the litigation ledger - Industry Trend or Event

Emedia Professional, March, 2000 by Michelle Manafy

DVD Copy Control Association vs. 72 Web Sites

The DVD Copy Control Association filed suit against 21 individuals and 72 Web sites for posting information and utilities designed to break the copy protection on DVD movies. Once the Content Scrambling System encryption was cracked, Web sites began publishing the information. The group responsible for reverse-engineering the CSS voluntarily took down the information, but others have not. Among the defendants in the current lawsuit are Emmanuel Goldstein, editor and founder of 2600 magazine and Slashdot.org. Jeff Bates, executive editor for Slashdot.org, was also named in the suit.

ORealNetworks vs. Streambox

RealNetworks, Inc. is suing Streambox, Inc., alleging that the startup is a violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle, RealNetworks alleged that Streambox has infringed on its copyrights by manufacturing software that enables users to copy audio and video intended for broadcast by RealNetworks software. The Streambox software also allows users to convert the files into other formats, including MP3 and Microsoft's Windows Media Player. In addition, RealNetworks asserted that because Streambox allows users to download and install its Ferret software as an add-on component to the RealPlayer, it undermines RealNetworks' licensing agreement with Snap LLC. Snap has the exclusive right to perform searches conducted through the RealPlayer and pays RealNetworks a fee for each search. In response to the lawsuit, the U.S. District Court granted a temporary injunction against Streambox to halt the development, production, and sale of its Ripper, VCR, and Ferret software.