By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 7-12-16 As expected, the FCC's set-top proposal got a lot of attention at the House Communications Subcommittee FCC oversight hearing Tuesday. Among the takeaways were that the U.S. Copyright Office is concerned about the proposal, and FCC chairman Tom wheeler is committed to working with the office to [...]
Prof. Jane C. Ginsburg, Columbia University School of Law* June 29, 2016 Courts have twisted themselves into knots trying to create a test to effectively ascertain whether the artistic aspects of a useful article can be identified separately from and exist independently of the article's utilitarian function. Varsity Brands, Inc. v. Star Athletica, LLC, 799 [...]
Dean Rodney A. Smolla, Delaware Law School, Widener University June 24, 2016 Louis Vuitton can’t take a joke. That was the view of Judge Jesse Furman of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York in a decision earlier this year involving a trademark and copyright infringement action brought by Louis [...]
FOR RELEASE: June 15, 2016 Contact: Richard T. Kaplar The Media Institute 703-243-5700 Arlington, Va., June 15, 2016 –Chris Moeser of TEGNA Inc. has been elected to the Board of Trustees of The Media Institute. Moeser serves as Associate General Counsel of TEGNA, based in McLean, Va. Moeser joined TEGNA in July 2015 after [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 6-14-16 In a big and sweeping victory for the FCC, the Obama Administration and FCC chairman Tom Wheeler, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has let stand the FCC's new Open Internet order. That includes the definition of Internet service [...]
Prof. Jane C. Ginsburg, Columbia University School of Law* May 30, 2016 Photographers, graphic designers, and photo agencies have expressed dismay over the systematic stripping of copyright management information (CMI), including author identification, from images uploaded to social media platforms. Sometimes downstream users remove author identification, often unwittingly, as detailed in this recent blogpost by [...]
Dean Rodney A. Smolla, Delaware Law School, Widener University May 24, 2016 The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, in a decision by Judge Leigh Martin May, recently issued an order allowing a copyright infringement case brought on behalf of 54 Sudanese refuges against the makers of the film “The Good Lie.”1 [...]
Filed an amicus brief (with other amici) with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Yershov v. Gannett. The case involved the sharing of an anonymous device code with a data analytics provider used by USA Today. The brief argued that the district court panel relied on a highly technical reading [...]
By Des Bieler, washingtonpost.com, 4-26-16 The Washington Redskins have asked the Supreme Court to review their appeal of a federal judge’s July ruling that upheld the cancellation of their trademark. But there’s a catch: the team only wants the high court to consider its case if it takes up a similar one involving a band [...]
By John Eggerton, Broadcasting & Cable Online, 4-19-16 The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will hold a hearing April 20 on federal rulemaking and the "administrative state." Among the topics being addressed is the FCC's network neutrality rulemaking, which Republicans have been highly critical of, including the perceived pressure from the Obama Administration [...]