R-J.'

Above text copyright Las Vegas Sun, etc. and so on...

[SpankMe]

28. Ninety-six lawsuits?

Google "abuse of process". These turkeys need to be taken down.

[notesdev]

99. "Vexatious litigation"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexatious_litigation

disbar the m-fer

[mzmolly]

36. Isn't the right wing supposed to be opposed to frivolous law suits?

Seems they only whine when someone wealthy is a "victim".

[davidinalameda]

86. they sued the freepers last month

not sure if they're right wing

[xultar]

9. Fuckers. Assholes. Bastards. Pricks.

[DoBotherMe]

11. What she said!

Dana ; )

[SkyDaddy7]

59. YOU GO GIRL!

How are your dogs doing? My 3 Chihuahuas are sitting right here next to me enjoying DU!


Talk to you later!

[xultar]

81. My kids are fine. I only go home every other weekend now though so I miss them

something terrible.

[JCMach1]

10. Crap any 'real' chance of a cease and desist order (i.e. shuttering)

by the judge...?

[Freddie Stubbs]

12. They don't care about cease and desist, they just want $$$

[comtec]

14. they dont have to win, just cost skinner money

so he will be forced to shut down DU

standard corporate tactic, microsoft uses it to great effect.

sue a company you dont like, draw out the litigation, and shut that company down because they cant afford ti fight anymore.

and unless skinner can counter sue after winning for frivolous lawsuit, there goes DU

[Hawkeye-X]

17. DU can very well countersue to get $$ back - I will contribute for a legal fund

or demand a bond to pay for the lawsuit in case Righthaven loses.

I just wish these lawsuits would come with a hefty bond to ensure that the opposing party gets paid if Righthaven loses.

And they will lose, big.

[Xithras]

25. What makes you think they'll lose?

Free Republic lost a million bucks to a lawsuit just like this one, and the LAT was just demanding money. These guys routinely try to shut infringing sites down.

If they can prove copyright violation, they'll win. As a test, I just opened the top 10 threads in LBN right now. All 10 would fail a Fair Use test in court. All are actionable copyright violations.

Just because it happens regularly, in sites all across the Internet, doesn't make it legal. If they can prove a violation of their copyright, they'll win.

Free Republic tried the "everyone does it" and "we only excerpt a couple of paragraphs" arguments in its defense against the LAT. The judge ruled, correctly, that neither argument is a defense against a copyright lawsuit. American law provides no such exceptions.

[DeSwiss]

64. As a test, I just opened the top 10 threads in LBN right now.

"All 10 would fail a Fair Use test in court. All are actionable copyright violations."


I pulled up the top ten posts and I don't believe that that's true. I found only one that might be questionable (meaning that it wasn't clear that it is a "fair use" by having no more than 4 or 5 paragraphs from the article. But that's as I understand fair use. Likewise, since Righhaven hasn't followed correct procedures under the copyright law by notifying anyone of a copyright infringement and issuing a takedown order then I don't think they have a case. Not to mention whether they even have standing to sue at all.

Although that's my take on it -- but since I'm not a copyright judge my opinion wouldn't count anyway. But if you can, please tell me what you found wrong with them, because I really can't see a copyright violation here.

on edit: spelling

[Xithras]

67. Actually, excerpting even a single paragraph can be infringement.

There is this urban myth on the Internet that excerpting only a couple of paragraphs is "Fair Use", and I certainly agree that it's fair, but legally there is NO distinction between excerpting a single paragraph and excerpting entire articles.

The actual Fair Use exceptions, as enshrined by law, permit the re-use of copyrighted work if you are including as part of a larger commentary, for educational purposes (within an actual classroom), or for criticism. You cannot simply copy four paragraphs and toss in a single sentence of commentary...the proportion of the excerpted work compared to the size of the excerpting article is just as important. Four paragraphs of excerpts in an original 30 paragraph political essay will probably be construed as fair use. A four paragraph excerpt followed by one or two sentences of commentary does NOT fall under the legal definition of fair use. If the value of YOUR post is primarily derived from the information in the excerpt, you are violating copyright. If your post has merit and informational value on its own, and the excerpts are simply for reference or to reinforce your point, then you have a fair use exception.

