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Media Studies 1 > Lawsuits > Flashcards

Lawsuits Flashcards

1
Q

Issues in Stigwood vs Sperber?

A
  1. Does the use of 20/23 songs in sequential fashion constitute a dramatic presentation?
  2. Can Sperber use the name OATC?
  3. Can Sperber use JCS in the Ads?
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2
Q

What happened in Sitgwood vs Sperber?

A

Robert Stigwood group acquired rights for stage productions and dramatic presentations of JCS, Betty Sperber wants to make a concert using 20/23 songs for her company OATC(original American theatre company)

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3
Q

What happened in Disney v Air Pirates?

A

Disney claimed that Air Pirates copied the graphic depiction of over seventeen characters, each contained in the comics. Issue was whether the Air Pirates’ work constituted fair use as a parody or an infringement on Disney’s IP rights

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4
Q

What were the issues in Disney v Air Pirates?

A
  1. Are the characters, as distinguishable from
    the entire work, copyrightable? Disney’s characters were, yes due to the style
  2. Is the copying protected by fair use? No, they were too similar
  3. Is the conduct protected by the First Amendment? No
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5
Q

What kind of case was Disney v Air Pirates?

A

Civil, involving copyright and trademark law

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6
Q

What were similarities and differences between Disney and Air Pirates

A

Similarities: graphic depiction, names of characters

Differences: themes/plots, all other respects

Disney: image of innocent delightfulness

Air Pirates: message of significance couched in allegorical terms

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7
Q

What happened in Haley v Courlander

A

Civil case: Dispute over plagiarism

Haley: famous writer (Roots: There Saga of an American Family)
Courlander: noted folklorist
(The African)

Issues: copyright infringement: Roots contained substantial portions of The African (direct passages, characters etc)

Result: settled

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8
Q

What was the test that emerged from the Haley case?

A

Substantial similarity test:

Three-fold test:
1. Access
2. Familiarity
3. Similarity

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9
Q

What was the George Harrison case?

A

Unintentional copyright infringement, civil case

“My Sweet Lord” by George Harrison was accused of plagiarising “He’s So Fine” by the Chiffons

Issues: “My Sweet Lord” copied the melody and chord progression and it would be too similar to “He’s so Fine”

Harrison argued that he hadn’t deliberately copied “He’s So Fine”

Harrison had to pay 1.6 mil in damages, songs were substantially similar

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10
Q

What is the ASCAP?

A

American Society of authors and Publishers (1914)

Oldest performance rights org in USA, protect rights of music creators by licensing their works, collecting royalties and distributing them to songwriters, and music publishers who own the rights to the music

Charge broadcasters rates to play music e.g. on the radio

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11
Q

What is BMI?

A

Broadcast Music Incorporated

Main competitor of ASCAP

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12
Q

What is payola?

A

Illegal taking of unreported gifts from record promoters in exchange of heavy airplay

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13
Q

What happened in Columbia Pictures v Red Horne?

A

Copyright infringement case: Whether a video rental store (Maxwell’s) that allowed customers to watch rented movies in private viewing booths infringed on the copyright holder’s exclusive right to publicly perform the work

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14
Q

What were the issues of Columbia Pictures vs Red Horne

A
  1. Does the showing of a videocassette in a private booth in Red Horne’s establishment constitute a public performance? Yes, listed on the same page as movie theatre listings
  2. Does the First Sale doctrine protect Red Horne from infringement claims? No, does not deal of showing of the material
  3. Are Robert and Glenn Zeny and the Red Horne company contributory infringers? Yes
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15
Q

What is the first sale doctrine?

A

Prevents owners of the materials from controlling the distribution and display

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16
Q

Significance of Red Horne case?

A

Killed the idea of the in-store rental concept

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17
Q

What happened in Spielberg v Litchfield

A

Litchfield wrote one-act play: “Lokey from Maldemar” (symbolic, moral and ethical questions)

Spielberg directed ET (children’s tale about befriending and saving a lost alien)

Litchfield continued to market her play after Universal rejected it, claimed that Spielberg copied her idea

18
Q

What were the issues in Spielberg v Litchfield

A

(1) Did the producers of the motion picture, E.T., — The Extra Terrestrial, infringe the copyright of a musical play, Lokey from Maldemar No

(2) was summary judgment (court makes decision without full trial) proper on the issue of substantial similarity? No

19
Q

How to prove similarity of ideas?

