Playboy’s lawsuit against Boing Boing bounces back
A US court has dismissed a lawsuit brought by Playboy Entertainment Group with leave to amend, as the facts produced failed to support the company’s copyright infringement allegation.
District Judge Fernando Olguin delivered the order at the US District Court for the Central District of California on Wednesday, February 14.
As reported by sister site TBO, men’s entertainment magazine Playboy filed the copyright infringement claim against Happy Mutants, the company behind technology and culture website Boing Boing, in November 2017.
Playboy complained that Boing Boing had violated its copyright by linking an online feature to an image gallery and YouTube video which featured pirated copies of the magazine’s notorious fold-out photographs of naked women.
Boing Boing referred to the complaint as a “ baseless, bizarre case”. The content linked to was not created, hosted, or stored by Boing Boing, the company said.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), representing the technology website, filed a motion to dismiss the claim last month. It told the court that Boing Boing was merely reporting on a historical collection of centrefolds.
Yesterday the court granted the motion to dismiss, allowing Playboy leave to amend the complaint by February 26.
Olguin quoted a decision from 2014 in a copyright complaint brought by film director Quentin Tarantino, relating to a copy of his script for the film “ The Hateful Eight”.
“An allegation that a defendant merely provided the means to accomplish an infringing activity is insufficient to establish a claim for copyright infringement.
“Rather, liability exists if the defendant engages in personal conduct that encourages or assists the infringement.”
Taking that standard into account, Olguin was “sceptical that plaintiff has sufficiently alleged facts to support either its inducement or material contribution theories of copyright infringement”.
The EFF has called the dismissal a “win for free expression” and a “good result for supporters of online journalism and sensible copyright”.
Despite Playboy being granted leave to amend, the EFF hopes the men’s lifestyle magazine will “choose not to continue with its misguided suit”.
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