Response To Righthaven Suit Claims That Las Vegas Review Journal Engaged In Entrapment

from the might-be-a-stretch dept

We recently noted that one of the sites sued by Righthaven, the company that buys copyrights from the Las Vegas Review Journal and sues websites that repost parts of its stories, had claimed that the LVRJ gave an implicit license by specifically encouraging people to "share" each of their articles, with quicklinks to 19 different services. It appears that another defendant is taking that argument a step further, and suggesting the LVRJ is engaged in entrapment with these lawsuits after encouraging people to share their content:
"Even if a defendant was to republish an article from the LVRJ.com website directly, he is not only within his rights to do so, but all users of LVRJ.com are encouraged to do just that. The LVRJ.com website offers and invites its users to 'Save and Share' all of its articles no less than 19 times per article. In addition, the LVRJ.com website encourages and invites its users to 'Email This,' 'Save This,' 'Print This' and subscribe to its 'RSS Feeds.' This not only puts the users of LVRJ.com in a quagmire, but it is the opinion of the defendant that LVRJ.com is guilty of entrapment, or at least setting up the users of LVRJ.com for a potential lawsuit. While the LVRJ.com encourages and invites its users to 'Share and Save' articles a total of 23 times per article, LVRJ.com will file a frivolous copyright infringement lawsuit against its users, if they follow LVRJ's directions and invitations to 'Share and Save' articles published on the website."
Legally, this sounds like a bit of a stretch, but it is quite fascinating to see the range of defenses that sites are coming up with to fight back against Righthaven.
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Filed Under: copyright, entrapment, lawsuits
Companies: las vegas review journal, righthaven, stephens media


Reader Comments

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  1. identicon
    Valkor, 25 Aug 2010 @ 3:45pm

    Summary dismissal?

    Is it possible for a judge to issue a dismissal with extreme prejudice and a kick in the nuts? I'm thinking that would be the best way to get the point across to Righthaven.

    "Bailiff, please escort these gentlemen to the back alley and administer some justice..."

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 25 Aug 2010 @ 4:19pm

    Its called consent and waiver.
    A boxer consents to being assaulted by his opponant. He can not give that consent, and then sue the other person for assault. Of course, even consent has its limits. If the boxer uses brass knuckles under the glove, that is not contemplated by the consent, and an assault charge could stand.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Las Vegas, 12 Nov 2010 @ 7:37pm

    entrapment.

    I think that this is ridiculous. A site that "encourages" sharing of it's content should not be able to sue people when this practice does happen. Only in America.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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