JOLT Digest

District of Massachusetts reduces jury-awarded damages by 90 percent in copyright infringement lawsuit
By Abby Lauer – Edited by Jad Mills

Sony BMG Music Entertainment et. al. v. Tenenbaum, No. 07cv11446-NG (D. Mass. July 9, 2010)
Slip Opinion

In a decision by Judge Nancy Gertner, the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts reduced the damages awarded by a jury to members of the recording industry in a copyright infringement lawsuit. After finding defendant Joel Tenenbaum guilty of illegally downloading copyrighted music, the jury awarded statutory damages of $22,500 per song, $675,000 total for 30 songs. Judge Gertner held that the damages award should be reduced to $2,250 per song or $67,500 total. In so holding, Judge Gertner maintained that the jury’s award was far greater than necessary to serve the government’s interest in deterring copyright infringement and compensating copyright owners whose rights have been infringed. She argued that Congress never intended the extraordinary damages provisions of copyright law to apply to situations where a defendant did not receive pecuniary benefit from his infringing activities.

Ars Technica provides an overview of the case. The Electronic Frontier Foundation commends the court’s decision. (more…)

Another Win for the Record Companies in an Inducement Claim Against Lime Wire
By Sharona Hakimi – Edited By Ryan Ward

Arista Records LLC v. Lime Group LLC, No. 06 CV 5936 (KMW) (S.D.N.Y. May 11, 2010)
Slip Opinion

On May 11, 2010, the Southern District Court of New York granted summary judgment against Lime Wire for inducing copyright infringement of Arista Records’ music, but denied summary judgment for either side on Arista’s contributory infringement claim. The court held that Lime Wire committed a “substantial amount of copyright infringement,” induced others to commit copyright infringement, and engaged in unfair competition using its LimeWire application. Additionally, the court held Lime Wire’s chairman and CEO, Mark Gorton, and its principle investor, the Lime Group, liable for the inducement.

The Wall Street Journal Law Blog offers a brief summary of the case. Ars Technica and Eric Goldman discuss the case and the court’s inducement analysis. The New York Times provides background and reports on the reactions of academics and industry members to the case. (more…)

By Kassity Liu

India’s Stringent Patentability Standards Cause Corporate Dissatisfaction

On February 12, the WSJ Law Blog reported that India’s standards for patentability may be leading to a lack of significant patent protection for important pharmaceutical drugs. Before 2005, India offered patent protection to processes for making pharmaceutical drugs, but no protection to the products themselves. After the patent system was extended to cover the products, a large number of multinational drug companies began to market their products in India. However, as time passed, many companies became dissatisfied as they found that the new laws were not as protective as the U.S. and Europe. The WSJ post notes several examples of inadequate protection, including the recent Deli High Court’s refusal to ban a competitor’s copy of Bayer’s cancer drug Nexovar. However, one executive of an Indian generic drug manufacturer favors India’s high standard for patentability, claiming that “[t]he U.S. would grant a patent to a piece of toilet paper.”

FBI Challenges Probable Cause Standard for Cell-Phone Data

On February 11, the WSJ Law Blog reported that Third Circuit panel in Philadelphia was set to hear an appeal on February 12 of a lower court decision denying the government’s request to access cell phone records without probable cause. Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff reports that the FBI has increasingly been obtaining cell-phone records for criminal investigations without a showing of probable cause. Advocacy organizations such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation and ACLU support the probable cause standard, and argue that Fourth Amendment requires the government to “show that it has good reason to think such tracking will turn up evidence of a crime” before it can pull private cell-phone data. However, the government believes that the Fourth Amendment does not protect cell-phone data which they consider to be “routine business records.”

P2P File-Swapper Thomas-Rasset Set to Face Third Jury Trial

On February 9, Ars Technica reported that Jammie Thomas-Rasset is set to face a third trial on the issue of damages. In her last trial, a jury returned a $1.92 million verdict against Thomas-Rasset, which the judge reduced to $54,000 on remittitur. The RIAA refused to accept the new award out of concern that the judgment would effectively cap statutory damages for individuals who illegally download and upload music to $2,250 per song. The new trial comes as a surprise to many, since the amount of damages is the only issue at stake, and the judge has already held that anything over $54,000 would be excessive.

First Circuit Explains Judgment Against File-Sharer Tannenbaum
By Eric Engle  – Edited by Miriam Weiler

Sony BMG Music Entertainment et al. v. Tannenbaum, Case No. 07cv11446-NG (Dist. Mass., Dec. 7, 2009)
Memorandum and Order

The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts elaborated on its July 27 summary judgment against Joel Tannenbaum, holding that file sharing for personal use was not presumptively fair under the Fair Use doctrine.  In so holding, the court suggested that Tannenbaum could have escaped liability with a more tailored fair use argument, but his expansive argument failed.

The Copyrights and Campaigns Blog provides an overview of the case and its commentary. Ars Technica criticizes the decision as being badly litigated and missing a chance to extend the fair use doctrine to encompass sampling music prior to purchase or space-shifting to store purchased music more efficiently. Wired.com defends Professor Nesson’s litigation strategy.

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By Stephanie Weiner – Edited by Evelyn Breithaupt

On July 31, a Boston federal jury ordered physics Ph.D student Joel Tenenbaum to pay $675,000 in damages to various recording companies for willfully infringing 30 songs by downloading them over KaZaA — an award of $22,500 per song. It was only the second file-sharing case to go to verdict in the Recording Industry Association of America’s (RIAA) anti-downloading litigation campaign, along with that of Jammie Thomas-Rasset, though thousands are settled or pending.

Each day of the trial was thoroughly covered by Ben Sheffner, guest reporting at Arstechnica. JoelFightsBack — Tenenbaum’s defense team’s blog — provides extensive information about the case, including firsthand accounts from Tenenbaum himself. Ray Beckerman argues that the most salient legal issues remain unresolved, and that the plaintiffs ought to have been held to higher evidentiary standards in order to establish infringement and entitlement to statutory damages higher than the minimum available.

Defending Tenenbaum was Harvard Law School professor Charles Nesson, whose unusual litigation tactics have been much blogged about since he took the case in September 2008.

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