Righthaven defendant in new dispute over Las Vegas casino image
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29 May 2011
2:53 p.m.
Righthaven Archives
Righthaven lawsuit figure Brian D. Hill has been accused of copyright infringement again – this time involving an image of a Las Vegas casino.
Hill, 21, gained national attention after he was sued in January for copyright infringement by Las Vegas-based Righthaven LLC over a Denver Post TSA pat-down photo.
Righthaven, which sues over Las Vegas Review-Journal and Denver Post material, eventually dropped the suit against Hill.
That was after the North Carolina blogger said he has disabilities including mild autism, that he didn’t copy the photo from the Denver Post and found it elsewhere after it went viral on the Internet; and that he couldn’t afford what he said was a $6,000 settlement demand by Righthaven.
In his latest skirmish over copyrights, Hill said Sunday that a satire image he placed on Yahoo Inc.’s Flickr.com site was removed by Flickr after online travel website Destination360.com complained the image infringed on its copyright.
The image shows slot machines in what Destination360 suggests is a Las Vegas hotel-casino.
Hill said he digitally altered the image, changing a sign pointing to a hotel tower to say "Wall Street" and adding an image of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke saying"Welcome to the Wall St. Casino" and commentary from gamblers such as"Ah damn! Lost my family home,""Bye bye, Main Street" and"I am now in total debt."
"Because of my political beliefs I made the satire based on what I know was true," Hill said Sunday."I feel like Wall Street has become like a casino because people lose and win money there, so when people lose money they may lose their family home. That is why I chose a casino setting for the satire. I was never intending to make any casino look bad. If that casino got the wrong idea about my political satire, that was never my intent."
Hill’s website, USWGO.com, is now spotlighting the dispute between him, Flickr and Destination360.
"Brian will continue to go to war with any copyright troll and copyright enforcer that attempts to take away the 1st Amendment for political control and censorship!," a post there said Sunday.
A request for comment was place with Destination360.
The dispute illustrates how website owners can potentially see their material appropriated for use by others under the fair use doctrine of copyright law, which includes a specific provision for parody uses.
And this isn’t the first time Wall Street investment and banking practices have been unfavorably compared to casinos and gambling.
The New York Stock Exchange, for example, sued the New York-New York hotel-casino in Las Vegas after it opened in 1997, complaining the casino’s"Stock Exchange" and"$lot Exchange" façade slogans were "mutilating and bastardizing" NYSE trademarks.
Another example: In commenting on the 2008 financial crisis and its aftermath, a New York Times editorial complained investment banks had"turned the financial system into a casino" by designing obscure mortgage-based investments so that certain clients could bet against them.
The title of the editorial: "Wall Street Casino."
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Enough is enough. This was a satire which has been upheld time and time again not only be fair use but protected by the First Amendment.
Why do I have a feeling Righthaven has something to do with this?
Our freedom of speech is being taken away bit by bit by overbearing IP maximilists who believe IP trumps all other rights. No one needs permission to parody anyone and this complaint against Brian Hill is an attack on the very rights this country was founded upon and that is the right to speak out against institutions of power.
Brian Hill should demand Flikr reinstate this image or Brian Hill should sue both Flikr and Destination360 for civil rights violations.
Flikr is a privately owned company.
Flikr can do whatever it pleases to do. It is their property.
If you don't like Flikr then don't use their service.
You can start your own Flikr like site.
Destination 360 sent a take down notice to Flikr. They could have sued Brian. It would have been their right to do so.
Brian can't sue Flikr.
He might be able to sue Destination 360.
How ironic that would be? Suing somebody for sending a take-down notice which you guys often whine that Righthaven does not do.
Ken, I think Destination360 might have a valid complaint here. The original image, if owned by them, has nothing to do with Wall Street and is not itself being parodied, by rather is being used as a component of a larger satirical work.
If the casino depicted in the image were in fact the object of the parody then Hill might be right, but I think this one is open to debate, and with what has been said I am leaning towards Destination360 so far.
SgtRock
I'm not sure if Brian could sue Flickr or not. It may be a good idea to look into it though because companies often times take the path of least resistance and just shut something down even if the person effected was within his rights.
I do think Destination 360 is on thin ice with this one. I think this would be a good case for civil rights organizations to follow and maybe even assist in bringing a law suit against them, There are civil rights and free speech implications in this that go way beyond Brian Hill or Destination 360.
Stealing other people's work is not a civil right.
botfx
Courts have upheld that satires do not necessarily have to be aimed at the copyright holder to be protected. In fact most don't. For instance there are many satires created from images of various Presidents and obviously the President is not the copyright holder.
