Law Commons^™

Bouchat V. Baltimore Ravens: The Fourth Circuit Adopts The Strinkingly Similar Doctrine To Infer Proof Of Access, Douglas R. Arntsen

Fordham Intellectual Property, Media and Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The Balancing Act Of Copyright: The Copyright Laws Of Australia And The United States In The Digital Era, Dilan J. Thampapillai

Cornell Law School J.D. Student Research Papers

The digital era has posed a unique challenge to copyright law. The emergence of the information technology revolution and the internet has increased the ability and the willingness of copyright users to copy and distribute protected material. In response to this phenomenon copyright owners have pushed for stronger laws to protect their content from infringement. Their success has prompted a strong counter reaction from copyright users and consumer groups.

This paper seeks to examine how changes to Australian and US copyright law have resulted in an imbalance between owners and users and whether the traditional safeguards of fair dealing and …

Copyrighting Facts, Michael S. Green

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Mgm V. Grokster, Brief Amici Curiae Of 40 Intellectual Property And Technology Law Professors Supporting Affirmance By The Ninth Circuit Of The Lower Court, Laura Quilter, Jennifer Urban, Pam Samuelson, Deirdre Mulligan

Laura Quilter

Amicus brief in the MGM v. Grokster case.

Mgm V. Grokster, Brief Amici Curiae Of 40 Intellectual Property And Technology Law Professors Supporting Affirmance By The Ninth Circuit Of The Lower Court, Laura Quilter, Jennifer Urban, Pam Samuelson, Deirdre Mulligan

Jennifer M. Urban

What's Wrong With Eldred? An Essay On Copyright Jurisprudence, L. Ray Patterson

Scholarly Works

With few exceptions, the U.S. Supreme Court has rendered wise copyright decisions consistent with the Copyright Clause. Unfortunately, Eldred v. Ashcroft adds to the exceptions. The difference is that the former are positive law, and the latter natural law, decisions.

Panel Ii: Mickey Mice? Potential Ramifications Of Eldred V. Ashcroft, David O. Carson, Eben Moglen, Wendy Seltzer, Charles Sims

Fordham Intellectual Property, Media and Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

"Book Review Of Controlling Voices: Intellectual Property, Humanistic Studies, And The Internet", James S. Heller

Library Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

Fragmented Copyright, Fragmented Management: Proposals To Defrag Copyright Management, Daniel Gervais, Alana Maurushat

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

The collective management of copyright in Canada was conceived as a solution to alleviate the problem of inefficiency of individual rights management. Creators could not license, collect and enforce copyright efficiently on an individual basis. Requiring users to obtain permission from individual copyright holders for the use of a work was equally inefficient. Collectives, therefore, emerged to facilitate the clearance of rights between creators and users. Even with the facilitation of collectives in the process, clearing rights remains an inherently difficult and convoluted process. This is especially so in the age of the Internet where clearing rights for multimedia products …

The Role Of Intellectual Property Rights In Negotiating And Planning A Research Joint Venture, Kurt M. Saunders

Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review

This Article considers the role of intellectual property rights in research joint ventures. Professor Saunders begins by outlining the various advantages of pursuing research in a joint venture business form, including the sharing of expertise and investment costs. The author identifies and elucidates the intellectual property issues, as well as related licensing and antitrust implications, that arise in the joint venture context. Most notably, Saunders articulates the different intellectual property concerns that surface at each separate stage-from negotiation and planning, to termination of the collaboration.

Comments On Cyber Copyright Disputes In The People's Republic Of China: Maintaining The Status Quo While Expanding The Doctrine Of Profit-Making Purposes, Wei Yanliang, Feng Xiaoqing

Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review

This Article addresses the status of cyber copyright disputes in the People's Republic of China with an inside view of the government's influence and control over copyrighted works. Examining cyber copyright case law, the authors seek to answer the question of whether China's 2001 Copyright Law will lead to an increase in royalty payments under a fair distribution system. The need for equitable, consistent enforcement is pressing, as the proliferation of copyrighted material through mobile phone and Internet use is rapidly increasing. In China, all current-affairs news first flows through state-run news organizations. Thus, in order to post the news, …

Anti-Circumvention: Has Technology's Child Turned Against Its Mother?, Terri B. Cohen

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Because its function is to protect and support innovation, copyright has been deemed a child of technology. Yet, as copyright laws increase the scope of protection for copyrighted material, one may wonder when such protection will begin to stymie, rather than encourage, emerging technology. The global trend toward internationalizing copyright protection has resulted in the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty, which was intended, in part, to bring international copyright protection into the digital age. The treaty, however, extends traditional copyright protections by including a requirement that member nations implement anti-circumvention provisions into their laws.