The assumption that excerpting only three or four paragraphs, without substantial additional commentary, is "fair use" is based on the legal concept of "de minimis", and was the legal foundation for other fair use arguments including musical sampling. Sadly, the courts have ruled that de minimis is really not a legal defense against these kinds of suits ( Bridgeport Music, Inc. v. Dimension Films, Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enters, Grand Upright Music, Ltd. v. Warner Bros. Records, Inc). Excerpting even a one second audio track, or one paragraph of a publication, is sufficient to trigger damages if the excerpted material adds substantial value to the new work, or the new work lacks any substantial value of its own.

I just re-checked those top 10 again. Not counting this thread, only ONE of the first 10 articles had enough original information to make a valid fair use argument. The rest are all infringing on someones copyright.

[DeSwiss]

77. Thank you. ;-) n/t

[JCMach1]

79. Replies to posts can also be construed as criticism and commentary...

[MineralMan]

54. Righthaven won't lose.

A case like this cost Free Republic a pile. If the copyright-protected material appears on the site without permission, the site loses. There's not really a good defense. And if you think there are not entire news articles posted here, despite the rule about excerpting, you haven't been looking very hard. I see them every day. Hereafter, though, I'll alert on every one of them. I want DU to survive and thrive.

The free ride on other people's writing is about to come to an end. This is just the beginning. I guarantee it.

[sabrina 1]

78. Bullshit, this discussion is an old one and has been resolved

on many blogs with the advice of attorneys. Most linked articles BENEFIT advertisers. When someone uses an excerpt with a link and people go to that link, which is required for fair use, then that publication and their advertisers benefit. It is the equivalent of free advertising and no one in their right mind will kill that kind of revenue. Everyone WANTS to be linked to so long as they are given credit for their work.

Linking is currency online and it will never go away. Every once in a while there will be scumbags like this doing the equivalent of attempted highway robbery.

It's doubtful they will prevail, because they skipped the first step in a copyright case. They never asked that the material be removed. That generally settles the matter. They're going to look foolish when they get to court and cannot point to the 'evidence' since most people will have removed that material. End of story. The courts don't like having their time wasted when there is a simple solution.

See what just happened to Orly Taitz for her constant filing of lawsuits, and she's not the first.

So alert all you want, and join the would-be censors of the internet, or join the fight against them. Me, I'll choose the latter. No wonder wonder Americans get stepped all over all the time. At the first sign of a fight they are ready to

1) Inform on their fellow Americans and
2) Run for the hills and leave everything for the bullies.

[OmahaBlueDog]

122. Could you please define "cost Free Republic a pile" ?

Thanks!

[New Dawn]

108. Just don't settle with those fucking thieves.

They are a threat to the entire Internet.

[Xithras]

15. All RightHaven suits demand shutdown of the target sites.

They even demand that ownership of the domain name be handed over to them. I don't know if they've done that in the DU suit, but I've read papers on three of their other suits and it seems to be SOP for them.

[Xithras]

19. deleted

wrong spot

[Freddie Stubbs]

47. They may demand shutdowns, but have they actually gotten that?

[Xithras]

53. Yes, through settlements.

Most people sued by them simply settle, and their standard settlement offer is $70,000 and ownership of the domain name. Most blogs and websites, when faced with huge potential losses, simply throw in the towel and agree to those terms.

[Freddie Stubbs]

56. DU's domain name is probably worth a lot more than these smaller websites

I doubt that they would give it up without a fight.

[Hawkeye-X]

16. Also, 96 lawsuits from Righthaven with the purpose of "settling" for $$

is called extortion and the Feds needs to get involved since it does involve interstate commerce clause.

Righthaven needs to be countersued, and show that it's in violation of every US law imaginable, including extortion, threats, barratry and being a vexatious litigant.

[MineralMan]

18. This should be a growing concern for websites like DU and others

where copyright material is commonly posted. Even though it's pretty common practice to post things like images, and news stories, it's actionable, if the copyright holder wants to push it. Copyright law is pretty simple, really. If you hold the copyright in some intellectual property, it is your right to control its publication, whether for money or otherwise.

