3 Count: Walking Away

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1: Premier League Drops Copyright Infringement Case Against YouTube

First off today, Owen Gibson at The Guardian reports that The UK Premier League, along with the French Tennis Federation and several record labels, have dropped their lawsuit against Google-owned YouTube for copyright infringement.

The groups had sued YouTube in New York back in 2007 alleging that the site, especially in its early years, was a haven for copyright infringing videos and was responsible for at least some of that infringement. They had sought to make the suit a class action lawsuit but, in May, a judge denied a request to do so saying it was unrealistic as different copyright holders had different facts.

The case is separate from and followed Viacom’s better-known $1 billion claim against YouTube, which is still ongoing.

2: Piracy Release Group Has Been Spying on Downloaders For 9 Months

Next up today, Andy at Torrentfreak writes that the software piracy group MeGaHeRTZ has been found to be distributing malware with its releases and using it to collect information about user computers.

The group was part of the warez community and would distribute illegal software with a patch to break copyright protections. However, a researcher found that the patch included malware code that was sending information about the user, including their username, computer name, serial numbers and the host machine’s IP address. That information was then sent via email addresses to accounts connected with the organization.

The group had been operating for about nine months and had released many popular applications. Though the warez community they were a part of has “nuked” all of their releases, other copies are widely available on other file sharing sites.

3: NMPA Targets Unlicensed Lyric Sites, Rap Genius Among 50 Sent Take-Down Notices

Finally today, Alex Pham at Billboard reports that the National Music Publishers Association (NMPA) has sent some 50 lyrics sites takedown notices, including the popular site Rap Genius, which recently received a $15 million investment.

The NMPA highlighted that this was not a campaign against personal sites for fan pages, but rather, only commercial sites that were using lyrics without an appropriate license. David Israelite, the Chief Executive of the NMPA, added that it is fairly simple to license lyrics through multiple providers.

According to Israelite, sites that don’t respond to the takedown notices either by obtaining a license or shutting down will be sued. The organization recently won a $6.6 million judgment against LiveUniverse, which the NMPA said was operating an illegal lyric site.

Suggestions

That’s it for the three count today. We will be back tomorrow with three more copyright links. If you have a link that you want to suggest a link for the column or have any proposals to make it better. Feel free to leave a comment or send me an email. I hope to hear from you.

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