Dow Jones Wins Default In Questionable 'Hot News' Case
from the please-make-hot-news-just-go-away dept
For years, we've been covering the dangerous "hot news" doctrine, a court created form of intellectual property protection that had been considered almost entirely dead, but which is technically still the law in New York, relying on a century old court ruling, that allowed a publication to claim that another publication couldn't report the same news when it was still "hot." About five years ago, a few legacy media players tried to revive the hot news doctrine after online competitors were getting attention for spreading the news that those legacy players were too slow (or too expensive) to help spread. Earlier this year, we noted that Dow Jones had filed a hot news lawsuit against Ransquawk, a so-called "squawk" service that provides near-real-time news updates, often to stock traders.While Dow Jones had initially threatened the company with copyright infringement, someone realized that there's no copyright in headlines or factual news, which is basically all Ransquawk was sharing. Ransquawk had responded to initial threats from Dow Jones by pointing out that it got its information from a variety of sources, but apparently decided not to respond at all to the lawsuit. Because it didn't respond at all, the court found Ransquawk in default and has now granted an injunction against Ransquawk, saying it can't get someone with lawful access to Dow Jones to share their account, it can't pass on any Dow Jones content prior to that content being published on the web or in print, and it can't market its products to suggest that it will help people get access to Dow Jones content (even if it's true...).
Ransquawk responded to the ruling by noting somewhat accurately:
Ranvir Singh, the chief executive and a co-founder of the London-based Ransquawk, said in an emailed statement Friday that Dow Jones's case against Ransquawk is unconstitutional because it precludes free speech.That explains why he didn't respond to the lawsuit... but it also explains the result. Most US courts will simply give the party filing the lawsuit exactly what it wants if the other side doesn't show up. That's what a default judgment is. In this case, though, it's extra problematic because it may inspire others to think that hot news is a legitimate doctrine, even though the issue wasn't fully adjudicated here, but was rather decided on default.
"Hot news misappropriation is an antiquated law, recognized in only 5 U.S. states and completely unrecognized in the U.K. and [European Union]. If we are guilty of it, then so are a multitude of other news aggregators," he said. The decision "truly flies in the face of modern practicality where news is transmitted across the globe in seconds, irrespective of who initially published it."
He added that fighting the claim would bankrupt Ransquawk as a company, and in the U.S. the company wouldn't even be able to claim its costs back.
It would be nice if we could just make it clear that the hot news doctrine violates the First Amendment and stop having to see these kinds of cases altogether.
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Filed Under: default, free speech, hot news, journalism, squawk service
Companies: dow jones, ransquawk
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A very fair justice system. Not stacked against the weaker player. No, not at all.
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Sad thing is, I fully expect someone to reply to this with an example of someone trying it.
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Enforcement
Though, given everything that's happened with Kim Dotcom who knows how far the UK will bend over to US corporations.
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Shame that isn't a 2 way street.
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Ransquawk would be wise to geo block their service in the US to avoid any further issues.
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Looking at two Techdirt stories ...
It's a funny old world.
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Re: Looking at two Techdirt stories ...
The bad news is that it's in a dead, archaic language (democracy and reality).
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Justice
Really, this should be Pre-trial practice across the board.
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Time to get rich quick
Hmm, I think I know what my next get rich quick scheme will be!
*Goes to write up some legal papers*
To everyone here, I am suing you all for infringing on the rights to me and my likeness. You all have 2 arms, 2 legs, and 1 head just like me. And the men among you even have the same anatomy as me! As compensation for you all infringing on the rights to my likeless I demand up to 25% of your pre-tax income for the rest of your life.
If any of you actually show up in court to fight back I'll drop my case. Otherwise I'll win a default judgement, even though my lawsuit has no basis in reality or legally!
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Re: Time to get rich quick
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Re: Re: Time to get rich quick
Will you be paying cash or check?
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If the Hot News doctrine is valid...
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Re: If the Hot News doctrine is valid...
They'd just drone strike their competitors into bolivion.
/Poe's
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Just because a few professors and organizations such as the EFF want this to be so does not make it so. At the current time there is to my knowledge nothing in the body of judicial precedent that compels the outcome these vocal few passionately advocate. Of course, their advocacy is to me somewhat suspect since they strive to strip every vestige away from the concept that one who expends time and energy to create something useful should at least have some opportunity to attempt benefiting from his/her work before some coattail rider jumps on board and snatches the opportunity away...kinda like the children's fable about the making of a pie that the baker could not get anyone to help make, but they were all only too willing to partake of it once all the work was done. You know, sometimes the law operates on principles that do not fit neatly into the "Katie Bar the Door" economic principles proclaimed here are true and righteous. Sometimes simple fairness comes into play when fashioning remedies.
