CBC Radio One - Who Owns Ideas?

A recent CBC Radio Ideas feature entitled "Who owns Ideas?" discusses the progression of intellectual property law and specifically copyright law. The host describes a tension in copyright law that has become known as the copyfight, and it's ultimately a dispute about who owns ideas.

CBC has posted a free streaming audio of the show here.

Hasbro, Inc. v. RJ Softwares et al

Hasbro, Inc. v. RJ Softwares et al. was filed July 24, 2008 in the New York Southern District Court. This case relates to an allegation of trade-mark and copyright law infringement against the makers of the Facebook application Scrabulous.

The effect is that the well used Facebook application Scrabulous is shut down. I'm not a big user of Facebook or the application, but the New York Times reports that fans of the application are upset. Unfortunately, Hasbro's version of the game was having downloading difficulties. Electronic Arts develops the application for Hasbro.

Radiohead v. Prince

I attended Coachella Valley Music and Arts festival this year, where Prince performed on the Saturday night and covered Radiohead's 'Creep'. When clips appeared on YouTube Prince's label had them removed. Thom Yorke responded:

"Really? He's blocked it?" asked Yorke, who figured it was their song to block or not. "Surely we should block it. Hang on a moment."

Yorke added: "Well, tell him to unblock it. It's our ... song.

Associated Press Story

Let's look for potential copyright in this picture.

The Copyright Act section outlining "works":

Section 3. (1) For the purposes of this Act, “copyright”, in relation to a work, means the sole right to produce or reproduce the work or any substantial part thereof in any material form whatever, to perform the work or any substantial part thereof in public or, if the work is unpublished, to publish the work or any substantial part thereof, and includes the sole right.......

(d) in the case of a literary, dramatic or musical work, to make any sound recording, cinematograph film or other contrivance by means of which the work may be mechanically reproduced or performed,

(e) in the case of any literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work, to reproduce, adapt and publicly present the work as a cinematographic work,

(f) in the case of any literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work, to communicate the work to the public by telecommunication

......

The song Creep (music and lyrics) is a work, and let's assume Thom Yorke is the owner. As owner, he has the right to perform the song Creep (music and lyrics) in public. However, it seems that Prince is the owner of another work: his performance of Creep. The person who filmed Prince's performance may have treaded on Prince's right to publicly present the work as a cinematographic work on YouTube. Who should decide? Thom?

As you can see, Copyright and ownership is complex and intermingled.

CSUSA - Annual Meeting

The Copyright Society of the USA (CSUSA) is having their general meeting on June 8th to June 10th in Newport, Rhode Island. CSUSA is:

"dedicated to advancing the study of copyright law and related rights in literature, music, art, theater, motion pictures, television, computer software, architecture, and other works of authorship, distributed via both traditional and new media".

Page of meeting details

Orphan works

A great resource for orphan works is the U.S. Copyright Office's page

For a detailed review check out the Statement of Marybeth Peters before the Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and IP. The recommendation:

"we recommended a framework whereby a legitimate orphan works owner who resurfaces may bring an action for “reasonable compensation” against a qualifying user. A user does not qualify for the benefits of orphan works legislation unless he first conducts a good faith, reasonably diligent (but unsuccessful) search for the copyright owner"

In Canada, we call them unlocatable copyright owners, an overview of Canadian treatment is on The Copyright Board of Canada's page.

Viacom et al v. Youtube et al

I have been following the above U.S. copyright infringement lawsuit. Click here for links to the court documents.