Source: http://copyright-debate.co.uk/?p=933
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 05:25:14+00:00

Document:
● Culture of the Public Domain – A Good Thing?
1 The Lumen Project, a database of takedown notices, receives approximately three thousand notices a day. It was, until November 2015, known as Chilling Effects. Lumen Team, ‘Chilling Effects Announces New Name, International Partnerships’ (Lumen Blog, 2 November 2015) <https://lumendatabase.org/blog_entries/763> accessed 16 December 2015.
3 The power to grant such injunctions is found in Directive 2001/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 May 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society  OJ L167/10 (InfoSoc Directive) Art 8(3).
97A of the CDPA,4 and Ireland, which ordered six leading Irish ISPs to block access to The Pirate Bay in June 2013.5 In contrast to this, was the Australian decision in iiNet6 in 2012, which was a decision substantially more favourable towards ISPs. This was entirely reversed, however, by legislation in 2015.7 Blocking injunctions are a measure that have experienced controversy regarding their implementation, and certainly stimulate debate. The second half of this chapter discusses blocking legislation in the UK, the controversy regarding implementing blocking injunctions in Ireland, the greater controversy regarding the attempt to create a power for blocking injunctions in the US, and finally the rapid change of opinion in Australia.
4 Twentieth Century Fox and others v Newzbin Ltd  EWHC 608 (Newzbin1).
5 EMI Records (Ireland) Ltd and others v UPC Communications Ireland Limited and others  IEHC 274.
6 Roadshow Films Pty and others v iiNet Ltd  HCA 16.
7 Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Act 2015 (Australia).
8 Google Transparency Report, ‘Requests to remove content: Due to copyright’ <http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/> accessed 21 September 2015, <https://www.dropbox.com/s/fmqqo1t7gr6m86u/Screenshot%202015-09-21%2014.41.15.png?dl=0> accessed 21 January 2016.
9 Directive 2000/31/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce, in the Internal Market  OJ L178/1 (E-Commerce Directive).
10 Specifically, on becoming aware of illegal activity or information, it must act ‘expeditiously to remove or disable access to the information’: E-Commerce Directive (n 9) Art 14(b).
In the US, a similar scenario is created by virtue of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998 (DMCA).13 The DMCA passed the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act (OCILLA) 1998,14 which creates a safe harbour for Online Service Providers (OSPs) (which includes ISPs and other online intermediaries), shielding them from copyright liability provided that they follow certain rules. This safe harbour provision includes the American notice and takedown system. Following the procedures set out in OCILLA, copyright holders may send a takedown notice to OSPs where their content is infringed through the direction of a user (eg a post to a message board, upload to YouTube, or a search engine result).15 The service provider will then take down the link to the content and notify the uploader that their content has been removed. The uploader may, if they wish, then send a counter notice, in response to which the complainant has fifteen days to bring judicial proceedings. If this does not happen, the content will be released. In order to retain their immunity from litigation, OSPs are required to put in place a system which deals with ‘repeat offenders’ with regard to copyright infringement. This may range from Google removing certain websites from their search results to an online forum banning a user who persistently posts copyright material – the circumstances can be varied and diverse.
13 Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998, Pub L 105–304 (US).
15 Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998, 17 USC § 512(c).
16 Google Alerts is a system which monitors Google search results for specific keywords – an author could monitor their name, the title of their book, the name of the book series, etc. The system will then send notifications to the Alerts user, directing them to the search results which display their keywords. Google Alerts <https://www.google.co.uk/alerts> accessed 16 December 2015.
behalf of those they represent – MarkMonitor,17 Remove Your Media LLC,18 and Takedown Piracy LLC,19 as well as industry bodies such as the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the BPI (British Recorded Music Industry), and the Publishers Association (PA). While some agencies cover a multitude of content types (eg MarkMonitor), others are more specialised, and focus on a particular content type (eg Remove Your Media focuses on film). When considering industry bodies, they tend to focus on only a single content type, due to their nature as industry bodies – for example, the RIAA focuses on recorded music, whereas the PA focuses on print media – books, magazines, journals etc.
