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A
UNESCO treaty on cultural diversity will take effect in March
2007 - over Hollywood's objections - after being ratified
by 35 nations, including Canada, Mexico and the European
Union. UNESCO
Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of
Cultural Expressions The
European Court of Justice has held that Spain violated the EC
Rental & Lending Rights Directive by exempting almost all
establishments from the obligation to pay royalties to authors
of loaned works Commission
of the European Communities v. Kingdom of Spain An
appeals court in Australia has held that the operator of the
website mp3s4free.net violated that country's Copyright Act by
linking to other websites from which infringing music
recordings could be downloaded. Cooper
v Universal Music Australia Pty Ltd The
Canadian Supreme Court has held that The Globe and Mail
newspaper may not republish freelance articles in electronic
databases from which articles may be retrieved individually,
though it may republish freelance articles on a
CD-ROM that displays an entire issue of the newspaper. Robertson
v. Thomson Corp. Washington Monitor It
is now OK to circumvent technological measures that control
access to certain kinds of copyrighted works, despite the
DMCA's general ban on circumvention, including some movies and
TV programs used by film professors in college classes, and
video games in obsolete formats, the Librarian of Congress has
ruled. Exemption
to Prohibition on Circumvention of Copyright Protection
Systems for Access Control Technologies
Sony
BMG Music has settled claims made by California and Texas as a
result of the company's selling CDs containing secret
copy-prevention software that infected users' computers. California
Settlement Announcement and Documents Texas
Settlement Announcement and Documents Recent
Cases Virgin
Records has been awarded an injunction barring an Internet
user from downloading Virgin's music without a license. Virgin
Records America, Inc. v. Johnson Universal
City Studios Productions v. Bigwood Viola
v. A & E Television Networks A
clothing company infringed the trademarks of USC, LSU, Ohio
State and Oklahoma State by selling clothes bearing the
schools' color schemes and initials. Board
of Supervisors of LA State v. Smack Apparel The
Communications Decency Act grants immunity to those who
republish defamatory statements on the Internet, even if they
do so after being warned that the statements are untrue; only
the original speaker may be sued, the California Supreme Court
has ruled Barrett
v. Rosenthal
Departments
Previously Reported: The
U.S.
Supreme Court has denied cert in Brown
v. Perdue |
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