Righthaven Takes On Drudge Report

from the copyright-fun dept

Thu, Dec 9th 2010 1:55pm — Mike Masnick

We recently noted that MediaNews, the second largest newspaper publisher in the US, had apparently signed up with Righthaven to start suing blogs and other websites for using any content from the Denver Post. It looks like for its second lawsuit over Denver Post content, Righthaven has gone big: it's suing Matt Drudge, the operator of the famed Drudge Report, because he used a photo from the Denver Post. This is a bit different than the usual Righthaven lawsuits over copies of articles -- and perhaps an even tougher claim. Drudge may have a decent fair use claim on a single photograph, though that may depend on a lot of other details. Still, all this is doing is making me wonder why anyone would ever want to use any Righthaven connected publication as a source ever again.

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Filed Under: copyright, drudge, matt drudge, photos, trolling
Companies: drudge report, medianews, righthaven

23 Comments

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whytewolf (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 2:11pm

shooting ones self in the foot.
this is funny.

the irony here is that if drudge goes down one of the largest director of traffic that a lot of these newspapers have left will go with it.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Dec 2010 @ 2:24pm

They may want the domain
Could be that is the exact reason they are targeting Drudge. Sue, seize the domain and then they get to decide what the Drudge site links to.

I wouldn't want to argue that drudge's use falls under fair use, I don't think it is.

Regardless no matter how you slice it Righthaven and others like it are pretty slimy it makes those that use them seem pretty desperate.
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Joshy, 9 Dec 2010 @ 2:31pm

They are actually are suing for the forfeiture of the web address Drudgereport.com

Wow I don't think (even if they are found guilty) using one photos means the right to live in ones own house (domain) need be taken away.

Imagine if Yahoo.com or microsft.com somehow used the wrong photo. Must they forfeit there web address???
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MrWilson, 9 Dec 2010 @ 2:32pm

Re: They may want the domain
"Sue, seize the domain and then they get to decide what the Drudge site links to."

Yeah, that's not gonna happen. It's one photo. Even if it isn't fair use, its infringement is certainly not worth the cost of a widely visited (sadly) domain name.
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interval (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 2:35pm

Re: Re: They may want the domain
I'm hoping Drudge fights back, adding another loss to Righthaven's portfolio of lost suites.
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MrWilson, 9 Dec 2010 @ 2:39pm

Re:
Domain forfeiture has been demanded before in Righthaven's settlement demand letters. As far as I know, even people who have settled haven't given in to this particular demand. It's just meant to make the demands sound more threatening and the consequences of not settling seem more severe, however unlikely.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Dec 2010 @ 2:40pm

Re:
will if this becomes a precedent. If this goes through the first person to sue yahoo/microsoft needs to put in the lawsuit
"This lawsuit was made possible by RightHaven and protectionism for dying industries. Also support was received by you, the recipient"
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Mike Masnick (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 3:07pm

Re:
They are actually are suing for the forfeiture of the web address Drudgereport.com

Eh. I wouldn't read too much into that. Righthaven makes that claim in every lawsuit, and there is absolutely no basis for it. There is simply no precedent for infringement leading to a domain name handover.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Dec 2010 @ 3:13pm

Drudge is one of the web's biggest image abusers. It is shocking it took this long.
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Joseph (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 3:34pm

The irony
Someone commenting on this article noted that Sherman Frederick, columnist for the Las Vegas Review-Journal and defender of the Righthaven suits (http://tinyurl.com/245fves), is more than willing to post copyrighted material on his blog without permission: http://www.lvrj.com/blogs/sherm/SNL_on_TSA.html
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iamtheky (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 3:39pm

drudge displays thumbnails that can be crawled, and the occasional larger image at the top, no? The same exact thing google images does...
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Dec 2010 @ 3:47pm

Re: shooting ones self in the foot.
No irony, pure business acumen. Drudge would, should, issue blacklist to all associated sites. All bloggers should at this point, as well. It's not like this paper has a monopoly on information/content.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Dec 2010 @ 3:50pm

Re:
"abusers?" Is that when the pixels are forced down tubes?

One could say that his images bring more traffic to sites he links to. Drudge can't survive without the content, sites can't survive without the reference links. Give/take, it should work out.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Dec 2010 @ 4:50pm

Re: Re:
You have a logical failure there. Drudge can't survive without other people's content, but the other people who actually make the content can survive just fine without Drudge. It's the amazing power of making your own content, you are the source, not just a user. Drudge is disposable (and also a one sided republican shill that makes Fox News look reliable, but that is for another debate)
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DanVan (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 5:12pm

I hate Drudge but OMG, HE USED A PICTURE?

Huh? Suing over that?

Do papers realize the money they are wasting on these idiotic suits that will do NOTHING in the long run?
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Mike C. (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 5:42pm

Re: Re:
Mike, you should have clarified and said that there is no court approved, fully litigated precedent for infringement leading to a domain handover. Otherwise, you'll get tons of trolls pointing to TechDirt posts about the ICE seizures... :-)
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Chris Meadows (profile), 9 Dec 2010 @ 10:59pm

We may be looking at this all wrong
Whatever you say about Righthaven, you have to admit that they're not pulling an RIAA, making threats to people they believe will readily cave and pay them more money than it cost to send the copyright notices.
They're going after one of the most pugnacious bloggers in the whole blogosphere, the guy who stood up to an ex-Clinton aide and won. (What are they thinking? Are they thinking?)
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Killer_Tofu (profile), 10 Dec 2010 @ 6:50am

Re: Re: They may want the domain
As much as I think most of what shows up on Drudge report is for those who have troubles thinking for themselves, I side with Drudge Report on this. They are definitely in the right (no pun intended).
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btr1701 (profile), 10 Dec 2010 @ 9:40am

Re: They may want the domain
> Sue, seize the domain and then they get to
> decide what the Drudge site links to.

What makes these people think they automatically get the domain names of any site that commits copyright infringement? The US Code certainly doesn't specify that as statutory damages.

Even if they win on the merits and Drudge is found to have misappropriated the photograph, they actually think they�re going to be able to take over a web site worth hundreds of millions of dollars because of one picture?

It's idiotic.
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btr1701 (profile), 10 Dec 2010 @ 9:44am

Re:
> Drudge is one of the web's biggest image abusers.

Exactly how is that site an abuse?
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btr1701 (profile), 10 Dec 2010 @ 9:46am

Re: We may be looking at this all wrong
> They're going after one of the most pugnacious
> bloggers in the whole blogosphere

Drudge is a blogger? Seems like the definition of the word must have been greatly broadened, then, because as far as I can see, he doesn't blog about anything. Listing a bunch of links to news articles doesn't really fit the commonly-accepted definition of the word.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Dec 2010 @ 10:29am

Re: Re:
have you seen that blue and red flashy light thing he posts all the time?
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24AheadDotCom, 10 Dec 2010 @ 11:12am

What to do
Things like this affect the entire web. What you can do is urge everyone to delink the APost and LVRJ.

Sign the Twitter petition: act.ly/2t5
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