Many of these monitoring systems are commercial agencies, and thus difficult or expensive to gain access to. The PA, which represents book and journal publishers across the UK, maintains a database, the ‘Copyright Infringement Portal’,20 which can be used as an example of the effectiveness of notice and takedown. Access to the Portal is free for all members of the PA, and available to others on a subscription basis.21 The Portal, which was established in 2009, as eBooks were on the cusp of becoming an industry standard,22 sent over three million takedown notices in the time from establishment to end of research period.23 The Portal allows publishers to share the load of monitoring content infringement, creating an effective way of dealing with notice and takedown procedures. Over the years, the Portal has become a fully-fledged notice and takedown system with monitoring capabilities, which will send multiple notices with the correct legal requirements – eg referencing European or US law as relevant – in an automated system which reduces the need for small and medium businesses to engage the services of a solicitor to protect their copyright.
17 MarkMonitor <https://www.markmonitor.com/> accessed 23 September 2015.
18 Remove Your Media <http://www.removeyourmedia.com/> accessed 23 September 2015.
19 Takedown Piracy <http://takedownpiracy.com/> accessed 23 September 2015.
20 Copyright Infringement Portal <http://copyrightinfringementportal.com> accessed 19 December 2015. 21 Publishers Association, ‘What does the CIP do?’ (The Publishers Association) <http://www.publishers.org.uk/services-and-statistics/copyright-infringement-portal/what-does-the- cip-do/> accessed 14 January 2016.
22 Amazon’s Kindle was launched first in 2007, and the Apple iPad first in 2010 – these devices brought eBooks to the forefront and made them a more mainstream content type. Jacob Kastrenekes, ‘The iPad’s 5th anniversary: a timeline of Apple’s category-defining tablet’ (The Verge, 3 April 2015) <http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/3/8339599/apple-ipad-five-years-old-timeline-photos-videos> accessed 16 December 2015; Kyle Wagner, ‘The History of Amazon’s Kindle So Far’ (Gizmodo, 28 September 2011) <http://gizmodo.com/5844662/the-history-of-amazons-kindle-so-far/> accessed 16 December 2015.
23 Claire Anker, ‘Meeting the Infringement Challenge’ (BookBrunch, 4 November 2015) <http://www.bookbrunch.co.uk/article_free.asp?pid=meeting_the_infringement_challenge> accessed 19 November 2015.
24 Conversation between author and Publishers Association Digital Infringement Manager, Claire Anker, 2 September 2015 3pm.
25 Google Transparency Report, ‘Reporting Organization: The Publishers Association’ <http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/reporters/141/The-Publishers- Association/> accessed 14 November 2015.
to respond to takedown requests, while other OSPs which do not cooperate can then be targeted for further action.
This is, of course, not to say that notice and takedown does not have its weaknesses and failings – both the DMCA and the European system have their weaknesses, including the fallibility of automated notice sending27 – the reason why printers have been subject to DMCA notices.28 The systems are open to abuse in multiple ways – including, inter alia, sending notices where the notice sender is not the copyright holder,29 or where the use of the work is legitimate under fair use or other exceptions, sending multiple notices rather than following the correct procedures,30 and sending notices to take down works where the notice sender is the subject of the work, not the copyright holder.31 There are, however, some measures in place to prevent some of these abuses. In 2001 Chilling Effects,32 a joint project of several US law schools, including Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, was established as a database which analyses copyright removal requests, with the aim of studying the potential ‘chilling effect’ of those notices on free speech. It rebranded in 2015 as Lumen Database.33 Lumen is used by major OSPs, including Google, Twitter, and reddit, to list their takedown requests and analyse them for abuse.34 Further, in 2006, an independent third party analysis of the frequency of improper and invalid takedown submissions was conducted.35 This paper listed some of the weaknesses of the DMCA, and made suggestions for reforms which might help to curb abuses in the system.
27 Automated notifications could in themselves be an abuse of the system, given that the DMCA requires a ‘good faith belief’, and computers are not capable of beliefs or faith. Digital Millennium Copyright Act 1998, 17 USC § 512 (c)(3)(A)(v).
28 Michael Piatek, Tadayoshi Kohno, Arvind Krishnamurthy, ‘Challenges and Directions for Monitoring P2P File Sharing Networks – or – Why My Printer Received a DMCA Takedown Notice’ (HotSec Conference, San Jose, 29 July 2008) <http://dmca.cs.washington.edu/uwcse_dmca_tr.pdf> accessed 23 September 2015.