It's expensive to sue about it, but can be ruinous for places that get sued. This outfit is trolling the internet for its clients, looking for stuff under copyright that falls under the ownership of its clients. They can make big money getting settlements from those who have the material on their sites but who cannot afford the cost of defending themselves.

Lots of people treat this stuff as a joke, but it's not a joke. It can take a site down faster than almost anything there is.

DU, like most forums, is full of copyright materials that are being used without the permission of the copyright holder. An example is the use of Tom Tomorrow cartoons, which appear here all the time. There's a copyright notice on every cartoon, just as there are on almost all political cartoons. Now, the creator of Tom Tomorrow may not care if his cartoons are posted all over the internet, but his site has a page where you can contact him for reprint rights, and he charges for them.

It's a risky thing to post copyright-protected material without permission. It's also very, very hard to police on a site as large as DU.

Those of you who think Skinner doesn't care should take a glance at the rules again, and at the alert page, which lists "Copyright Violation" as one of the reasons to alert. It's worth thinking about.

[okieinpain]

71. so you can post the title and url, just leave out the actual story. n/t.

[MineralMan]

92. Yes. Titles are generally not protected, and anyone may post

a link to any website.

[okieinpain]

119. thanks. n/t.

[PJPhreak]

20. Hey Skinner...

Is it possible for you to comment on this yet?

This is the place I go for my daily news fix,I surely don't wanna lose DU.

And How can We Help?

[struggle4progress]

43. I sincerely hope The Admins talk carefully with their lawyers before uttering a peep

[PJPhreak]

109. I hope so too!

Thats why I asked "IF" they could comment.

[Xithras]

21. Much of this is traceable back to LA Times vs. Free Republic

The court found that websites are liable if they knowingly permit people to post copyrighted material without permission. The "two or three paragraph" rule doesn't actually carry any force of law. A single paragraph excerpted from a CNN article, and posted without sufficient additional editorial to qualify it as Fair Use, is sufficient to trigger a copyright lawsuit.

Under the Fair Use doctrines, you may only excerpt copyrighted content if the excerpt is included in a larger work, such as a criticism or editorial. A two paragraph excerpt followed by a one or two sentence comment is going to fail the Fair Use test in court every time. Unfortunately, most people don't understand how Fair Use actually works, and this law is violated here on DU every single day.

By the way, I looked it up...RightHaven is suing the Freepers right now for the very same thing.

[sixmile]

22. Sounds like the end of much of the Internet!

The sharing of information across many web sites is the marrow of the net!

[MineralMan]

27. Yes. The internet has ignored copyright law since it began. The

crap's about to hit the fan, though. Time to start thinking about what's being posted on your blog or site. If you didn't create it, someone else did, and they automatically have protection under the copyright laws. Post something that's identified at the original source as copyright-protected, and you have no viable defense, either. Even if you copied it from a secondary source, it's easy to demonstrate that you didn't do your due diligence.

If you didn't create it, it belongs to someone else. Get ready for an onslaught, since lawyers, like everyone else, is hurting for money these days. It could get very ugly.

[Lightning Count]

42. Next thing you know they'll be saying that downloading music for free is a crime. nt

[Shining Jack]

115. Next thing you know...

Someone will copyright every letter of the alphabet.

SJ 2010 ©

[Buns_of_Fire]

120. Speaking thereof,, my lawyers will be in contact with you about your frivolous use of the letter

Not to mention the letter "A". Dammit, I paid good money for the vowels, why should YOU get to use them for free?


(Uhhh... j/k as if you needed that. It's so durned hard to tell these days when I should and when I needn't.)

[Shining Jack]

124. Lol !

[Xithras]

30. Actually, that's not quite true.

The excerpting and republishing of information from websites is really a phenomena of the last decade or so. While there may be citeable examples of it happening earlier, the practice really didn't take hold until Free Republic started doing it (yeah yeah, like it or not, FR was the first major political discussion board on the Internet, so they started a lot of the practices that even WE use today). The practice spread from political sites, onto blogs, and eventually the Internet in general.

I've been an Internet user since 1988, wasted untold hours on Usenet discussions before WebbBB's became popular, and then haunted many discussion boards back in the mid and late 90's. Back then, SOP was to post your commentary and then a link to the site you were reading. It was fairly rare for someone to excerpt more than a couple of sentences.