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(well thats loaded right there)
They gather some facts, and write their own interpretation of them. Another group gathers the same data, but because group 1 arrives first they get to be the only outlet for NEWS... and you think this is perfectly acceptable.
Obama's plane touches down at JFK. Because station A said it first no one else ANYWHERE can report those facts until it is no longer "hot news".
Please show your mental gymnastics on a separate piece of paper.
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Actually, the issue is that group 2 doesn't gather it's facts, it's just reads the report from group 1 and instantly rebroadcasts it as their own. They do none of the work, just reap the reward.
Put it another way: If Dow Jones didn't get the news for them, then Ransquawk would have no content, apparently they do not actually create their own.
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This isn't about "I did the work." It's about stifling competition.
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"we're not engaging in censorship, we're protecting intellectual property rights!"
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Dow Jones doesn't create the news. If Ransquawk is copying DJ verbatim, that's a copyright violation regardless of hot news. If they're writing their own copy, then it shouldn't matter if one of the sources of their facts was DJ.
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The facts belong to no one.
Those rebroadcasting the facts are not claiming to be a primary source. Yes, if someone claimed to be the primary source of facts and they weren't that would be a lie. but where is this happening here?
How is this promoting the progress of the sciences and useful arts? Is it copy protection laws that encourage the Dow Jones to report or are they doing it for other reasons? What, if they don't get copy protections on their reports will they suddenly go bankrupt or something and no one will have any reports?
IP laws should be about serving a public interest not about giving Dow Jones a monopoly on information that they shouldn't be entitled a monopoly on.
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Exactly --- plagiarism is BAD
The First Amendment protects you when you're expressing your OWN opinion, not when you're simply copying someone else's work verbatim.
The EFF is just a tool of billionaires who want to make more money.
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Re: Exactly --- plagiarism is BAD
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Re: Exactly --- plagiarism is BAD
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Re: Exactly --- plagiarism is BAD
Sometimes I wonder if you IP extremists are really critics pretending to be extremists. Then again IP extremists have been known to non-anonymously say stupid things and to contradict themselves.
"RIAA Claims File Sharers Are 'Undermining Humanitarian Efforts In Haiti', But Leaves Out The Facts"
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100305/0317058431.shtml
I would think that your posts are either satire or someone pretending to be an IP extremist when they're not if it weren't for the fact that IP extremists are just dumb even when not being anonymous. Then again the entertainment industry (ie: Hollywood) has a long history of drug use (ie: actors always in rehab) so it should come as no surprise that much of what they say comes out as incoherent nonsense.
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"Hot news" laws are, in essence the copyrighting of facts. There is legal precedent against the copyrightability of facts. See Feist v. Rural.
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Yeah! And respected federal judges too!
http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2837&context=journal_articles
Oops.
You can apologize now. But you won't. Because you never apologize when you're wrong. And yes, you're wrong. Nearly everyone recognized that the hot news doctrine was dead and buried, and a serious free speech problem until the AP tried to revive it a few years ago. This wasn't just an "EFF and professors" issue.
You could admit you were wrong. But you won't.
Why is it that every time you comment here I have to point out how you don't seem to know the facts?
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IP extremists have no conscience. They subvert the democratic process through revolving campaign contributions, revolving door favors, and back door dealings. So it's no surprise they will come here and continue to spread lies that only serve to make them look bad.
Why should anyone take the moral opinion of someone with no conscience seriously?
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If this issue ever makes its way back to the USSC such that INS was presented for reconsideration, I rather doubt the court would find persuasive "This is easy. Posner asserts you blew it in INS."
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Does it hurt your back to move those goalposts so far?
1. I note that many people recognized "hot news" was an obsolete doctrine.
2. You claimed that it was only academics and EFF types.
3. I point out that's not true, that respected judges like Posner have said the same.
4. You move the goalposts and pretend someone said that Posner is the final say.
Still waiting for your admission of being wrong, knowing it'll never come.
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I'd dismiss you as a troll, but I find your presence here to be quite useful. Your role is rather like that of Simplicio in Socratic dialogues.
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FWIW, being a matter of state law, I am unaware of anyone who seriously argues that the doctrine is a subset of IP. A class of activity that has been recognized in some jurisdictions as a form of Unfair Competition? Yes. Property? No, though I would not be surprised if some have done so. If you are aware of any article so advocating, I would be interested to read it because it would advocate a counterintuitive position.