29 Electronic Frontiers Foundation, ‘Takedown Hall of Shame: News Agency With Dubious Copyright Claim Threatens Removal’ (Electronic Frontier Foundation, 2011) <https://www.eff.org/takedowns/news- agency-dubious-copyright-claim-threatens-removal> accessed 16 December 2015.
30 If a notice is appealed, then the notice sender’s next course of action should be to file a lawsuit. However, notices which are appealed may simply be ignored, and a second notice sent to take down the relevant content, rather than resorting to litigation. This is an abuse of the system.
31 Jeffrey Cobia, ‘The Digital Millennium Copyright Act Takedown Notice Procedure: Misuses, Abuses, and Shortcomings of the Process’ (2009-10) 10(1) Minn JL Sci and Tech 387.
32 Lumen Database <https://lumendatabase.org/> accessed 23 September 2015.
33 Lumen Team (n 1).
34 See, for example, David F Gallagher, ‘New Economy; A copyright dispute with the Church of Scientology is forcing Google to do some creative linking’ (The New York Times, 22 April 2002) <http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/22/business/new-economy-copyright-dispute-with-church- scientology-forcing-google-some.html?src=pm&_r=0> accessed 16 December 2015.
35 Jennifer M Urban and Laura Quilter, ‘Efficient Process or “Chilling Effects”? Takedown notices under section 512 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’ (2006) 22 Santa Clara Computer and High Tech LJ 621.
These included changing the time of takedown until after the alleged infringer has had a chance to respond, and strengthening the remedies for abuse.36 Although the report made some conclusions about the proportions of improper takedown notices, it is worth noting that the data related to the first years of operation of the Chilling Effects/Lumen database (2002-2005), and the numbers concerned were far lower than in 2015 – hundreds of notices per year, rather than the hundreds of millions in 2013 and 2014. Thus, the evolution of the DMCA processes required further assessment.
Although notice and takedown is not a perfect solution, and focuses only on single files being taken down, it has been successful in removing millions of infringing files every month and continues to be a tool in the arsenal of rights holders as they protect their content. Research has shown that takedown does result in a decrease in the availability of files, even if this effect is only temporary.39 Furthermore, the monitoring of notorious, prolific, or non-cooperative sites for the frequency and variety of content, or a refusal to engage with takedown procedures then informs the second copyright enforcement measure discussed next in this chapter – that of blocking injunctions.
37 Tobias Lauinger and others, ‘Clickonomics: Determining the Effect of Anti-Piracy Measures for One- Click Hosting’ (Network and Distributed System Security Symposium, San Diego, 24-27 February 2013). 38 See Chapter 7.
39 Lauinger and others (n 37) sIV(a).
40 Supreme Court Act 1981 s 37(1).
41 InfoSoc Directive (n 3) Art 8(3).
the CDPA42 creating the power to issue an injunction against a service provider ‘where that service provider has actual knowledge of another person using their service to infringe copyright’.43 This provision remained unused until 2011, when it had its first outing, in Newzbin2.44 In Newzbin145 six film studios sought an injunction against Newzbin Limited, a website which operated on Usenet46 (an online discussion system). The claimants asserted that the operation of the site allowed users to access copyright materials in a matter of clicks, and that this was the focus of Newzbin. Newzbin asserted that it was content agnostic – that it neither encouraged nor discouraged piracy.47 This case resulted in an injunction against Newzbin, restricting them from providing links to the content owned by the claimants.48 Newzbin was taken down shortly after, but reappeared at the same domain days later, this time operating in Sweden under a slightly different name.
42 This section was inserted by the Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003 SI 2003/2498, s 27. 43 Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (as amended) s 97A(1) (CDPA).
44 Twentieth Century Fox and others v British Telecommunications PLC,  EWHC 1981 (Ch) (Newzbin2).
46 Usenet is, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, ‘[a] non-centralized communication service comprising a large number of newsgroups, now typically accessed through the Internet.’ It is, in a simplistic sense, a cross between an email chain and a discussion forum.