There are various music parodies that have been created and the parodies have nothing to do with the band or the owner of the copyright. Weird Al Yankovick generally asks permission of the copyright holder as a courtesy but there have been times he has done it without the permission from the artist.
http://www.legalzoom.com/intellectual-pr...
Your pal can file a counter notification with Flickr.
http://www.chillingeffects.org/question....
The risk of doing so is that it will either force Destination 360 to sue your pal or allow him to post his information on Flickr.
He should go for it.
Sgt Rock
Brian did send a reinstatement request to Flickr:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/56605325/My-Sa...
We will see how Flickr reacts.
Here is a good legal article on the topic.
It seems satire has a weaker position to claim fair use vs. a paroldy.
http://apps.americanbar.org/litigation/c...
You pal should fight for his 1st admendment rights and either file a counter notification or directly sue both Flickr and Destination 360 and Congress and the President and perhaps the entire court system.
Speaking of the New York Stock Exchange, they now claim to own the copyright to any image taken inside the Exchange as well as any image that includes their trademark. This would be like Disneyland claiming to own all images taken inside the park, or McDonald's saying they own any image that includes the Golden Arches.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/20...
That is a not proper counter notification claim.
Go back to the link that I provided above.
He needs to follow the instructions.
I think the website will actually send it for him.
It is not up to Flickr. Flickr will forward the counter notification to Destination 360. Destination 360 has 14 days to decide to sue your pal or give the green light to Flickr to re-post your pals stuff.
But since your pal did not file a proper notification Flickr can just ignore it.
He needs to follow the law.
He needs to have this in his notice:
proper counter-notice must contain the following information:
The subscriber's name, address, phone number and physical or electronic signature [512(g)(3)(A)]
Identification of the material and its location before removal [512(g)(3)(B)]
A statement under penalty of perjury that the material was removed by mistake or misidentification [512(g)(3)(C)]
Subscriber consent to local federal court jurisdiction, or if overseas, to an appropriate judicial body. [512(g)(3)(D)]
He can go here and fill all his information in and the website will generate a letter for him for him to print and sign and send in.
http://www.chillingeffects.org/dmca/coun...
Sgt Rock
I will send your link to Brian.
One thing that makes any case against Brian weak on this one is that the photo in question says nothing about Destination 360 so the use of it cannot possibly harm any market or confuse customers that somehow Destination 360 had something to do with this Parody. This would fall under parody and not necessarily satire since Brian was using a depiction of a casino to make a point about Wall Street and casinos so there was a direct relationship to the image and the subject of the parody.
It is not a parody. A parody makes fun of the original work.
This is a satire. You pal is not making fun of Destination 360 work which would be a parody.
He is making fun of Wall Street. It is a satire piece.
Your pal can still sue directly Flickr and/or Destination 360. Anybody can sue anybody at anytime.
If he does the counter notification. Destination 360 will probaby decide it is not worth it and give Flikr the green light. If Destination 360 does not sue in 14 days then your pal will have cause to sue Flikr if they don't re-post.
That is if your pal files a proper counter notification.
He can be sued by Flikr for sending in an improper notificaiton.
Sgt Rock
Thanks for the information. I have passed it along to Brian.
Hey.....has your pal ever thought of this.
Using his brain and his hands and create something of his own without borrowing another human being's hardwork.
That is a novel idea.
Don't leverage the hard work of others.
Generate something on your own.
Wow......shocking it is not!!!!!
Sgt Rock
So what your are saying is unless you happen to have access to the President and can take a photo yourself you have no right to parody or satire him or any public figure for that matter?
You could ask permission but they could be supporters of the President and say no giving them veto power over your free speech. So can't you see why in the case of criticism and parody there has to be some exceptions to copyright?
Hmmmm.....the Destination 360 original was not a photo of the president.
It was a photo of slot machines.
You pal has no restrictions to pay for Destination 360 photo or ask permission for the Destination 360 photo or get one of many friends to take a picture of slot machines.
No....instead he was lazy and decided to use somebody's work.
He is a bum.
Brian needs to let this one go. I think we need to understand here that it's improper to use others' work and make it their own. It's apparent that Drudge uses photographs that are copyrighted and for all I know, he's gotten permission from some owners to do so. Perhaps he owns a few subject matter photos. I use my own photographs, create my own graphics, or buy them royalty free. It's not that hard to do and not that expensive. And, we'll assume here that the casino photo did belong to Destination 360. I would even go so far to say that had Brian asked for permission to use the photograph, permission would have been granted with attribution regardless of what makeover he wanted to give it. It's all about creativity. He needs to let this one go.