‘RealDVD’ Copyright Suit Pushed to 2009, Stymying Holiday Sales
Consumers who had hoped to easily and legally make backup copies of their DVDs will have to wait at least until February, as dueling lawsuits between vendor RealNetworks and the MPAA studios (CED Oct 1 p5) drag on into the new year.
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Lawyers for RealNetworks confirmed to us Friday that court hearings on a temporary restraining order against the company’s RealDVD copying program won’t begin until Jan. 27, thereby making it unavailable during the holiday selling season. In the hiatus, RealNetworks promised free service to customers who had downloaded a trial version of RealDVD before the court’s TRO -- assuming its application is vindicated of Hollywood’s charges of copyright infringement.
“Thousands of you who downloaded a free, 30-day trial of RealDVD will find yourselves at the end of that trial period without the ability to buy the product as promised,” RealNetworks said on its Web site and in e- mails to potential RealDVD subscribers last week. “This is because we have been forced by legal action to at least temporarily halt the sale of RealDVD by Hollywood’s largest movie studios. You shouldn’t be caught in the middle…. As a thank you for your patience we will upgrade your trial to a fully licensed copy, free of charge, if we are legally allowed to resume distribution of RealDVD,” RealNetworks said.
RealNetworks told customers it expects a ruling on the case “in the first part of next year.” The company’s lawyers wouldn’t speculate on that. “The hearing on the preliminary injunction is scheduled for January 27 through 29,” said Colleen Bal, RealNetworks’ outside counsel in the case, in response to our queries. She wouldn’t speculate further. The case is being heard in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, by Judge Marilyn Patel.
RealNetworks’ CEO Rob Glaser said the company expects to prevail in the case (CED 10/31 p8). Its $30 program enables consumers to copy DVDs they already own to a PC hard drive, for viewing there. But the content is locked to that PC or others with a RealDVD license registered to the original customer, and can’t be distributed on the Internet or to portable devices. RealNetworks claims it doesn’t circumvent DVD’s Content Scramble System, and therefore can’t be sued as violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.