47 Jeremy Phillips, ‘A fable for modern times: the Fox and the Newzbin’ (The IPKat, 29 March 2010) <http://ipkitten.blogspot.co.uk/2010/03/fable-for-modern-times-fox-and-newzbin.html> accessed 16 December 2015.
48 Newzbin1 (n 4), 135.
51 Those ISPs, incidentally, were Sky, BT, EE, TalkTalk, Telefónica [O2] and Virgin.
52 Dramatico Entertainment Ltd and others v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd and others  EWHC 268 (Ch).
53 KAT stands for KickassTorrents.
54 EMI and others v BSkyB and others  EWHC 379 (Ch).
55 Football Association Premier League v BSkyB and others  EWHC 2058 (Ch).
injunctions, as well as the fact that it was a relatively hassle-free method of blocking access to content infringing websites (for content owners, at any rate) ensured the popularity of blocking injunctions as a viable method of enforcing copyrights. In addition, when ISPs ceased to argue against these injunctions, the financial burden associated with seeking an injunction was lessened, making them relatively quick and easy to obtain.
All the above judgments relate to P2P sites and streaming sites. They blocked ‘first generation’ torrent sites. The reach of these injunctions was extended the following year. The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) requested an order to block access to a list of 21 websites by the end of October 2013.56 What was particularly interesting about this order was the fact that the 21 listed websites included linking sites, which did not host the content themselves. This issue was considered also regarding SolarMovie and TubePlus57 – sites which provided a database of links to infringing content but did not actually host the content. SolarMovie allowed the downloading of content, where TubePlus did not, but both sites monitored the quality of links, as well as providing services to make the links easier to find, such as categorisation and referencing. This case then raised the question: does hyperlinking constitute an infringement of copyright? In considering this, Mr Justice Arnold made extensive reference to three cases before the CJEU,58 but ultimately declared that mere hyperlinking is not communication to the public. However, he also declared that the websites in question in this case were doing more than just linking, and thus issued another blocking injunction.
56 1967 Ltd and others v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd and others  EWHC 3444 (Ch).
57 Paramount Home Entertainment and others v BSkyB and others  EWHC 3479 (Ch).
58 Svensson and others (Case C-466/12), C More Entertainment (Case C-279/13), and Bestwater (Case C- 348/12).
59 Publishers Association, ‘Publishers Win High Court Support in Fight Against Infringement’ (Press Release, 26 May 2015).
which administers the Copyright Infringement Portal. The sites were link providers and curators which provided access to an estimated ten million books – PA investigations showed that upwards of 80% of content available on the websites was unlawful.60 The application was not contested in court – ISPs had ceased to argue against these cases by this point – and the order was given to block the sites. The seven blocked sites61 then brought to over 120 the number of sites blocked under the section 97A provisions.62 When one takes into account the proxies, redirects, and clones which are also required to be blocked under the injunctions, the number of sites blocked is over 500.63 For content owners and their representative bodies, blocking injunctions are something of a no-brainer. Given the lack of opposition from ISPs, and the fact that orders are often made without the need for a full hearing or judgement, they are a simple and relatively quick way to block access to infringing sites.
However, that is not to say that they are infallible. The injunctions apply only to consumer broadband, meaning that the sites are still accessible through mobile, business, or other types of internet access. Indeed, during the course of research, the author was able to access all the sites listed as blocked, as she was working on a university internet connection, not a consumer broadband connection. However, the deterrent effect of a block on consumer broadband should not be underestimated.
60 Henry Mance, ‘Book Publishers Win Landmark Case Against eBook Pirates’ (Financial Times, 26 May 2015) <http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/988850e0-038c-11e5-a70f-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3bG2vyKuv> accessed 24 July 2015.
61 Ebookee, LibGen, Freshwap, AvaxHome, Bookfi, Bookre, and Freebookspot.
62 Sky, ‘Websites we’ve blocked under order of the High Court’ (Sky) <http://help.sky.com/articles/websites-blocked-under-order-of-the-high-court> accessed 15 July 2015; List of Court Orders <http://www.ukispcourtorders.co.uk/> accessed 15 July 2015.