A good example of an old site that still uses the older method of linking to the source rather than duplicating it is Slashdot.

So, no, I don't think it will kill the Internet.

[MineralMan]

52. Actually, I remember very well the whole thing being a big issue

on the forums on Compuserve, predating the wide use of the internet by several years. Compuserve simply prohibited any posting of copyright-protected material and moderated heavily. They knew the risks at the time. The sheer size of the internet has inhibited copyright cases so far, but that's about to end.

The discussion and link is the safest thing, as you say. It's also pretty easy to say, in general, what was said in the material, without using any of the material, then comment on that. It's a little more work, though, and that doesn't appeal to lots of people, who find it dead easy to just drag, copy, and paste. Even despite the rules here about excerpting, I frequently see wholesale copy and paste posts here, often with zero commentary at all, and sometimes without even a link or source information. It's lazy and irresponsible, in my opinion.

You're right. It won't kill the internet. It will just force people to do things the right way. That's not so hard, and might actually improve the level of discussion if people couldn't just copy and paste their way into discussions. Of course, I write quickly, so it's no big deal to me. It might be more difficult for some. I don't know.

[Xithras]

63. Ah yes, I forgot about those. LBN on DU is an issue though.

I was a DosCIM user for years, and I do remember those. Most of the articles they were posting were out of more conventional publications, though, or were taken from other parts of the CServe network itself. I wasn't an AOL user, but I do know that the old pre-Internet AOL boards had similar problems as well. Heavy moderating was the only way to stamp it out.

As for examples here, one merely needs to look to LBN to see enough copyright violations to make any IP lawyer jump for joy (a new boat!) The rules in LBN essentially require that the news be from an outside (e.g. copyrighted) source, and that the poster not insert"opinion pieces, editorials, frivolous items, or other stories that are not news." Because Fair Use only covers the republishing of copyrighted material as part of a larger work or criticism, the rules all but prohibit the posting of material that IS legal under copyright law. If you were to properly reword the article and insert sufficient commentary to avoid an IP violation, most of the mods would move the article to GD because the posted commentary would no longer match the article you are linking to. The entire system is set up to not only facilitate and encourage copyright infringement, but to essentially require it.

My prediction: Big cash settlement and a change in DU rules.

[MineralMan]

68. I wouldn't make a prediction at all, except in general.

I suspect that every forum is about to start thinking about how they deal with material from commercial sources. Links will be safe, I have no doubt. As far as I'm concerned a link with a paraphrase of what the article is about and the conclusion it draws is the best approach. I know that's more difficult than just copying and pasting, but it's safe.

You may notice that news aggregators like the evil World Net Daily, rewrite their stories completely from legitimate news sources. That lets them trim and manipulate and insert their own bias into the news. They're actually very good at it, and it lets them steal the work of others without any legal risk.

Ideas can't be protected by copyright. So, anyone can read a news article and rewrite the facts in their own words with complete impunity. Only the actual words of written material can be protected. If this were not so, places like WND would have to gather their own news directly, rather than letting others do that, then simply taking the information and re-writing it in their own, distorted words.

They know what they can and can't do. Individual posters on internet discussion forums often don't have that capability, so a lot of what we read on forums, particularly in OPs, is simply copied and pasted. What follows is commentary, so, the issue gets all cloudy and difficult.

I do expect rules to change all over the web. Some forums will simply shut down, because the kind of moderation that will be required will just be too tough for volunteer moderators. Others will implement filters of some kind. Others will do the actual moderation. Some will educate their members to do things in a safe way.

As I said, it's going to be a strange period for a while. As for myself, I'm shifting 100% to OPs that use paraphrase and links when I'm posting news items. That's safe. Something like this:

"At the Washington Times, they're saying that Obama's trying to change the USA into a socialist nation with his Health Care Reform. Check out what the so-called journalists over there wrote: Link"

Absolutely safe. The reader can click the link and read their content on their website, then come back and comment. This is where it's going to end up going, I think.

[MineralMan]

24. Yes, but it goes back further than that.

This is a tried-and-true money-maker, and copyright infringement settlements have been around since there was copyright. The internet has had only a few well-publicized cases, but there have been many, many more that have caused websites to close their doors or go bankrupt.

