Katy Perry, team ordered to pay $2.7 million for copying song

LOS ANGELES, United States — A US gospel rapper whose song was partially copied by Katy Perry was awarded $2.7 million in damages by a federal jury Thursday in the latest high-profile copyright ruling to rock the music industry.

Perry herself was ordered to pay just over $550,000 to Marcus Gray -- who performs as "Flame" -- after the jury found that a beat used in her 2013 song "Dark Horse" constituted copyright infringement.

The ruling followed a weeklong trial in Los Angeles where Perry took the witness stand and said she had never heard of Gray's 2009 rap "Joyful Noise."

Perry's representatives immediately vowed to appeal if the case is not dismissed pending a defense motion.

"The writers of 'Dark Horse' consider this a travesty of justice," attorney Christine Lepera said outside court.


Gray's lawyers had argued for a far higher penalty of around $20 million.

"These defendants made millions and millions of dollars from their infringement of the plaintiffs' song," attorney Michael Kahn told the court.

During the trial, Perry's lawyers said the two songs' underlying beat was "commonplace" and therefore cannot be copyrighted.

But Gray's lawyers said the defendants had "copied an important part" of his song, referring to a 16-second instrumental section.

Perry's label Capitol Records was ordered to pay $1.2 million of the damages. Her producers will also pay toward the sum.

Perry performed a version of "Dark Horse" at the 2015 Super Bowl, while "Joyful Noise" has been viewed more than 3 million times on YouTube.

Gray's team first brought the litigation against Perry in 2014.

The number of copyright lawsuits has been proliferating in recent years in the US.

The case follows a long-running copyright dispute by the family of Motown legend Marvin Gaye who won a nearly $5 million judgment against Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams.

Thicke and Williams were accused by Gaye's estate of copyright infringement for their 2013 hit because of similarities with the late singer's "Got to Give It Up."

The initial judgment against Thicke and Williams sent shockwaves through the songwriting community, which has been accustomed to lawsuits alleging musical similarities but never expected courts to take such claims seriously.

British rock group Led Zeppelin are facing another trial over claims they copied part of "Stairway to Heaven" after a US appeals court last year overturned a 2016 judgment.

source: philstar.com

Ex-Viva Hot Babe Asia Agcaoili reveals ties to Megaupload

Former actress, TV host and Viva Hot Babe Asia Agcaoili has revealed her ties to cashiered cyberlocker Megaupload in an article she wrote for the January 2013 issue of FHM Philippines.

Although it was an editor’s comment that named Megaupload, Asia shared details of her life after she left showbiz and stopped writing her popular sex column in FHM — including her long association with the file sharing site whose controversial founder, Kim Dotcom, is married to a Filipina.

“Well, from Manila I moved to Amsterdam, Netherlands, where I lived for two years,” she said, adding that she got married there and had a son. Her husband, whom she did not name in her article, is Bram van der Kolk — a handsome Dutchman often described as a dead ringer for Matt Damon. Bram is also the chief programmer for Megaupload, which the US government took down last year with a massive copyright infringement indictment.

Now 29, Asia calls herself “a full-time housewife and mother” –except her household is far from ordinary. In 2009, she moved to New Zealand with Bram and their son Xander and lived in Kim Dotcom’s lavish mansion just outside Auckland.

In the early hours of January 20, 2012, that mansion became the scene of an FBI-sponsored commando-style raid that shut down Dotcom’s internet empire, seized all his company’s assets and saw his arrest, along with Bram and several others.

“That day was very traumatic for me,” Asia admitted. Initially, being “woken up by a man in police uniform” appealed to her naughty side.

“I thought my husband [had] hired a male stripper to perform a dance routine, and then realized after a few hours that it was not a joke at all,” she said.

That raid was subsequently declared illegal by a New Zealand court. Dotcom and his co-accused are fighting extradition to the US, where they are charged with racketeering, copyright infringement and money laundering.

On Sunday, Dotcom held a grand launch for a new content storage service called Mega, which technology blog Gizmodo has called “maybe the most private, invincible file-sharing service of all time”.

source: interaksyon.com

YouTube Users Can Make Videos Creative Commons By Default

Starting on Wednesday, YouTube users can license their videos for Creative Commons by default.

Cathy Casserly, CEO of Creative Commons (CC), wrote a blog post published on Wednesday reminding the public that its Creative Commons video program on YouTube is still up and running — and has added 40 years of video in the past year since its launch.

“Four million creative commons videos on YouTube are just waiting to be reused, remixed, and reimagined,” Casserly wrote.

The program, referred to as “CC BY” allows users to borrow media, edit it and share it without the threat of copyright violations.

“Do you need a professional opening for your San Francisco vacation video?” the blog post suggests. “Perhaps some gorgeous footage of the moon for your science project? How about a squirrel eating a walnut to accompany your hot new dubstep track?”

YouTube users can borrow content in videos marked “CC BY” and edit it in YouTube Video Editor.

Creative Commons licensing allows photographers and videographers to circulate their work, while letting publications and businesses take visuals from their large selection.

YouTube give you this scenario: “Imagine seeing your footage used by a student in Mumbai, a filmmaker in Mexico City, or a music video director in Detroit. By letting other people play with your videos, you let them into a global sandbox, kicking off a worldwide team of collaborators.”

If you’re interested in including your YouTube videos to the CC BY program follow these steps: Once you upload a video on YouTube, select “Creative Commons Attribution license” from the “License and rights ownership” menu.

source: mashable.com

Microsoft sues two Chinese IT companies over pirated software

BEIJING — Two Chinese IT companies were brought to court on Thursday for using a number of pirated Microsoft software packages in their offices, and the U.S. company is seeking at least 10 million yuan (1.59 million U.S. dollars) in compensation.

Microsoft accused Beijing Ming Wan Zhi Da Technology Co., Ltd. and Ming Wan Information Technology Co., Ltd., which jointly operate two websites and offer e-commerce solutions to small and medium-sized companies, of installing pirated Microsoft Windows, Office, Visual Studio and other software packages on the companies’ computers, according to the lawyer representing Microsoft in the case.

The two IT companies are based in Beijing and run branches across the country.

The 10 million yuan in compensation sought by Microsoft includes economic losses the U.S. company estimates it incurred related to the case. But the claim was vigorously refuted by the defense lawyer in court, citing miscalculation in the estimate, court officials said.

Microsoft also demanded the two companies issue a statement of apology in the country’s flagship newspaper the People’s Daily, the lawyer said.

The judge of Beijing No. 2 Intermediate Court ruled that the court needs to hear the case in a second trial due to stark differences in the two sides’ estimates of economic losses.

Chinese authorities have begun to crack down on the rampant use of pirated software in recent years. All levels of government agencies are required to use copyrighted software by the end of 2012.

Copyrighted software has already been installed in central government departments, and it will be popularized among local authorities in 2012, an official with the Ministry of Commerce said in December last year.

Many businesses have also begun to phase out pirated software in their offices over fears of being targeted in rising intellectual property lawsuits in the country.

source: interaksyon.com