Depiction of Michigan as Hands Doesn’t Preclude Similar Depictions–High Five v. MFB
High Five Threads sells t-shirts and tchotchkes. It claims copyright and trademark protection for a depiction of upper and lower Michigan as two hands (left-most image below). People routinely depict lower Michigan as a hand, and apparently others envision the…
Ninth Circuit Rejects Lawsuit Over Hijacked Facebook Account–Long v. Dorset
Long is a book author. He ran a Facebook business page to promote his work. An interloper, using the alias “Tammy Dorset,” gained administrator access to the Facebook page. Once in control of the page, Dorset allegedly posted items that…
Broadcaster Fails to Enjoin YouTube–Kifle v. YouTube
Kifle operates a broadcast channel called Mejera, which apparently caters to the Ethiopian community. He has a YouTube channel that simultaneously rebroadcasts the programs. The YouTube channel had 2,500 videos and 200k+ subscribers, but YouTube abruptly terminated it. It appears…
512(f) Preempts Tortious Interference Claim–Copy Me That v. This Old Gal
“Copy Me That” (I’m pretty sure no IP lawyer recommended that name–it’s like a confession for copyright defendants) makes an app to help users manage recipes. “This Old Gal” (again, who comes up with these names?) publishes recipes. This Old…
U.S. Supreme Court Upholds Fair Use in Google-Oracle Software Battle (Guest Blog Post)
By Guest Blogger Tyler Ochoa [BONUS: Prof. Ochoa will be speaking on this case April 13, 6pm Pacific. Free registration.] On April 5, the U.S. Supreme Court held 6-2 that Google’s copying of 11,500 lines of code from the Java…
Section 230 Preempts Contract Breach Claims–Morton v. Twitter
This case involves the model Genevieve Morton. She created nude images and sold them at her website. An interloper, SpyIRL, tweeted some of the images. Morton asked Twitter to remove the images and suspend the accounts. Twitter removed the images…
Udemy Qualifies for 512(c) Safe Harbor for User-Uploaded Courses–Kinsley v. Udemy
This case involves two videos by Kinsley that third parties uploaded to the education site Udemy. Udemy promptly honored Kinsley’s takedown notices, but he sued anyways. In a fairly efficient opinion, the court grants summary judgment that Udemy qualifies for…
Blogger Loses Copyright Ruling Over Photo…But No Mention of the CC-BY-SA License!–Von Der Au v. Imber
Von Der Au is a professional photographer. The photographer took a photo of the Semperoper opera house in Dresden, Germany. The defendant blogs at MichaelGImberBlog.com and republished the photo in a post. The court claims the “value of a license…
Blogger’s Photo Republication Isn’t Fair Use–Golden v. Grecco
This case involves a photo of Lucy Lawless as Xena. The TV studio hired Michael Grecco to take the photo and paid him $25k for his services. Grecco retained the photo’s copyright, and he made the photo available for licensing…
Pinterest Defeats Contributory Copyright Infringement Claim–Davis v. Pinterest
This is a copyright infringement case against Pinterest for allegedly infringing “pins” by users. The plaintiff alleged claims for direct and contributory copyright infringement. Pinterest moved to dismiss the claim for contributory infringement. The court grants the motion. In addition…