It's never a joke. It's not a laughing matter. It's serious business. I'm very concerned with all the posting of copyright-protected political cartoons without permission. Those cartoonists make crap for money already and, one of these days, one of them is going to figure out just how much money they can pull in by going after use without permission on political websites. Then, once the word gets out that someone made a lot of money this way, they'll all go for it.

Copyright law includes the internet. It's risky to use copyright-protected material on any site without permission. That's why there's a rule against it here on DU, and the Alert button will show "copyright violation" as one of its choices. Now that DU has been sued, you can expect a lot more enforcement of that. It's not funny.

[Turborama]

60. Couldn't it be argued that all the subsequent on topic comments in a thread add up to an editorial?

I know it's a stretch but it doesn't sound that far fetched if it's essentially adding additional material to the original piece...

[Sebastian Doyle]

23. These guys are equal opportunity vultures

They went after RimJob too. http://www.the-peoples-forum.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?Ar...

[Jamastiene]

26. Oh shit!

[Jamastiene]

29. Does anyone know what copyrigts they are claiming were violated?

[Ian David]

31. See also: Righthaven LLC v. Free Republic, LLC et al

Righthaven LLC v. Free Republic, LLC et al

FC Case Number: C-R10-1194F
Court Case Number: 2:10-cv-01194-LDG-RJJ
File Date: Monday, July 19, 2010
Plaintiff: Righthaven LLC
Plaintiff Counsel: Joseph C. Chu, Steven A. Gibson, John C. Coons of Righthaven LLC
Defendant: Free Republic, LLC
James C. Robinson
John Robinson
Cause: 17:501 Copyright Infringement
Court: Nevada District Court
Judge: Judge Lloyd D. George
Referred To: Magistrate Judge Robert J. Johnston

More:
http://www.rfcexpress.com/lawsuit.asp?id=61293

Maybe if we counter-sue, we can ask Free Republic to enjoin us?

[unblock]

34. class. action. countersuit.

[MineralMan]

55. Won't work. The copyright violations exist. They're everywhere.

And not just here. Free Republic lost a big suit over this kind of issue. If the material appears on the site, the site will almost always lose. Everyone's just been coasting so far, but the economy has a lot of lawyers out looking for money-making work.

[unblock]

75. i think it's different when you sue first and ask questions later.

properly, you find a copyright violation at one website. you ask them nicely to remove. if they fail to comply you ask them firmly and threaten to sue. if they fail again, after you've given AT LEAST this much warning, then and only then you sue.

if you sue 96 companies without saying boo first, that's a different matter because it shows clearly that you're not even trying to achieve any kind of resolution.


moreover, democraticunderground has what i think is a reasonable defense, namely, that they can't possibly PREVENT postings its members that violate copyrights, but that it has a responsible mechanism (the alert feature) that calls moderators' attention to an offending post, and a strong track record of removing copyright-violating posts quickly after an alert.

as far as we know, no one from the plaintiff's company logged on and alerted any offending post. to me, it's pretty damning if they didn't even avail themselves of a free and easy way to make the problem go away, nevermind if they didn't send a warning letter.

[Jefferson23]

35. Righthaven filed a lawsuit against FreeRepublic too, as others have

mentioned, the lawsuits are rampant.

http://www.the-peoples-forum.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?Ar...

On edit to add:

Righthaven LLC v. NORML
NOTE: The information and commentary contained in this database entry are based on court filings and other informational sources that may contain unproven allegations made by the parties. The truthfulness and accuracy of such information is likely to be in dispute.
Posted March 24th, 2010 by CMLP Staff
SummaryThreat Type: Lawsuit Date: 03/15/2010
Status: Pending Location: Nevada
Disposition: Verdict/Settlement Amount: n/a
Legal Claims: Copyright Infringement
Righthaven LLC, a Las Vegas company associated with Las Vegas Review-Journal owner Stephens Media LLC, filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) on March 15, 2010. The complaint,... read full description

PartiesParty Issuing Legal Threat: Party Receiving Legal Threat:
Righthaven LLC National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws
Type of Party: Type of Party:
Organization Organization
Location of Party: Location of Party:
Nevada District of Columbia
Legal Counsel: Legal Counsel:
Steven A. Gibson, Jodi Donetta Lowry, J. Charles Coons

http://www.citmedialaw.org/threats/righthaven-llc-v-nor...

