WIPR survey: ‘Dancing baby’ case fails to get it right
The long-running ‘dancing baby’ copyright saga does not achieve the right balance between copyright and fair use, according to the majority of readers.
In response to WIPR’s latest survey, 75% of respondents claimed that the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit had failed to strike the right balance between copyright and fair use in the case.
WIPR previously reported on the potential for further review, with rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filing a petition for a writ of certiorari at the US Supreme Court.
The dispute centres on Stephanie Lenz, who had uploaded a 29-second video to YouTube of her young son dancing to Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy”.
Soon after the video appeared, Universal, which owns the copyright to the song, sent YouTube a takedown notice under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) informing it that the video was not authorised and that it should be removed.
The EFF sued Universal on Lenz’s behalf at the US District Court for the Northern District of California in 2007 for wrongfully targeting what she thought was lawful fair use.
The California court ruled that senders of false DMCA notices could be excused if they subjectively believed the targeted material was infringing, no matter how unreasonable that belief.
Ahead of the possible re-hearing of the case, WIPR asked readers if the Ninth Circuit’s ruling achieved an adequate balance between copyright and fair use.
One respondent claimed: “Anyone can ‘profess’ a belief: it would make a mockery of protection under copyright law."
Another respondent added: “There should be no excuse if the copyright owner had no objective reason for believing that the targeted material was infringing. Allowing people to rely on an objectively unreasonable belief of infringement is absurd.”
For this week’s survey we ask: “Last week we reported that Demi Lovato and Ariana Grande had been sued for copyright infringement and tha t Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams had appealed against the Blurred Lines infringement ruling. Did that ruling encourage more people to target high-profile songs for copyright infringement?”