A

Extrinsic test: requires comparison of plot, theme, dialogue, mood, setting

20
Q

How to prove similarity of expression?

A

Intrinsic test: tests the response of the ordinary person

21
Q

How to prove similarity of ideas?

A

Extrinsic, requires comparison of plot, theme, dialogue, mood, setting

22
Q

What is a derivative work?

A

A work based upon a pre-existing work
e.g. Madame Butterfly
Long wrote story, Belasco bought dramatic rights, Italian Opera Company purchases musical rights

Rights are divisible- as you move from one medium to another you create new rights

23
Q

What is the criteria for a fair use case?

A

Purpose of the use, nature of the work, amount taken, market effect

24
Q

What happened in Sony Vs Universal Studios and what were the issues?

A

Fair-use case

Determined whether Sony, as the manufacterer of the Betamax VCR, was liable for contributory copyright infringement since consumers were using VCR to record TV programs at home (without permission from copyright holders)

Ruling:
- Time-shifting fell under fair use
Majority opinion: recording TV programs to watch later was non-commercial, private use

  • Sony could not be held liable for contributory infringement bc the VCR was capable of substantial infringing use
25
Q

What was the impact of Sony vs Universal?

A
  • Allowed growth of video recoding tech, paved the way for MP3 and DVRs
  • Expanded the concept of fair-use, especially around the idea of time shifting
  • Safe harbor for tech producers- manufacturers of tech products cannot be held liable for contributory copyright infringement
26
Q

What are the two kinds of derivative works?

A

Public domain work and existing with a valid copyright

27
Q

What happened in Yonay v Paramount Pictures 2022 and what were the issues?

A

Heirs of author Ehud Money sued Paramount, claiming copyright infringement related to “Top Gun: Maverick”

Copyright of Top Gun novel was terminated in 2018 under Section 203 of US Copyright Act

Paramount preceded with production of TGN without securing a new license, saying it was a new story

Court ruled that there was no substantial similarity, granted Paramount summary judgment but found that there were similar thematic elements

Nevertheless paramount did not have to reacquire rights from Yonan’s estate

28
Q

What happened in Werlin vs Reader’s Digest and what were the issues?

A

Eileen Werlin submitted a report to Reader’s Digest on Bat Mitzvah of a girl with Down syndrome, got denied, but later staff from RD (Joseph Blank) created an agile on this topic anyways

Down Syndrome: a third copy of Chromosome 21

Significant bc introduces the idea of the “ideas” test

Court gives Werlin $500: kill fee instead of spotter’s fee

views case as “unjust enrichment”

made ideas/expression dichotomy more naucned- in some situations now we will protect ideas

29
Q

What is the ideas test:

A
  1. Novel
  2. Concrete
  3. Actually appropriated by the previous party
30
Q

What happened in Zacchini v Scripps and what were the issues?

A

Hugo Zacchini (human cannonball performer) act was recorded, broadcast on news w/o consent

Sued for “right of publicity”, argued he couldn’t profit from his performance (performed in private property)

Key issue: whether First Amendment protected news station use of the footage or whether Zacchini’s right to control the commercial exploration of his act took precedence

Court ruled in favour of Zacchini: First Amendment does not immunise unauthorised commercial use of someone’s whole performance

Significance: recognise issue of right of publicity

Covers name, likeness and appearance
Links to labor theory of IP

31
Q

What happened in Presley v Russen and what were the issues?

A

Right of publicity case:
Estate of Elvis sued Russen, who produced a live show called “The Big El Show”- heavily featured an Elvis impersonator

Issues: Whether Russen’s use of Presley’s likeness and persona vilolated Elvis’ posthumous right of publicity?

Court’s ruling: Ruled in favour of Presley estate
Said that the show capatzlied on Elvis’ identity in a way that went beyond fair use/tribute
(Recreated specific elements of Elvis’ persona, performance, exploited his fame for commercial gain)

Significance: right of publicity after death
reeinforce how indiivduals/estates have control over the commercial exploitation of their name, likeness + image

32
Q

What is the issue of colorisation?

A

Is it a copyright problem? No.
Arugments in favor:

-Makes movies mroe marketable
-Owners own the copyright- control the work
- Colorized work should be treated as derivative

Against:
- Movies were written, designed based upon black and white asthetic
- - Mutliating original vision of artist
- Distraction

33
Q

What happened in Sellers v ABC and what were the issues?