[Hepburn]

37. Why is this filed in NV???

[Brother Buzz]

70. The Las Vegas Journal Review is published in Neveda?

[Hepburn]

102. Yeah, but the issue is jurisdiction over the defendant...not the plaintiff.

I see a transfer motion in the future.

[Jefferson23]

38. Some targets of Righthaven lawsuits fighting back

The Righthaven lawsuits filed in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas at first glance seem pretty simple: They show bloggers, nonprofits and generally small-time websites around North America for years have been cutting and pasting entire Las Vegas Review-Journal stories on to their websites without authorization.

That seems like obvious copyright infringement. But, as defendants with and without attorneys fight back in some of the cases, Righthaven’s claims don’t appear to be so cut and dried.

The defense attorneys and some defendants without attorneys are making complex legal arguments about whether the Nevada court has jurisdiction over the out-of-state defendants, whether Righthaven itself has standing to sue and whether Righthaven failed to follow the law in filing no-warning lawsuits rather than first sending requests or takedown orders to the infringing websites.

“What makes this action frivolous is the baseless allegations pertaining to the existence of personal jurisdiction over me, when it should have been crystal clear to Righthaven that I am not amenable to suit in Nevada. The complaint is replete with false averments in an attempt to mislead the court, which is a blatant abuse of process,” said Dean Mostofi, who was sued after an R-J story about a lawyer being reprimanded allegedly was posted on his website deanmostofi.com

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/aug/04/some-target...

[Hepburn]

39. Interesting Info:

http://onlygunsandmoney.blogspot.com/2010/07/stephens-m...

[madinmaryland]

57. Interesting. So this "firm" goes out and buys the copyrights to various articals and

media firms and then sues people/blogs that are posting the articles on the internets.

Very odd business venture.

[Blue_Tires]

61. The only things missing from his 'business venture' is a sharkskin suit,

brass knuckles and a thompson hidden in a violin case...

[CreekDog]

82. RIP: Capitalism

[Jefferson23]

40. Nevada Democratic Party hit with R-J copyright lawsuit

The Democratic Party of Nevada was sued for copyright infringement Friday after Las Vegas Review-Journal stories allegedly were posted on its website without authorization this spring.

The party was sued in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas by Righthaven LLC, a company that has partnered with the R-J to sue website owners over what the R-J calls copyright theft.

The suit against the party was one of at least three suits filed Friday by Righthaven, which since March has sued at least 64 website operators.

A request for comment was placed with the Democrats, who have been busy the past two days with President Barack Obama in town.


http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/jul/09/nevada-demo...

[mahatmakanejeeves]

41. I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords.

Some targets of Righthaven lawsuits fighting back

[TygrBright]

76. Holey Moley, did you see the picture of that sleazeball in the news story you linked to?

Dang, that is a picture of a total waste of skin. I had to shower just after looking at it through a computer screen. EEEEEEEEEEYEW.

However, something tells me that this is not going to end well for Stibson. He is pissing off way, WAY too many people. And some of the people he is pissing off have bigger metaphorical and political guns than he has. And some, I'm pretty sure have way more of the non-metaphorical type.

I would not want to write an insurance policy on the, uh.... hmmm... can't call it a "guy" 'cause it ain't human.... umm... "individual," I guess.

amazedly,
Bright

[struggle4progress]

44. Publisher Sued For Reposting Article Based On His Own Research (June)

by Wendy Davis, Monday, June 28, 2010, 5:15 PM

... Anthony Curtis, publisher of the Las Vegas Advisor ... went to the trouble of fielding a survey and then shared his findings with the newspaper, only to find himself sued for posting portions of the ensuing article on his own blog.

Just for added irony, the original Las Vegas Review-Journal piece about the survey described Curtis's annual undertaking as a "thankless task" ...

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.show...

[Blue_Tires]

58. Now that's just over-the-top...

holy shit...

[berni_mccoy]

46. They're suing FreeRepublic too:

http://righthavenvictims.blogspot.com /

Scroll down to July.

