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Though this video is interesting, the comment thread gives a great look at people's thoughts on current copyright laws.

not actually news, but an interesting article on plagiarism from 2007. "The idea that culture can be property-intellectual property-is used to justify everything from attempts to force the Girl Scouts to pay royalties for singing songs around campfires to the infringement suit brought by the estate of Margaret Mitchell against the publishers of Alice Randall's The Wind Done Gone." What do you all think of Lethem's article?

"The internet titan was found guilty of infringing a patent related to the Linux kernel and fined " "The software is used by Google for its server platforms and could also extend to its Android mobile platform.The kernel is at the core of the open-source operating system meaning this verdict could be far-reaching" "The implication here is really that there is a huge number of Linux users who will be required to pay royalties if this patent holder knocks on their doors in the US. This is definitely a major impediment to the growth of Linux and makes companies, including Google, that rely on open source code particularly vulnerable to patent threats.

"A federal appeals court upheld a ruling that EchoStar infringed TiVo patents for digital recording technology, raising hopes the long legal battle could end with a TiVo victory."

"Samsung chose to copy Apple's technology, user interface and innovative style in these infringing products," Apple said. "The copying is so pervasive that the Samsung Galaxy products appear to be actual Apple products."

The "supposed" author is suing the licensing company that sold the rights of his song to sports teams on the basis that he hasn't been paid royalties. Also note that this song has possibly been a part of the the USC marching band's repertoire since the 1950s. How can this situation be addressed?

Viacom is maintaining its 2007 billion dollar lawsuit against Google (as it acquired YouTube in 2006), despite the latter continuous fervent denial. Though "Google argues that when YouTube promptly took down tens of thousands of videos after Viacom gave it notice, YouTube was within provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act." Viacom is stating that the infringement is taking the form of violating the 1998 Copyright Act. Which holds both content owners and systems operators responsible for the protection of copyrighted content online. After reading this article, a few questions come to mind: What can Google do to appease and keep the "integrity" of YouTube? and Isn't it interesting that Viacom only filed this $1 billion lawsuit AFTER Google had acquired YouTube? What can we say about interested parties possibly abusing copyright law?

International Publishing Company, Hachette has signed a "print-on-demand" agreement with the French National Library (BnF) which will allow them to sell out-of-copyright works from the BnF's online library. European Union countries have been known for setting limitations on the reproductions of oeuvres, particularly where the web is concerned. Hachette seems to have found a way to profit from this...

Some claim that the digital music industry is not going to grow any larger than it already is--mostly due to piracy occurring online. Inspired by the U.S. Senate, which shut down LimeWire last year, other countries across Europe and Asia are looking to revisit copyright laws to crack down on piracy and promote growth in the digital music industry, as well as lead a shift away from monopolizing applications, like iTunes, and redirect sales to alternative subscription music service websites.

What can you do if that novel you've been looking to read isn't available as an e-book? Well, it turns out that Japanese companies are actually taking books and scanning them for their customers as PDF files compatible with iPad, iPhone, Kindle and Nook. In Japan, copyright agreements depend on the author, and in turn the secretary general of Japan Book Publishers Association suggests all of this activity may be legal. It would be interesting to see this service offered in the U.S. and the copyright infringement cases that might arise.

This case study looks at "jailbreakers," who are hacking their iPhones so that they may use unauthorized software and applications from other cell phone carriers. Apple has warned that such hacking will not only damage their iPhone, but is indeed copyright infringement. However, the Copyright Office has actually proposed that "jailbreaking" is actually considered "fair use." In the past, other laws, like the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (1998), have been used to protect creative property for much longer than actually necessary, thus diminishing valuable work available in the public domain.