Judge Issues $5 Million Award To Dow Jones In Hot News Case... But It's Meaningless

from the hot-news? dept

In January, we wrote about Dow Jones suing Ransquawk, a UK-based service that sends out news alerts to clients. Dow Jones used the antiquated and obsolete concept of "hot news" misappropriation, since there was no actual copyright claim to be made. For years, we've discussed the problematic nature of the hot news doctrine, which some news companies just can't let go of using. In May, we noted that Ransquawk basically ignored the legal process (though it had publicly commented on the lawsuit), leading to a default judgment against Ransquawk. That's what happens when you don't show up in court. This week, the judge officially awarded Dow Jones $5 million in the case, which is again fairly meaningless. In theory, Dow Jones can go after Ransquawk for the money, but it doesn't appear that it has any US-based assets to attack.

While some who don't follow the details and don't understand the nature of a default judgment may make a bigger deal of this, the ruling is kind of meaningless since there was no actual adversarial process here. But, really, the bigger issue is that hot news is just a concept that needs to go away. In an age of social media sharing, retweeting, forwarding, reposting, etc., the idea that someone can claim some sort of exclusive ownership over "breaking" news is just silly and pointless. If your entire value is wrapped up in being a few minutes ahead of the competition, and you can't stand someone repeating the news that you were still first in getting out, you've got other, much more serious problems with your business model.

Filed Under: default judgment, hot news, misappropriation, news, squawk services
Companies: dow jones, ransquawk

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.

"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.

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.

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.

Filed Under: default, free speech, hot news, journalism, squawk service
Companies: dow jones, ransquawk

Dow Jones Files Idiotic 'Hot News' Lawsuit Against A Service That Sends News Alerts

from the opening-a-can-of-worms dept

For a few years now, we've been covering the troubling return of the "hot news" doctrine. This is a non-copyright concept that was mostly considered dead and buried, but was suddenly revived a few years ago. Technically, it's still considered "law" in New York, and it involves the idea that there's some sort of "protection" in news, such that others can't re-report the news that others have reported if it's "too soon." Under basic copyright, of course, facts are not copyrightable, so it's always been considered fair game to repeat factual news information (so long as you're not copying specific expression). The whole hot news concept had basically become defunct before the Associated Press brought it back up in a lawsuit about five years ago. Of course, there are all sorts of troubling implications of creating a new form of intellectual property such as "hot news" -- especially in an age of Twitter, Facebook and other methods of sharing news and information. Already, some have sought to stretch the definition of hot news. So far, thankfully, most recent hot news lawsuits have failed in court, though many seem to end in "settlements."

One of the "settled" cases was brought by Dow Jones a few years ago, and apparently the company has decided to try again. It has filed a hot news lawsuit against a company almost no one has heard of (until Dow Jones just gave them a ton of free publicity), Ransquawk.

In Dow Jones' initial cease and desist letter, it claimed that Ransquawk violated its copyrights, but apparently the lawyers at Dow Jones finally figured out how copyright works and realized that wasn't true. The lawsuit only makes use of the hot news concept.

In its defense, Ransquawk explained to Dow Jones that it does not have an account from Dow Jones' DJX service, which Dow Jones says Ransquawk is illegally copying, but rather that it finds the information from Twitter, Dow Jones reporters themselves and various other services who often share the same headlines. Since Ransquawk is a UK company, it also rejects the copyright claims, pointing out that news reporting is considered fair dealing under UK law.

The actual lawsuit makes some brazen claims:

How does Ransquawk provide such a popular service? Its business model is as simple as it is illegal: Ransquawk's audio and text services are based on the systematic unauthorized reproduction and redistribution of news content published by Dow Jones, and undoubtedly other news content providers as well.

But, again, repeating a news headline is not illegal. The complaint also insists that Ransquawk is lying in claiming that it's obtaining the news from other sources, noting that sometimes Ransquawk is repeating the DJX news within five seconds, which suggests it has access to a direct feed, despite denying it. It's entirely possible that someone is violating DJX's terms of service, to allow Ransquawk to have access to the feed, but that's a completely different matter than hot news.

While Ransquawk may follow in the footsteps of others and settle this case to be done with it, this remains a really stupid move by Dow Jones -- a company that quite frequently has its own staff repeating and sharing news first reported elsewhere. It's not difficult to see how any precedent Dow Jones might set with this lawsuit will almost certainly come back to bite them when others realize that Dow Jones does the same exact thing. News is news: it's factual and sharing the news is just a part of how the world works today. Rather than freaking out about it, Dow Jones should focus on adding the kind of additional value that it claims to add, such that mere headlines from Ransquawk won't make a difference. Seriously, if the only value that Dow Jones provides is somehow "misappropriated" by Ransquawk then it makes me think that Dow Jones really doesn't provide much value at all.

Filed Under: hot news, intellectual property, news alerts
Companies: dow jones, news corp., ransquawk