Righthaven Gets Smack Down By Judge: Your "business model" isn't my problem

[IScreamSundays]

Ars Technica freelancer Eriq Gardner was recently sued over a photo that appeared in a piece he wrote for us last year. The flimsy lawsuit was quickly dismissed, but the company behind it lives on—and has sued 50+ people in Colorado for their use of the same photo. Now, the federal judge overseeing all these cases has made it clear that he sees through the company's "lawsuit as revenue generation" strategy, and that he's not interested in enabling it. Righthaven is already backing down.

The company at issue here is a Las Vegas litigation firm that finds allegedly infringing newspaper posts and images online, contracts with the newspaper in question for control of the the copyright, and files federal lawsuits against its targets. Since its inception, Righthaven has made the obviously outrageous demand that the entire domain name for the site in question be locked and then turned over to the company. This has never happened, but the threat of massive damages and of losing one's Web address seem calculated to force people into settlements of a few thousand dollars.

Recently, Righthaven has filed dozens of suits in Colorado over a Denver Post photo of a TSA airport security pat-down. One of those suits targeted Brian Hill, a 20-year-old North Carolina man who ran an "alternative news" site. Hill is a "mentally and physically disabled young man who has been unwittingly swept up in this unforgiving 'business model,'" said his lawyer in a court filing. Hill has "autism, as well as a rare and severe form of diabetes known as brittle type-1 diabetes, Attention Deficit Disorder, and hyperactivity." He is cared for at home by his mother.

Judge John Kane, who is overseeing all the Colorado Righthaven suits, last week weighed in on Hill's case. Righthaven asked for a three-week extension of time to file a response in the case, hoping to settle with Hill and to avoid drafting additional court briefs in the case. Such extension requests are generally routine, but this one was opposed by Hill's lawyer, David Kerr, who absolutely blasted Righthaven in his lengthy filing (PDF).


more: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/04/judge-to-copyright-troll-your-business-model-isnt-my-problem.ars?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+arstechnica%2Findex+%28Ars+Technica+-+Featured+Content%29

[Warpy]

1. Good. More people need to dig in their heels and force those parasites

to spend time and money on going to court. It's the only way to get rid of them, make their scam financially nonviable.

[gratuitous]

2. Activist judges stifling small business!

Is Glenn Beck still on Fox? This could be the story that catapults (catapults, I say!) him back into the big time.

[chill_wind]

3. K & R.

[IScreamSundays]

4. !