Statutory damages for a willful copyright infringement for a single work can reach $150,000, but the average cost of litigating a copyright case is around $278,000. Even though copyright theft affects the majority of copyright owners, a small minority in reality enforce those rights and receive due compensation. As a potential solution, Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) […]
Tag Archives: copyright
The Cosby Show Sues over Unwanted Return to TV
Even though The Cosby Show has been pulled from broadcast, the show’s producers have filed a copyright lawsuit against BBC and Sugar Films for allegedly using a substantial amount of copyrighted material for a documentary called Bill Cosby: Fall of an American Icon, which depicts the sexual assault scandal that Bill Cosby was embroiled in these past […]
Notorious Markets List Sparks Debate over Stream Ripping Sites
Each year the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) publishes a report on “online and physical marketplaces that reportedly engage in and facilitate substantial copyright piracy and trademark counterfeiting,” called the Notorious Markets List. As part of creating the report, the USTR requests the aid of the public to identify these marketplaces through […]
Disney, Not Pleased Knock-Off Party Characters, Sues
Disney doesn’t want you to hire “Big Hairy Guy,” a Chewbacca lookalike, for your child’s next birthday party. Disney and its corporate affiliates have filed a lawsuit against Characters For Hire, LLC (“CFH”) for copyright and trademark infringement. Though CFH changes the names of many of its characters, such as Darth Vader to “Dark Lord,” […]
Music Royalty Collector Kobalt Nabs Another $14M
As digital music streaming continues to explode, it calls for a platform that can track the data generated from billions of clicks and collect royalties for artists. Kobalt, the independent music services company founded in 2000, has been focusing on such a platform since Paul McCartney took his music publishing interest from EMI to Kobalt […]
Studios and Streaming Join Forces to Take On TickBox
Streaming companies and major film studios have joined forces to sue TickBox, the company behind TickBox TV, a device that offers its users easy access to free online content. The complaint filed on Friday, October 13 by companies such as Universal, Disney, Hulu and Netflix, has alleged that TickBox sells “illegal access to Plaintiff’s copyrighted […]
Nintendo says “Mama Mia!” to Tokyo’s Real-Life Mario Kart
Tourists hoping to visit the Mushroom Kingdom may have to make other plans, after Nintendo filed a lawsuit against a Japanese company offering real-life Mario Kart inspired tours of Tokyo. According to the New York Times, Nintendo is claiming that the rental company, which operates under the name of MariCar in English, violates Nintendo’s intellectual […]
When Morality and Copyright Collide
As reported by Complete Music, in early March 2017, relatives of the late Egyptian composer Baligh Hamdi filed new papers in their ongoing appeal of a moral rights claim against music icons Jay-Z and Timbaland. The case began in 2007, when Hamdi’s family alleged that Jay-Z and Timbaland’s sampling of Hamdi’s music in their 2000 smash […]
Beyoncé to Get Lawyers in “Formation”
As reported by Law360, the estate of deceased YouTube performer, Anthony Barré, has filed a suit against Beyoncé and Sony Music Entertainment seeking $20 million in damages as well as declaratory and injunctive relief for copyright infringement. The complaint alleges that the pop star sampled phrases from Barré’s YouTube videos in her 2016 chart-topping hit […]
Paging the Fashion Police
As reported by The Fashion Law, in an ironic turn of events, retailer Forever 21, which has been sued over 50 times in recent years for copying others’ protected designs, has filed suit against C. Luce and CornerStone Apparel (doing business as TCEC and Papaya Clothing, respectively) for infringing on one of its protected designs. The suit centers around the […]