In the News

["Jack Boeve" <JBoeve@xxxxxxxx>]

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Copyright Troll Righthaven Goes on Life Support.
By David Kravets, Wired, September 7, 2011.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/09/righthaven-on-life-support/

"The great experiment in copyright trolling that is Righthaven appears
to be nearing an end. Righthaven, which was founded more than a year ago
to monetize print news content through copyright infringement lawsuits,
has suffered a myriad of courtroom setbacks in recent months."

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New Zealand traffic down as "three strikes" copyright law takes effect.
By Timothy B. Lee, Ars Technica, September 7, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3uxd8wl

"Two New Zealand ISPs have reported falling traffic after that nation's
controversial new "three strikes" copyright enforcement legislation went
into effect at the start of the month. Kiwi Internet users may have been
spooked by the threat of fines as high as NZ$15,000."

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Sarkozy Routes Around Parliament, Ditches Net Neutrality, Forces
Copyright Clauses Into All ISP Terms Of Service.
By Mike Masnick, TechDirt, September 7, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3eqv8z7

"This is hardly a surprise, given that the Sarkozy administration
appears to believe that copyright is more important than all other human
rights but apparently, as part of a telecom bill in France, the
administration added a clause that forces all French ISPs to have
clauses concerning copyright infringement in their terms of service,
which also force ISPs to ignore some basic principles of net neutrality.
What's interesting here is that Sarkozy didn't even go through
Parliament to do this, but rather made use of some process called
"transposition" that allowed him to add certain clauses to the Telecoms
Act, outside of the Parliamentary process."

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Victory for Cliff's law.
By Rory Cellan-Jones, BBC, September 7, 2011.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14829373

"Remember the attempt to extend copyright for music beyond the current
50 years?  It became known as the Cliff Richard law, because it promised
to make sure the veteran rocker would go on earning money from 60s hits
like Living Doll for many years to come.  Now it looks as though Sir
Cliff and his fellow musicians could be on the verge of victory."

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New copyright law yet to impact.
By Jono Galuszka,  Manawatu Standard, September 7, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3qfw5dd

"A week after coming into effect, the Skynet copyright law has had
little impact on businesses and internet users. The Copyright
(Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Act was put into action last week to
clamp down on illegal downloading, but InspireNet technical specialist
Dave Mill said he was yet to see the results."

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Pirate Politician Calls for Block on EU Copyright Extension.
By Jennifer Baker, PC World/IDG News, September 6, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3pblvfy

"A member of the European Parliament (MEP) has made a last-ditch call to
block plans to extend the copyright protection time for music recordings
from 50 to 70 years."

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Court Tosses Copyright Case Against Home Depot.
By Joe Celentino, Courthouse News Service, September 6, 2011.
http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/09/06/39567.htm

"Home Depot did not violate the copyright of a product-classification
system when it built its own database after buying a perpetual license
to another company's system, the 7th Circuit ruled."

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Geist: Canada pressed on copyright law, cables show: Officials willing
to move lockstep with U.S.
By Michael Geist, The Ottawa Citizen, September 5, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3z6399r

"Parliament is set to resume in several weeks with the reintroduction of
a copyright reform bill by Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore and
Industry Minister Christian Paradis slated to be one of the government's
top priorities. The bill is expected to mirror Bill C-32, the previous
copyright package that died with the election in the spring."

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Google in freetard-friendly copyright infringement update: Choc Factory
wishes content biz Happy Labor Day... And Nyah!
By Andrew Orlowski, The Register, September 5, 2011.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09/05/google_copyright_update/

"The Friday before a public holiday is traditionally a great time to
bury bad news. Google chose the Labor Day Lull to give the world an
update on its copyright infringement measures. Funny, that."

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UK Copyright Modernisation Effort Picks Up Steam.
By Dugie Standeford, Intellectual Property Watch, 31 August 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3ljzeez

"Efforts to modernise Britain's creaking copyright regime sped up over
the summer as the government accepted recommendations for major changes
to the system, Parliament opened an inquiry into the matter, and the
Intellectual Property Office said updating the rules could significantly
boost the UK economy."
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Star Scientific, Burberry, In-N-Out, Nu Image: Intellectual Property.
By Victoria Slind, Bloomberg, Aug 29, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3ea9bn5

"Star Scientific Inc., a maker of smokeless tobacco products, tumbled
the most in two years after losing a bid for a new trial in its
patent-infringement case against Reynolds American Inc. (RAI)"

===============

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Jack Boeve
Project Specialist
Center for Intellectual Property @ UMUC
Largo, Room 2294
3501 University Blvd. East
Adelphi, MD 20783
T: 240-684-2965 / F: 240-684-2961
jboeve@xxxxxxxx
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