Recently, on December 12, 2023, the Copyright Royalty Judges announced a cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) increase in the mechanical royalty rates for the 17 U.S.C. §115 statutory license for making and distributing phonorecords of nondramatic musical works regarding physical phonorecords and Permanent Downloads. The new rate is 12.40 cents per reproduction or 2.39 cents per [...]
by Madeline Rains, edited by BNSesq The backbone of Marvel Comics has always been the wealth of intellectual property possessed by the company. Its success was based around complete ownership of its characters, until Marvel ultimately sold its film rights for select characters to other studios in the 1990’s, following financial turmoil. Marvel’s struggle [...]
Is it time for Congress to draft a replacement for the 1976 Copyright Law? In point of fact, the law was drafted almost half a decade ago now and its last major amendment came in 1998 with the addition of the DMCA. Many argue that the advent of digital technology, driven of course by the [...]
By Bennett L. McMordie, ed. by Barry Neil Shrum “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do [...]
OR, What's in a Name? Personal Names as Trade Names REMIXED. By Barry Neil Shrum, Esquire (with Ashley Trout) "That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." You may know this quote from William Shakespeare’s classic play Romeo and Juliet or from the more "pop-culture" reference by Anne Hathaway [...]
A decade’s worth of music file-sharing and swiping has made clear that the people it hurts are the creators... and the people this reverse Robin Hooding benefits are rich service providers, whose swollen profits perfectly mirror the lost receipts of the music business. -Bono (New York Times, January 2010) March 11, 2011. The passage of the [...]
By Barry Neil Shrum, Esquire and Nathan Drake The classical libertarian, Frédéric Bastiat, is quoted as saying: In the full sense of the word, man is born a proprietor. . . . Faculties are only an extension of the person; and property is nothing but an extension of the faculties. To separate a man from [...]
The search engine giant Google, known for its colorful name and creative endeavors, has been convicted in French Court of infringing the copyrights of four artistic works and now faces fines upwards of $600,000, not including legal costs and attorneys fees. The plaintiffs in the case was made up of four entities who owned the [...]
By Barry Neil Shrum & Nathan Drake In November 2010, the Federal Immigration and Counterfeit Enforcement agency ("ICE") recently seized 82 websites and shut them down on the grounds that they were committing criminal copyright infringement. One of these websites has recently become the spotlight of attention:. Brain McCarthy, the owner and operator of channelsurfing.net, [...]
NBC Universal recently hired a company called Envisional to study counterfeiting activity over the Internet. The results of this study – despite the fact that it is industry funded – are literally astonishing: 24% of all global Internet traffic involves digital theft! Stated another way, one in every four people surfing the Internet are stealing [...]
