MMA Promotion Sued for Copyright Infringement
- Thread starter MadJack
- Start date
there's a law blog devoted to mixed martial arts law!? :shrug:
I read that in 1999 that the popular conservative website FreeRepublic.com lost a lawsuit in which they raised a fair use defense against a copyright infringement suit. Court said:
"Although the... Court found that the primary purpose of posting articles to the Free Republic site is to facilitate the discussion, criticism and comment of users, it nevertheless held that the commercial elements of the websites operations cut against the fair use defense. Because Free Republic solicited donations from visitors to its website, facilitated links to other webpages where donations to Free Republic and its affiliates were solicited, and ran advertisements for its parent company, its use of the newspapers articles was considered to be commercial.
The fact that the newspaper articles were republished in their entirety also weighed heavily against the fair use defense. Where media criticism is concerned, one can well understand a critic arguing that an offending article must be viewed in its entirety to assess the context and any subtle bias of the author. But the Court was unmoved by that argument, and it held that the Free Republic had failed to show how full-text copying was essential to its discussion forum. The Court implied that posting summaries of the articles or providing a link to the newspapers websites where the full articles could be read were alternatives that Free Republic should have employed. Finally, because the availability of the papers articles in full text on the Free Republic site fulfilled at least some demand for the original works on the papers own websites, and because widespread copying of this type would have a deleterious effect on the papers markets, the fourth factor weighed against the fair use defense.
In the end, in fact, the Court found that only one factor favored the fair use defense: that newspaper articles are predominantly factual rather than expressive in nature. Accordingly, the fair use claim was stronger than it would have been had purely fictional works been copied.
I read that in 1999 that the popular conservative website FreeRepublic.com lost a lawsuit in which they raised a fair use defense against a copyright infringement suit. Court said:
"Although the... Court found that the primary purpose of posting articles to the Free Republic site is to facilitate the discussion, criticism and comment of users, it nevertheless held that the commercial elements of the websites operations cut against the fair use defense. Because Free Republic solicited donations from visitors to its website, facilitated links to other webpages where donations to Free Republic and its affiliates were solicited, and ran advertisements for its parent company, its use of the newspapers articles was considered to be commercial.
The fact that the newspaper articles were republished in their entirety also weighed heavily against the fair use defense. Where media criticism is concerned, one can well understand a critic arguing that an offending article must be viewed in its entirety to assess the context and any subtle bias of the author. But the Court was unmoved by that argument, and it held that the Free Republic had failed to show how full-text copying was essential to its discussion forum. The Court implied that posting summaries of the articles or providing a link to the newspapers websites where the full articles could be read were alternatives that Free Republic should have employed. Finally, because the availability of the papers articles in full text on the Free Republic site fulfilled at least some demand for the original works on the papers own websites, and because widespread copying of this type would have a deleterious effect on the papers markets, the fourth factor weighed against the fair use defense.
In the end, in fact, the Court found that only one factor favored the fair use defense: that newspaper articles are predominantly factual rather than expressive in nature. Accordingly, the fair use claim was stronger than it would have been had purely fictional works been copied.
