LCA and Other Groups Join Electronic Frontier Foundation to File Amicus Brief in UMG v. Veoh
On July 26, 2010, the Library Copyright Alliance joined a coalition of public interest and consumer groups in an amicus brief written by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) asking the Ninth Circuit to reject the arguments made by Universal Music Group (UMG) and affirm the lower court's decision in UMG v. Veoh. Read Brief [PDF]
LCA Files Amicus Brief in Costco v. Omega
On July 8, 2010, the Library Copyright Alliance filed an amici curiae brief in support of the Petitioner, urging the Court to reject the Ninth Circuit's interpretation of the first sale doctrine. Read Brief [PDF]
LCA Members and Other Groups File Amicus Brief in Viacom v. YouTube
On April 12, 2010, members of the Library Copyright Alliance joined other groups in filing an amici curiae brief urging the Court to reject the Plaintiffs' interpretation of Section 512 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Read Brief [PDF]
ARL, ALA, and ACRL and Other Groups File Amicus Brief in Vernor v. Autodesk, Inc.
On February 11, 2010, the Library Copyright Alliance members joined the Consumer Federation of America (CFA), the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Public Knowledge (PK), and U.S. Public Interest Research Group (U.S. PIRG) in filing an amici curiae brief asking the Court to affirm the lower court ruling, recognizing that a proper application of the first sale doctrine here requires a ruling in favor of Mr. Vernor’s right to resell the four AutoCAD CD-ROMs at issue. Read Brief [PDF]
ARL, ALA and ACRL and Other Groups File Amicus Brief in Salinger v. Colting
On August 3, 2009, the Library Copyright Alliance members joined the Organization for Transformative Works and the Right To Write Fund in filing an amici curiae brief asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to reverse the Federal District Court’s ruling in Salinger v. Colting. Read Brief [PDF]
LCA Files Amicus Brief in Support of Google
On July 20, 2006, members of the Library Copyright Alliance signed on to a legal brief in support of Google in Perfect 10 Inc., v. Google, Inc. The brief addresses three issues of essential importance for the future of the internet, (1) whether providing a link to an image hosted on a third party website directly infringes a copyright owner’s public display right: (2), the proper legal standards governing the application of copyright’s secondary liability principles to internet search engines like Google; and (3) whether the creation and display of thumbnails by search engines properly qualifies as fair use. Read Brief [PDF]
U.S. Supreme Court Rules on MGM v. Grokster
June 27, 2005--In a unanimous ruling in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios v. Grokster, the U.S. Supreme Court declared that distributors of peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing systems may be held liable if they actively induce copyright infringement by users of those P2P systems. Importantly, the Court strongly reaffirmed its earlier ruling in Sony Corp of America v. Universal City Studios which held that technologies could not be outlawed if they were capable of substantial noninfringing uses. The Library Copyright Alliance welcomes this balanced decision that supports the interests of libraries while addressing issues of widespread copyright infringement. By focusing on conduct that induces infringement, rather than on the distribution of technology, the decision ensures the continued availability of new and evolving digital technologies to libraries and their patrons. Read Press Release [PDF]
The U.S. Supreme Court's decision followed its March 29, 2005, hearing of arguments in the case Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios v. Grokster. This is an important case to the library, education, technology and consumer electronics communities as there are significant implications for future technological development and innovation. In this case, 28 entertainment companies sued the makers of file-sharing services, Grokster, Kazaa, and Morpheus. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled that file-sharing services were not liable for their users' illegal activity. The ruling cited the precedent set in the U.S. Supreme Court decision, Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios (known as the Sony Betamax decision, 1984), and noted that file sharing systems have significant non-infringing uses not unlike videocassette recorders that allow consumers to make copies of copyrighted works for the purposes of time-shifting. The Library Copyright Alliance (composed of American Association of Law Libraries, American Library Association, Association of Research Libraries, Medical Library Association, and Special Libraries Association), the Internet Archive, the ACLU, and Project Gutenberg filed an amicus brief before the U.S. Supreme Court. The brief presented includes examples of peer-to-peer applications in the education and library arenas as well as a focus on free speech issues. Read Brief [PDF] These organizations also filed an amicus brief when the case was before the Court of Appeals. Read Brief [PDF]