recording
Justices Block Same-Sex Marriage Trial on YouTube
The Supreme Court on Monday blocked a delayed YouTube broadcast of a federal civil trial in San Francisco concerning the legality of same-sex marriage. The decision came after gay marriage foes told the court they would be harassed and intimidated if their testimony was disseminated on such a grand scale. The high court’s decision, which it is set to review again Wednesday, for the moment suspends a courthouse experiment that for the first time would have uploaded federal courtroom testimony to YouTube.
Continue reading »MPAA: Copyright Treaty Critics Hate Hollywood
If you don’t back a copyright treaty being negotiated in secret, you must want to destroy Hollywood, its blockbuster movies and all the jobs they create. At least that’s the message from the Motion Picture Association of America. It’s spelled out in a Thursday memo to the Senate Judiciary Committee, urging lawmakers to support the Obama administration’s efforts toward negotiating an intellectual property agreement with more than a dozen countries.
Continue reading »Judge Sides With RIAA in ‘Sham’ Litigation Class Action
A judge has dealt a major blow to a proposed class-action lawsuit alleging the Recording Industry Association of America’s nearly 6-year-old courthouse campaign against file sharers amounted to nothing more than “sham” litigation. The judge ruled that the RIAA has the right to bring civil lawsuits and is protected under a legal doctrine allowing special interests to form trade groups to protect their interests. The RIAA, the judge added, had an “objective basis” to bring lawsuits against individuals (.pdf) connected to IP addresses upon which file sharing is occurring.
Continue reading »MPAA staffer joins Obama crew
p2pnet news view Politics | MPAA:- The Department of Justice is loaded to the gills with RIAA adherents, the RIAA being the principal US extortion unit for Vivendi Universal (France), Sony (Japan), EMI (Britain), and Warner Music (US, but controlled by a Canadian). RIAA is, ironically, short for Recording Industry Association of America. And now ex-MPAA staffer Angela Belden Martinez has become senior advisor, director of outreach for economic development, at the United States Department of Commerce.
Continue reading »Judge Refuses to Punish Lawyer for Anti-RIAA Blogging
An attorney defending against a music-piracy lawsuit didn’t cross ethical bounds by filing motions broadly attacking the recording industry and posting them on his blog, a magistrate judge has ruled, rejecting demands from the RIAA for monetary sanctions. Attorney Ray Beckerman was “less than forthcoming at times” in defending a client against an RIAA lawsuit, but the music industry’s concerns were “largely overstated,” New York Magistrate Judge Robert M. Levy wrote Friday (.pdf).
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