Jonathan Bailey's List: Episode 53

There have been three opinions in six weeks on the suits brought by RIAA in which the issue of the alleged making available right as well as infringement of the distribution right have been raised. They are not the first opinions, nor will they be the last, but they are interesting in their own right, and are noteworthy because the judges involved took the time to address the issues seriously and thoughtfully.

TalkTalk is the first ISP to reject the British Phonographic Industry's(BPI) proposed "three-strikes-and-your-out"' scheme which would require it to disconnect customers who had been deemed by the music industry body to have shared content with others illegally.

After being blown off by the Norwegian police, MPAA lawyer Espen Tøndel is now demanding that ISPs disconnect Norwegian file-sharers from the Internet. According to IKT Norway, an interest group for ISPs, the lawyer has sent a letter to Norwegian ISPs on behalf of The Norwegian branch of the MPAA.

Students at the University of Maine School of Law's Cumberland Legal Aid Clinic are continuing their fight against the RIAA's legal tactics. A motion filed earlier this week on behalf of two "John Doe" University of Maine students sued by the RIAA seeks to not only have the John Doe lawsuit filed against the 27 U of M students thrown out, but to bar the RIAA from bringing any such lawsuits in the future.

A lawyer who sent out hundreds of thousands of threatening letters demanding that alleged file-sharers pay 400 euros, has been banned from operating for 6 months. Elizabeth Martin, who had been working with Swiss anti-piracy outfit, Logistep, was condemned by the Paris Bar Council.

University of Florida professor Michael Moulton thinks copyright law protects the lectures he gives to his students, and he's headed to court to prove it.

MySpace has officially announced their new music venture, and as reported yesterday, Universal Music Group, Sony BMG, and Warner Music Group are all in as launch partners, leaving EMI as the only major record label not participating

The five year old Creative Commons nonprofit organization announced a new CEO this afternoon as founding CEO Lawrence Lessig steps down: Joi Ito.

Google’s CIO Douglas Merrill is leaving to start as the new president at EMI, the record label giant. This bit of information was confirmed by folks that John Furrier knows close to the issue, however unbelievable it may be. It was so unbelievable, given that it’s April 1st, that I gave him a ring to chat about it.

EMI is suing MP3Tunes for copyright infringement and demanded that the service turn over the more than 100 million music files stored in all 125,000 MP3Tunes accounts. (The argument is that even if there is no sharing between lockers, users are transferring music to MP3Tunes, which is the same as distributing the music—a right only EMI has). A court in New York has denied that request, Robertson writes on his blog.

The US Justice Department seems to believe that if you tell a big enough lie, people will listen. Here's the latest: Attorney General Michael Mukasey claims that terrorists sell pirated software as a way to finance their operations, without presenting a shred of evidence for his case. He's doing it to push through a controversial piece of legislation that's bad for you.

Last weekend, a CAM version of the Norwegian movie “Lange Flate Ballær II” leaked onto several BitTorrent sites. Quite surprisingly, the producer doesn’t hold a grudge against the person who leaked the film. Instead, he thinks it’s an honor that someone took the effort to record it in a movie theater.

Book piracy on the internet will ultimately drive authors to stop writing unless radical methods are devised to compensate them for lost sales.

A 23 year old Dubai national has been fined for Dh. 10,000 for illegally downloading and using programmes from Showtime, Art and Orbit on his website.It was also ordered by the court to shut down the website of the convict with immediate effect.He was charged of unlawfully deciphering the encrypted channels — Art, Showtime and Orbit and downloading different programmes, which he broadcast in special forums on the website for a price.

Right before the Man of Steel celebrates its 70th birthday, a federal court judge has ruled (.pdf) that the heirs of Superman co-creator Jerome Siegel could claim an ownership share of the character’s domestic copyright. The ruling vests in Siegel’s heirs ownership in the first Superman comic, Detective Comics’ Action Comics No. 1.

o get even for a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by Zomba Records, Perez Hilton announced last night that he will not blog about any Zomba-related artists, including Leona Lewis, Jennifer Lopez, Whitney Houston, Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera, Pink, and many more. Zomba filed a lawsuit against Perez on October 11, 2007, because Perez allegedly leaked approximately ten songs from Britney Spears’ Blackout album before its release date.