Great debate has emerged …

Copyright And Computer Programs: A Failed Experiment And A Solution To A Dilemma, William F. Patry

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Slowing Down The Speed Of Sound: A Transatlantic Race To Head Off Digital Copyright Infringement, Eleanor M. Lackman

Fordham Intellectual Property, Media and Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

New Media, New Rules: The Digital Performance Right And Streaming Media Over The Internet, Joseph E. Magri

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

Streaming music over the Internet, or what otherwise is known as webcasting or Internet radio, has the potential to become the single most revolutionary means of music transmission ever developed.' In order to appreciate the potential impact of Internet radio, it is helpful to understand that Internet radio has the ability to venture far beyond the at-home personal computer that is tethered to a wall and logged-on to the Internet. With advances in wireless broadband technologies, such as wireless fidelity or Wi-Fi, and the growing availability of Internet content via mobile devices,' Internet radio will soon become widely available on …

The E-Rated Industry: Fair Use Sheep Or Infringing Goat?, Christina Mitakis

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

This Note explores the copyright issues presented by the litigation between companies that sanitize movies for viewing by the general public and the studios and directors involved in the creation of the edited movies. Collectively, these companies comprise what is generally referred to as the e-rated industry.' Certain companies within the e-rated industry use digital editing software to edit profanity, sex and violence from popular movies, while other companies provide software allowing viewers to edit their own DVDs. In all cases, this editing is done without the consent of the moviemakers. CleanFilms, which rents out e-rated movies, defines e-rated movies …

Idea Men Should Be Able To Enforce Their Contractual Rights: Considerations Rejecting Preemption Of Idea-Submission Contract Claims, Celine Michaud, Gregory Tulquois

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

It is a long-standing and general rule that ideas are "free as the air" as Justice Brandeis eloquently stated in the dissent to the seminal case International News Service v. Associated Press.' This axiom of copyright law expresses the idea that copyright does not protect ideas but only protects the expression of ideas in a work. The distinction between unprotected ideas and protected expression is often referred to as the idea-expression dichotomy...

The principle of the idea-expression dichotomy was initially stated in Baker v. Selden, and later cases further articulated this principle, so that it has become one of the …

Solutions Are On Track, Beth A. Thomas

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

This Note discusses the need to solve the copyright problems caused by digital file sharing over peer-to-peer networks and the possible solutions that would be acceptable to both the media industries and the public. While it is likely that the problems caused by file sharing will not decrease significantly by placing post-sales control in the hands of the artists, it is probable that legislative and industry driven technical counter-measures will be able to decrease illegal file sharing in an acceptable way.

Part I outlines copyright in general and how digital technology is pushing at the boundaries of copyright law. Part …

Copyright And The First Amendment: After The Wind Done Gone, Joseph M. Beck

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

On March 16, 2001, plaintiff SunTrust Bank filed a complaint in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia against defendant Houghton Mifflin Company, alleging copyright and trademark infringement based on defendant's yet-to-be published novel The Wind Done Gone. On March 23, plaintiff filed a motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction barring the book's imminent publication. The district court held a hearing on the motion for a temporary restraining order on March 29,2001, and then set down a second hearing for April 18, 2001. On April 20,2001, the district court filed a fifty-one page …

Perfecting Patent Prizes, Michael Abramowicz

Vanderbilt Law Review

When anthrax attacks recently led to a run on the patented antibiotic drug Cipro, politicians and commentators suggested that the government consider purchasing generic alternatives. Some used the occasion to illustrate what they perceived as a broader problem with patent protection: that pharmaceutical companies seeking profits would not allow the sick to obtain access to needed medications. The argument repeated a familiar refrain in the intellectual property debate, as a long history of articles has inquired whether society would be better off with no patent or copyright law at all. Even recently, commentators have questioned the broad scope of intellectual …

Controlling Opportunistic And Anti-Competitive Intellectual Property Litigation, Michael J. Meurer

Faculty Scholarship

It is useful to think of intellectual property (IP) law both as a system of property rights that promotes the production of valuable information and as a system of government regulation that unintentionally promotes socially harmful rent-seeking. This Article analyzes methods of controlling rent-seeking costs associated with opportunistic and anti-competitive IP lawsuits. My thinking is guided to some extent by the analysis of procedural measures for controlling frivolous litigation, and analysis of antitrust reforms designed to control strategic abuse of antitrust law. These analogies lead me to focus on pre-trial and post-trial control measures that reduce the credibility of weak …

How Dewey Classify Oclc's Lawsuit, Roger V. Skalbeck

Law Faculty Publications

In order to understand the nature of the rights asserted here, it is important to properly classify the Dewey Decimal lawsuit. To these ends, this article presents analysis aimed to better define its scope and legal framework. This is not an analysis of the merits of the claims, let alone a prediction as to the outcome. The issues are considered in the following three sections. In closing, I offer a lighthearted suggestion as to how this suit might be resolved outside of litigation or settlement.

