NIPC Law

It is perhaps eccentric if not downright ungrateful to promote a different business model for the music and motion picture industries having rebuilt my practice on advising and representing defendants to copyright infringement claims by trade associations in those industries but a flower is a great deal cheaper than an intellectual property lawyer and not necessarily less effective.  Before considering Mr.Justice Arnold's judgment in  EMI Records Ltd and Others v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd and Others     [2013] EWHC 379 (Ch), [2013] WLR(D) 86 it is perhaps worth watching Amanda Palmer's video on The Art of Asking and pondering her message which I have reproduced from the TED website : "Don't make people pay for music, says Amanda Palmer: Let them. In a passionate talk that begins in her days as a street performer (drop a dollar in the hat for the Eight-Foot Bride!), she examines the new relationship between artist and fan. Alt-rock icon Amanda Fucking Palmer...

In Dramatico Entertainment Ltd and Others v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd and Others [2012] EWHC 268 (Ch) (20 Feb 2012) Mr. Justice Arnold concluded that both users and the operators of the Pirate Bay website infringed the copyrights of the claimants (and those they represent) in the UK. That had been the trial of preliminary issues that Mr. Justice Henderson had ordered in respect of applications by various businesses in the music industry for injunctions requiring the defendant internet service providers to block access to The Pirate Bay under s.97A of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 .   I wrote about the case in  "Injunctions against ISPs Part III: Dramatico Entertainment Ltd and Others v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd. and Others " (21 Feb 2012). In  Dramatico Entertainment Ltd and Others v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd and Others  (No. 2) [2012] EWHC 1152 (Ch) (02 May 2012) the judge granted the blocking order. Analysing s.97A the judge directed...

After disappointments with Scarlet  and Netlog , the withdrawal of SOPA and PIPA and Her Majesty's Government's acceptance of the Hargreaves Report , Big Copyright had something to cheer about.  In  Dramatico Entertainment Ltd and Others v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd and Others [2012] EWHC 268 (Ch) (20 Feb 2012) Mr. Justice Arnold concluded that both users and operators of The Pirate Bay ( "TPB" ) infringe the copyrights of the claimant record companies in the UK. TPB weren't there, of course.   As the judge noted at paragraph [12] of his judgment, one of the founders of TPB was believed to be in Cambodia but the others have scattered to the four winds. All attempts to serve them with Swedish proceedings have come to nought. Not surprising as they have all been convicted of offences there. Not only were TPB missing from Dramatico but so too were the internet service providers ("ISPs") against whom orders under s.97A of the Copyright, Designs and P...