A footnote on the applicability of Digital Millennium Copyright Act...
A footnote on the applicability of Digital Millennium Copyright Act safe harbors to pre-1972 songs, from the recent ruling in the MP3tunes copyright infringement case brought by EMI (WID Aug 24 p1), may not be much help to defendant Grooveshark…
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in a related case, a copyright lawyer told us. U.S. District Judge William Pauley in New York said he agreed with MP3tunes that the DMCA safe harbors apply equally to state and federal copyright claims, and thus to songs produced before Feb. 15, 1972. That’s the date before which songs had no federal copyright protection, but rather fell under various state copyright laws. The Pauley footnote had been seen as a boon to Grooveshark, the on-demand music service being sued for infringement of Universal Music Group’s pre-1972 catalog, which includes Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry and the Jackson 5. UMG brought the suit in New York Supreme Court, which handles large-dollar civil cases (WID Jan 12/10 p5). A copyright lawyer we queried, who has represented major content companies, said Pauley’s finding about the safe-harbor extension to pre-1972 songs may not “carry much persuasive weight” to the New York state court. Pauley simply stated his conclusion without explaining why he disagreed with EMI’s contention that Section 301 of the Copyright Act -- which protects “any rights or remedies under the common law or statute” of any state until 2067 -- precludes federal safe harbors. “As far as I'm aware, no court had ruled on this issue” until Pauley’s ruling, the lawyer said, noting that neither EMI nor MP3tunes mentioned any case law relevant to their claims. We couldn’t reach Grooveshark to learn whether it saw good news for its own litigation from Pauley’s footnote.