Category Iii Films And Vcds: The Failure Of Deterrence In The Copyright Ordinance Of Hong Kong, Allen Woods

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

In 1997, the government of Hong Kong enacted the Copyright Ordinance. The goal of the Ordinance was to establish a strong deterrent against the illegal manufacture and sale of copyright infringing materials, especially pirated video and digital compact discs. Courts have interpreted the Ordinance to allow the Customs and Excise Department sweeping powers of search and seizure. As a result, the government has seized many thousands of copyright infringing video compact discs and courts have enforced lengthy custodial sentences against guilty parties.

Despite these efforts, though, film piracy continues to grow throughout Hong Kong and transnational film interests have begun …

A Sample For Pay Keeps The Lawyers Away: A Proposed Solution For Artists Who Sample And Artists Who Are Sampled, Charles E. Maier

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

The law of copyright has its origins in the constitu- tion of the United States, which grants congress the power "to promote the Progress of Science and the useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discov- eries. To carry out this mandate, Congress passed the Copyright Act, establishing the basic rights to be enjoyed by the copyright owner, including the right of adaptation, and the right of reproduction. ''

Sampling seems to be a clear violation of these exclusive rights. However, Congress has provided an excep- tion, the …

New Surveillance, The , Sonia K. Katyal

Faculty Scholarship

A few years ago, it was fanciful to imagine a world where intellectual property owners - such as record companies, software owners, and publishers - were capable of invading the most sacred areas of the home in order to track, deter, and control uses of their products. Yet, today, strategies of copyright enforcement have rapidly multiplied, each strategy more invasive than the last. This new surveillance exposes the paradoxical nature of the Internet: It offers both the consumer and creator a seemingly endless capacity for human expression - a virtual marketplace of ideas - alongside an insurmountable array of capacities …

Excuse And Justification In The Law Of Fair Use: Transaction Costs Have Always Been Only Part Of The Story, Wendy J. Gordon

Faculty Scholarship

In American copyright law, the doctrine of "fair use" has long been problematic. Every plausible litmus test that might simplify the "fair use" inquiry has proven inadequate, and copyright commentators have long sought an algorithm or heuristic to lend predictability and conceptual coherence to the doctrine. Twenty years ago, I published in this Journal an article entitled Fair Use as Market Failure, which suggested that the key to understanding the protean terms of "fair use" could best be found in the notion of market failure. That 1982 article has been often misapplied, by both courts and commentators. I am …

A Brief History Of Author-Publisher Relations And The Outlook For The 21st Century, Maureen A. O'Rourke

Faculty Scholarship

The Fiftieth Anniversary Edition of the Journal of the Copyright Society of the U.S.A. provides a particularly appropriate forum in which to discuss the current state of the copyright system. By some accounts, U.S. copyright law has been fabulously successful, encouraging the growth of industries whose copyrighted products both enrich American culture and contribute significant value to the economy.

Intellectual Property Law, Wendy J. Gordon

Faculty Scholarship

This chapter for the OXFORD HANDBOOK ON LEGAL STUDIES provides an overview of the theoretical literature in Intellectual Property, and suggests directions for further study. The emphasis is on economic analysis, but effort is made to embrace other perspectives as well.

Spiritual But Not Intellectual? The Protection Of Sacred Intangible Traditional Knowledge, Daniel J. Gervais

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

The use of sacred aboriginal art is nothing new. It is fairly common to see dream catchers hanging from rear view mirrors in cars. In Australia, sacred aboriginal designs are often found on tea towels, rugs and restaurant placemats. In the United States, people routinely Commercialize Navajo rugs containing both sacred and profane designs with no connection to the Navajo nation. Millions of dollars of Indian crafts imported from Asia are sold in the United States each year. Another example is the taking of sacred Ami chants by the German rock group Enigma for its song Return to Innocence. Can …

A Primer On U.S. Intellectual Property Rights Applicable To Music Information Retrieval Systems, Michael W. Carroll

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Digital technology has had a significant impact on the ways in which music information can be stored, transmitted, and used. Within the information sciences, music information retrieval has become an increasingly important and complex field. This brief article is addressed primarily to those involved in the design and implementation of systems for storing and retrieving digital files containing musical notation, recorded music, and relevant metadata – hereinafter referred to as a Music Information Retrieval System (“MIRS”). In particular, this group includes information specialists, software engineers, and the attorneys who advise them. Although peer-to-peer computer applications, such as Napster’s MusicShare or …