[msanthrope]

49. One can only hope the the gods of Internet vengeance--4chan--awaken. n/t

[Junkdrawer]

50. Well, people have cited that "newspaper" often....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/searchresults.html...

Looks like a lucrative business model. Hey - get my secretary on the phone...

[rug]

51. It's all pampango's fault.

[nuxvomica]

69. Don't they need to show due diligence in preventing copying?

They could just disable cut-and-paste on their text, like Authonomy.com does. Otherwise, have they really made an adequate effort to prevent use of the property?

[Xithras]

72. You're thinking about trademark, and not copyrights

Trademark laws require that the holders practice due diligence in suing violators. That's why Hormel occasionally sues companies selling anti-spam software. They don't actually care about junk email, but they have to maintain a history of defending their trademark, or every meat packer under the sun will start calling their canned meat "Spam". In the U.S., copyright is automatic, and lasts for 95 years from publication or 120 years from creation, whichever is shorter.

[okieinpain]

73. checking out some of the links on the stop righheaven facebook

page and followed one about a connection between the owner of rightheaven and president obama.

http://www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message1144773...

president obama has to be the most hated person in america. either he's not doing enough or he's plotting to destroy america with the socialist or terrorist of the world.

[greiner3]

80. WTF?

That's almost as bad as falling into freeperville. Why would anyone on this board link to that shit?

[okieinpain]

83. because it was funny as hell. n/t.

[RamboLiberal]

94. Hey that's what we get for being the Professional (or amateur) Left

They do have quite a link going here.

http://beforeitsnews.com/story/115/505/RightHaven_the_B...

All part of the Obama plot to shutdown RW websites. Hey maybe they think we've been too critical as well.

[Exen Trik]

74. I don't know all the legal details, but I do know one thing:

WE FIGHT BACK

[wovenpaint]

85. More info with photo of Righthaven CEO-he's makin' $$

here
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/07/copyright-trol... /

And another...
http://bostonherald.com/business/general/view.bg?articl...

He's in it for the money-figures that people will settle out of court, so good for him.

[RamboLiberal]

87. Might make for some strange bedfellows countering this suit

Website owners being sued banding together.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/aug/09/websites-bl... /

http://www.bostonherald.com/business/general/view/20100...

http://www.righthavenlawsuits.com /

http://www.scribd.com/righthavenlawsuits

[RamboLiberal]

90. Story on FreeRepublic being sued

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/jul/20/conservativ... /

[djg21]

91. Righthaven is a "Copyright Troll"

Borrowing a page from patent trolls, the CEO of fledgling Las Vegas-based Righthaven has begun buying out the copyrights to newspaper content for the sole purpose of suing blogs and websites that re-post those articles without permission. And he says he’s making money.

Read More http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/07/copyright-trol...


So-called patent trolls have gotten lots of press for buying up and enforcing patents, but there appears to be a new kind of practitioner with a different intellectual property focus—the copyright troll.

A Las Vegas start-up called Righthaven has purchased several copyrights to the Las Vegas Review-Journal and sued at least 86 website owners for copyright infringement, the Las Vegas Sun reports. The suits seek $75,000 in damages and forfeiture of the website domain names.

Read More http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/attack_dog_group... /

And more at http://www.litigationandtrial.com/2010/07/articles/liti... / and http://wnytruthers.org/print.php?news.4001

[RamboLiberal]

93. Righthaven has sued a mob enforcer!

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/jul/27/r-j-mob-sou... /

Maybe they'll make him an offer he can't refuse.

[Hawkeye-X]

107. I hope the mob takes care of him.

I don't care the hows, when, and wheres. Just get it done.

[mbperrin]

95. Barratry is a felony in Texas.

Perhaps they'll catch some of that 2-10 year fever when they step down into here.

History is against them. All efforts to restrict, tie up, or destroy the free flow of information end with the destruction of the organization doing so.

[RamboLiberal]

97. Video Jon Ralston interviewing this asshat

http://www.lasvegassun.com/videos/2010/jun/02/4022 /

Highly suggest everyone here watch this jerk!

[NYC_SKP]

101. Also suing Free Republic, NORML, others.

According to the Google.

