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Category: Intellectual property

Freemium is not “for free” in secondary transmission of signal

Non – profit organization Sports Fans Coaliti on NY, Inc. (“SFCNY”) operated the Locast service, which captures over-the-air (“OTA”) broadcast signals and retransmits them over the internet, enabling viewers to stream live television on their preferred internet-connected viewing device. The signals include copyrighted transmissions from plaintiffs’ broadcast stations. Locast has not paid for a license or obtained plaintiff’s consent to retransmit those programs.

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Use or lose the right to file a copyright infringement lawsuit

In 1994, Firooz Zahedi, a photographer, took several photographs of Uma Thurman in character in her now-famous role as Mia Wallace in the Quentin Tarantino film Pulp Fiction. Miramax, the studio that produced Pulp Fiction, used one of Zahedi’s photographs, with some changes (including changing the position of the gun on the bed in front of Ms. Thurman) on its poster for the film.

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Originality remains the sine qua non of copyright, no author may copyright his ideas or the facts he narrates

The musical Jersey Boys depicts the history of a popular musical quartet, the Four Seasons (“the Band”), from its origins in Belleville, New Jersey, in the 1950s, to the Band’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. In the late 1980s, Band member Tommy DeVito partnered with Rex Woodard to write a book telling “the whole story” of The Four Seasons. The result of this partnership was an autobiography of DeVito (“the Work”), ghostwritten by Woodard and completed before the Play was developed.

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Section 512 report – Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator

In 2008, Congress passed the Prioritizing Resources and Organization of Intellectual Property Act of 2008 (“PRO IP Act”) for the “critical” purpose of “improving IP enforcement both domestically and internationally.” Among other changes, the PRO IP Act created the position of Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator (“IPEC”) within the Executive Office of the President.

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The creation, curation, and provision of timely and accurate music lyrics transcriptions is not protected by the Copyright Act

Genius Media Group (Plaintiff) is a “digital media company,” one of whose “primary services is the development and maintenance of annotated music lyrics.” LyricFind is a Canadian company that maintains a database of music lyrics. Both Plaintiff and LyricFind “license lyrics for display and distribution from music publishers.” Google “owns and operates the internet’s dominant search platform.” Pursuant to an agreement “LyricFind provides lyrics to Google for use in Google’s search results.”

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Whether the Copyright Office can help stakeholders identify and adopt standard technical measures without congressional action?

As noted in the Report, the Office believes that the identification and adoption of standard technical measures (“STMs”) may provide an opportunity to improve the overall functioning of the notice-and-takedown system through relatively small, incremental changes that nonetheless could have a large impact on the ability of all rightsholders to protect their rights online.

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Public views on AI and IP policy

In January 2019, the USPTO held an AI IP policy conference. The conference featured IP specialists from around the world and included panel discussions on patents, trade secrets, copyrights, trademarks, IP enforcement, global perspectives, and the economics of IP protection of AI.

On August 27, 2019, the USPTO issued a request for comments (RFC) on patenting AI inventions. The USPTO received 99 comments from a wide range of stakeholders, including individuals, associations, corporations, and foreign IP offices.

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Third edition of USA copyright office compendium – audiovisual work copyright registration issues

Videogames

Generally (draft), a videogame contains two major components: the audiovisual material and the computer program that runs the game. If the copyright in the audiovisual material and the computer program are both owned by the same entity, they should be registered together on one application. By contrast, if the copyright in the program and the audiovisual material are owned by different parties, separate applications will be required.

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