September 29, 2006
Grokster Remand Decision Ain’t Pretty
Fred von Lohmann: “More Bad News for Innovators” (See also EFF’s posts on the decision from last summer, starting here.)
Bill Patry’s analysis.
Filed by Derek Slater at 11:03 am under General news
1 Comment
[…] Grokster puts Microsoft in a very different position from Apple. Under the Grokster inducement test, the courts are empowered to look very closely at a company’s internal records for any indication that it knew and intended for its product to be used to infringe copyrights. The Grokster Court found such evidence in internal corporate memoranda and e-mails, in the defendants’ business plans, and (most tellingly) in the fact that neither defendant “made an effort to filter copyrighted material from users’ downloads or otherwise impede the sharing of copyrighted files.” Indeed, if the lower court’s subsequent opinion in Grokster on remand from the Supreme Court is correct (about which I’m skeptical, but only time will tell), plaintiffs now aren’t required to demonstrate anything except that the defendant distributed a product with the intention that somebody use it to infringe. […]