[Hepburn]

103. Here, IMO, is the problem for the plaintiff:

It's the posters who are allegedly violating copyright ~~ not Skinner. LOL, I guess they would have to get the specific alleged infringements and hunt down each individual poster.

I can think of a thousand ways to fuck up this bullshit law suit!

[cosmicone]

105. DU can simply incorporate in Sweden and move the domain there

get nominee directors and officers who are not US citizens or residents and they will be immune from this.

[w4rma]

111. They picked on the wrong website this time. They'll be sorry they landed on our radar.

There are lots of people here with money, ties to big-time politicians, and lawyers. And most of us know the law pretty well. We also have members all over the nation, including Nevada. I think this extortion outfit needs to be shut down to protect others, not just this website, from them.

[RamboLiberal]

112. According to this site the bastards go for $75,000 or if they can't get

$2.95 per view based on what LVJR charges for reprints.

Facebook group against Righthaven witchhunt. http://www.facebook.com/pages/stop-the-LVRJRIGHTHAVEN-w...

And reason the newspaper publisher says they are using Righthaven. http://weeklyseven.com/news/2010/july/22/fighting-copyr...

[RamboLiberal]

114. Defendants in R-J copyright lawsuits speak out

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/aug/04/defendants-...

[Regret My New Name]

116. That's disgusting... What a piece of shit "company"

[RamboLiberal]

117. So far 20 of 98 have settled

-----

Among the latest defendants to settle are John (Jack) D. Wooden and Pennwell Corp.

Before settling, Wooden had argued the lawsuit was worth only $85.55. Wooden, of Columbus, Ind., runs the madjacksports.com website. He was sued by Righthaven on May 13 because R-J stories involving UNLV sports and hunting and fishing were posted on the madjacksports site.

Wooden came up with the $85.55 figure by saying Righthaven had obtained a copyright to one story posted by a third party on his site and that it was viewed there just 29 times. Since the R-J sells the story from its website archive for $2.95, the potential damages totaled $2.95 times 29 or $85.55, he had argued.

-----

Pennwell never publicly responded to the copyright allegation, but legal insiders say the company likely paid thousands of dollars to settle the case.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/aug/12/righthaven-...

[RamboLiberal]

118. Surprise - no sympathy from the Freepers though RH after them too

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2569133/posts

[RamboLiberal]

121. Las Vegas Sun Story of DU being sued and from TechDirt

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/aug/11/righthaven-... /

For example, one of its recent lawsuits is against the political forum Democratic Underground, where a user (not the site owner), quoted a mere 4 paragraphs of a 34 paragraph story -- and included a link to the full story. No matter, Righthaven sued. As it does in all of these lawsuits, it's demanding $75,000. The number is carefully chosen, because it's less than what going to court will likely cost. The idea is to just get people to pay up, even if the legal claims are bogus. Beyond the $75,000, it's laughably demanding that the domain name of the site be turned over as well.

Nice theory. Too bad that nowhere in copyright law does it require service providers to have such proactive policies, and in the various lawsuits where this has been challenged (I'm looking at you, Viacom/YouTube, and you, Veoh/Universal Music) courts have pretty much laughed out loud at the suggestion that sites have any legal requirement to proactively police user generated content.

Given the fact that Righthaven seems to be suing more sites every week (it's about to crack 100, if it hasn't already), it seems like the plan is to basically just sue everyone that a Google search turns up, no matter how dubious the legal merits might be -- and hope that enough sites settle before this operation is put out of its misery. Nearly everything about this setup is questionable. The fact that it doesn't issue DMCA takedowns or alert sites before suing, while legal, can't look good in court. It suggests, quite clearly, that the copyright holder did not make use of clear tools at its disposal to "minimize" any harm. Courts generally don't like that. On top of that, suing site owners for actions of forum users won't look good either. Nor is claiming infringement on just a small snippet of a much longer article that includes clear attribution and a link back. It's difficult to see how anyone at Righthaven can legitimately claim "harm" here.

The only "good" that may come of this is that Righthaven is really doing an excellent job demonstrating what a laughingstock copyright has become.

And from techdirt http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100812/01454910601.s...

[Jefferson23]

123. Great find, thanks. n/t

[Hawkeye-X]

128. kick for visibility