A

Related to television broadcast about Elvis’ death

Larry Sellers contracted with Geraldo Rivera about a story about Elvis’ death

Sellers signed an agreement guaranteeing him all copyright privileges, requiring AC to credit him hit uncovering the true cause of Elvis’s death: that his physician replaced cortisone he was supposed to be taking with placebos bc they wanted to prevent him from seeking repayment f a $1.3 million loan

Nine months after getting Seller’s story, Rivera does a story

Conclusion: Elvis did of a bad interaction of drugs (polypharmacy), not cardiac arrthymia

Seller claims that he told Rivera about the interaction of drugs and negligence of physicians in overprescribing them

Court says: because he didn’t use the cortisone theory, Rivera was in the clear

Significant because uses ideas test:
Needs to be
- Novel
- Concrete
- One appropriated by the defendant

But what Seller wasn’t concrete enough to meet this test

34
Q

What happened in Midler v Ford Motor Co?

A

Right of publicity case

Ford Motor Co wants to do an ad using Bette Midler’s voice singing “Do you want to dance”
She refused, so they used her backup singer Ula Hedwig to imitate her

9th circuit decision, adds “voice” to protectible elements of copyright

conclusion: voice is not copyrightable, but can be protected under right of publicity

ruled in favour of bette midler, awarded 400,000 in damages

35
Q

What happened in Basic Books v Kinkos?

A

1991 Innovative technology case: involves creation of a course packet to distribute reading materials to students

Kinko’s bookstore that sells college course packets
Several major publishing companies including Basic Books sued Kinko’s alleging copyright infringement

Kinko’s argued that it was fair-use, as course packets were being used for educational reasons

However
Court ruled against Kinko’s
found that commercial sale of course packets did not qualify for fair-use, done for profit, involved substantial portions of the works

36
Q

What happened in LA Times v Free Republic?

A

Fair-use case

Free republic (bulletin board-like website) took LA times articles and put it on their website

FR claims readers sometimes go back to the original source

Purpose of the use:
FR claims its transformative, does not use linking bc that would confuse readers

Nature of the work?
Defendant claims its non-profit- doesn’t market/sell a product or generate revenue

Amount taken: whole article

Market effect:
FR has 20,000 registered users, receives as many as 100,000 hits per day
Attracts between 25 to 50 million page views each month
Court says that FR copies are exact substitutes for plaintiff’s works

Finds 3/4 factors to weigh in plaintiffs favor- defendant’s motion is denied

37
Q

What happened in Kelly v Arriba?

A

Search engine case with Fair-use

Arriba operates a visual search engine on internet. The engine retrieves images, not descriptive text. Produces a list of reduced thumbnail sketches

Kelly: photographer who specializes in images of Gold Rush era. In Jan 1999, 35 of Kelly’s pictures put into Arriba database

Purpose + character of the use:
use of thumbnails was transformative, changes Kelly’s works from artistic tools to search engine tools

Nature of the work: artistic work

Amount taken:
Images were significantly reduced in size and quality, but still too big when full-size

Effect on market:
Did not harm market for images

Result
2/4 factors favoured fair use

Bc first factor most important, ruled that it was fair-use

38
Q

What happened in Mattel v MCA

A

2002, Mattel sued MCA records over the song “Barbie Girl” by Danish band AQUA

Claimed that the song infringed on the Barbie trademark, tarnished image of Barbie brand

Issues:
Fear of trademark dilution
First Amendment Defense: MCA records contended that the song was a parody, protected by First Amendment’s free speech rights

Court’s ruling:
“Barbie Girl” was a parody
Use of Barbie seen as artistic expression and social commentary on the doll’s cultural significance, not an attempt to dilute/tarnish the trademark.

“The parties are advised to chill”

39
Q

What happened in Quality Inn v McDonald’s

A

1988, Quality Inn attempted to launch new chain of budget hotels: McSleep Inn

Issues: McDonald’s argued that use of “Mc” infringed on its family of trademarks e.g. McMuffin

Fear of trademark dilution, even though businesses were in different industries

Court ruled in favour of McDonald’s saying that the name was likely to cause consumer confusion.

Created a permanent injunction prohibiting Quality Inns from using the name “McSleep” or any variation of “Mc” in connection with its hotels

40
Q

What is summary judgment?

A

When the judge makes a determination on all the issues in dispute

Media Studies 1 (8 decks)

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