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Advanced Copyright Issues on the Internet - Fenwick & West LLP

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defendant web page’s text and advertising. In <strong>the</strong> instant case, whe<strong>the</strong>r or not framing occurreddepended up<strong>on</strong> <strong>the</strong> settings <strong>on</strong> <strong>the</strong> user’s computer, over which Tickets.com had no c<strong>on</strong>trol, andframing <strong>the</strong>refore occurred <strong>on</strong> some occasi<strong>on</strong>s but not <strong>on</strong> o<strong>the</strong>rs. However, when users werelinked to <strong>the</strong> Ticketmaster web pages, <strong>the</strong> user of <strong>the</strong> Tickets.com site was taken directly to <strong>the</strong>originating Ticketmaster site, c<strong>on</strong>taining all <strong>the</strong> elements of that particular Ticketmaster eventpage, and <strong>the</strong> Ticketmaster event pages were clearly identified as bel<strong>on</strong>ging to Ticketmaster.Moreover, <strong>the</strong> link <strong>on</strong> <strong>the</strong> Tickets.com site c<strong>on</strong>tained a notice stating “Buy this ticket fromano<strong>the</strong>r <strong>on</strong>line ticketing company.” 2128 Accordingly, <strong>the</strong> court granted Tickets.com summaryjudgment <strong>on</strong> Ticketmaster’s copyright claims. 21298. The MP3Board CaseIn this case, several RIAA member companies brought claims for c<strong>on</strong>tributory andvicarious copyright infringement against MP3Board for operating a web site, located atwww.mp3board.com, which provided <strong>Internet</strong> users with resources to enable <strong>the</strong>m to locate MP3files from publicly available Web sites. No music files were located <strong>on</strong> <strong>the</strong> MP3Board web site.Instead, <strong>the</strong> web site featured an automated search engine that searched for, aggregated andorganized links to media files <strong>on</strong> <strong>the</strong> Web, and provided a tutorial offering users instructi<strong>on</strong> <strong>on</strong>how to locate and download such files. The site also featured a message board <strong>on</strong> which userscould post questi<strong>on</strong>s or s<strong>on</strong>g requests. In resp<strong>on</strong>se to users’ posts, MP3Board pers<strong>on</strong>nelpers<strong>on</strong>ally searched for links to s<strong>on</strong>gs and posted <strong>the</strong> links <strong>on</strong> <strong>the</strong> message board, solicited o<strong>the</strong>rusers to provide <strong>the</strong> requested works, and obtained and posted passwords to enable users toaccess certain music files. 2130The RIAA sent a number of infringement demand letters relating to MP3Board’sactivities before filing suit. On Oct. 27, 1999, and again <strong>on</strong> Apr. 18, 2000, <strong>the</strong> RIAA sent lettersto MP3Board’s ISP, identifying artists whose works were being infringed – but no specific s<strong>on</strong>gtitles – and demanding that <strong>the</strong> ISP remove or disable access to <strong>the</strong> MP3Board site orMP3Board’s links to infringing works. In resp<strong>on</strong>se to <strong>the</strong> sec<strong>on</strong>d letter, MP3Board’s ISPdisabled <strong>Internet</strong> access to <strong>the</strong> MP3Board web site, but service was restored after MP3Boardsupplied a counter notificati<strong>on</strong> to <strong>the</strong> ISP asserting that it had removed <strong>the</strong> infringing materialidentified in <strong>the</strong> RIAA’s notice. On May 25, 2000, <strong>the</strong> RIAA wrote directly to MP3Board anddemanded that MP3Board remove all infringing links, this time naming 21 artists and 22 s<strong>on</strong>gtitles which were representative of <strong>the</strong> titles being infringed. The letter also attached printouts of2128 Id. at *21-23.2129 Ticketmaster also brought a trespass to chattels claim against Tickets.com based <strong>on</strong> Tickets.com’s spidersunauthorized entry into <strong>the</strong> Ticketmaster site. The court granted Tickets.com summary judgment <strong>on</strong> this claim,ruling that in order to establish a trespass to chattels claim, <strong>the</strong>re must be some evidence of tangible interferencewith <strong>the</strong> use or operati<strong>on</strong> of <strong>the</strong> computer being invaded by <strong>the</strong> spider. “Since <strong>the</strong> spider does not causephysical injury to <strong>the</strong> chattel, <strong>the</strong>re must be some evidence that <strong>the</strong> use or utility of <strong>the</strong> computer (or computernetwork) being ‘spiderized’ is adversely affected by <strong>the</strong> use of <strong>the</strong> spider. No such evidence is presented here.This court respectfully disagrees with o<strong>the</strong>r district courts’ finding that mere use of a spider to enter a publiclyavailable web site to ga<strong>the</strong>r informati<strong>on</strong>, without more, is sufficient to fulfill <strong>the</strong> harm requirement for trespassto chattels.” Id. at *12.2130 Arista Records, Inc. v. MP3Board, Inc., 2002 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 16165 (S.D.N.Y. 2002) at *5-6.- 465 -

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