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You do realize that applies to you a hell of a lot more than it applies to me?
You said that it was only profs and EFF types who felt that way about hot news. I proved you wrong -- as I seem to do nearly every day when you make blatantly incorrect statements here.
And yet, as per your usual MO, you move the goalposts, or equivocate or insult, rather than manning up and apologizing for being wrong.
So, can you admit you were wrong? Of course not.
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You said: "Just because a few professors and organizations such as the EFF want this to be so does not make it so." The implication is clear that there's no support for the idea outside of academia and advocacy groups.
You're not fooling anybody. Not even yourself.
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No fucking duh. I give my opinion. Your response is "that's just your opinion!" Yes.
Now that we've settled that, can you finally admit that you were wrong?
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Obviously we have different views about what comprises an opinion. When I read the above it suggested to me that your intent was to some degree to scold those who simply do not realize that the doctrine and the 1st Amendment are irreconcilably at odds. By my reading it does not admit to any possibility that no conflict may arise. This is, of course, incorrect, and your "duh" seems to suggest so much. Problem is, your statement laid no foundation for the possibility of a "duh" situation.
As for the legitimacy of the doctrine, it remains a part of the body of tort law in a few jurisdiction and is anything but dead. The fact it is narrowly defined merely means that it is not a legal doctrine of wide applicability, but is one that may come to the fore is the presence of specific circumstances.
My comments here are merely general to briefly mention a couple specific points. Feel free to cherry pick them if you must to point out glaring inconsistencies, but in doing so do try to keep in mind that I am motivated solely by trying to note your article's characterization of the tort of misappropriation as expressed in the INS case appears to be a declarative statement that is not altogether correct.
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I would have thought that was obvious by now, but you still don't seem to get it.
Is it possible that courts will disagree with me? Yes. But that's true for the idiotic assertions that you often make as well.
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Copyright in the United States does not depend in any way on how much effort is involved in the creation of a particular work. Your use of the word "vestige" (as in "vestigial organ") seems rather apropos, considering the doctrine was soundly rejected in Feist Publications v. Rural Telephone Service.
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So this "hot news" thing isn't even part of copyright law? It's a whole separate statute?
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And how is International News Service v. Associated Press, which decided that facts aren't subject to copyright protection, "not about copyright"? While it's true that the decision against INS was ultimately based on unfair competition law, the end effect is exactly the same as if the law did grant copyright on "hot news". It therefore seems to me at least plausible that SCOTUS would today reject a "sweat of the brow" argument in favor of such "quasi copyright" protections, for similar reasons as in Feist.
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IP laws should only be about promoting the progress of the sciences and useful arts and serving a public interest. Not about giving someone a monopoly they are not entitled to. That people like you continue to misconstrue it into something else is arguably the biggest reason I want IP law abolished.
"At the current time there is to my knowledge nothing in the body of judicial precedent that compels the outcome these vocal few passionately advocate."
95+ year copy protection lengths and retroactive extensions are a result of a small minority. You and I and everyone here knows that they are a result of corporate lobbying, corporate campaign contributions, revolving door favors, and back door dealings. It's highly unlikely the majority of the people would agree to this. The negotiations favoring these laws are done in secret, with industry interests invited, because the negotiators know very well that the majority will not be happy with these laws. It is very rare for an elected official to run for office and win by claiming that they will expand IP laws when elected (actually I don't think I've ever seen it) though I have seen them claiming the opposite to some extent (I remember Obama, at one time during his early days as president and/or before was claiming he wanted to potentially eliminate the FDA approved patent length extension but, after much industry lobbying, he changed his mind). The reason elected officials don't run for office claiming that they will expand IP laws even more when they win is because they know very well this is a sure way to quickly lose an election.
SOPA brought forth many protesters but every time the MPAA or some other organization tries to start an astroturfing campaign, even after paying those trying to get signatures for each signature they get, it fails miserably. The corporations that are offering politicians campaign contributions and revolving door favors to the politicians that pass these sorts of laws aren't doing it because they're not getting anything in return. They're doing it in return for disproportional representation. When politicians pass laws based on what they personally get in return that's not democracy. It's not fair that a few corporate entities have managed to take over the legislative process.
and it only makes you look dishonest to keep repeating this lie which further gives me the impression that those holding your opinion are dishonest.
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DVDFab anyone?
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