63 Darren Meale, ‘500 and Counting: websites blocked by order of UK courts’ (The IPKat, 29 July 2015) <http://ipkitten.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/500-and-counting-websites-blocked-by.html> accessed 19 December 2015; TalkTalk, ‘Access restricted to certain file sharing websites’ (TalkTalk) <http://help2.talktalk.co.uk/access-restricted-certain-file-sharing-websites> accessed 14 January 2016; Darren Meale, ‘Access Blocked! List of UK ISP blocking injunctions’ (eLexica, 20 July 2015) <http://www.elexica.com/en/legal-topics/intellectual-property/29-access-blocked> accessed 14 January 2016.
64 This observation was made in the case EMI Records (Ireland) Ltd and others v UPC Communications Ireland Ltd  IEHC 377. Incidentally, this is the case which originally established that UPC was not required to implement a GR system like that of Eircom, although it was later subject to a different GR system.
In response to this, the government sought closing this lacuna, doing so in the form of the European Union (Copyright and Related Rights) Regulations, 2012 (the CRR Regulations). Article 8(3) of the InfoSoc Directive provides that ‘each Member State shall ensure that the rightholders are in a position to apply for an injunction against intermediaries whose services are used by a third party to infringe copyright or related right.’69 The CRR Regulations provide for this by amending Sections 40 and 205 of the Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000.70 They inserted into each section a provision that copyright owners may apply to the High Court for an injunction against such intermediaries.
65 E-Commerce Directive (n 9).
66 InfoSoc Directive (n 3).
67 Directive 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights  OJ L195/16.
68 EMI v UPC (n 64) 133.
69 InfoSoc Directive (n 3) Art 8(3).
70 Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000 (Ireland).
71 The proposed American bill (A Bill to promote prosperity, creativity, entrepreneurship, and innovation by combating the theft of U.S. property, and for other purposes —HR 3261 (2011) (SOPA)) envisaged wide-ranging powers to grant injunctions blocking access to sites with infringing content. It was hotly protested, as discussed infra.
72 Adrian Wreckler, ‘Reality Bytes: Ten-point guide to ‘Irish SOPA’ row’ (The Daily Business Post, 29 January 2012) <http://www.businesspost.ie/reality-bytes-ten-point-guide-to-irish-sopa-row/> accessed 14 January 2016.
73 Michael Freeman, ‘Ireland’s ‘SOPA’ Legislation: The big arguments for and against’ (TheJournal.ie, 26 January 2012) <http://www.thejournal.ie/ireland%e2%80%99s-%e2%80%98sopa%e2%80%99- legislation-the-big-arguments-for-and-against-336952-Jan2012/> accessed 14 January 2016; TJ Macintyre, ‘Everything you need to know about Ireland’s SOPA’ (TheJournal.ie, 24 January 2012) <http://www.thejournal.ie/readme/reader-irelands-sopa-a-faq/> accessed 14 January 2016.
74 Niall Kitson, Why ‘Ireland’s SOPA’ could be a good thing’ (rte.ie, 27 January 2012) <http://www.rte.ie/news/business/technology/2012/0127/311599-sopa/> accessed 14 January 2016.
75 RTÉ, ‘Prime Time’ (26 January 2012) <http://www.rte.ie/news/player/2012/1112/3180372-prime-time- copyright-law-changes-and-sopa/> accessed 14 January 2016.
76 See TJ Macintyre, ‘The law should be predictable as to what is mandated and what is forbidden’ (IT Law in Ireland, 5 February 2012) <http://www.tjmcintyre.com/2012/02/law-should-be-predictable.html> accessed 14 January 2016.
77 Stop SOPA Ireland <http://stopsopaireland.com/> accessed 14 January 2016.
78 TD – Teachta Dála, a member of Dáil Éireann, the lower house of the Irish Parliament.
79 CDPA (n 43) s 97A.
80 Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000 (As Amended) s 40 (5A) (Ireland).
81 European Union (Copyright and Related Rights) Regulations 2012 SI 2012/59 (Ireland). The main proposal for SOPA Ireland came from Minister of State for Research and Innovation Seán Sherlock.
82 Seán Sherlock TD (@seansherlocktd) (Tweet, 24 January 2012) ‘There is no intention by the government to introduce legislation to block access to the Internet or sites. I have state [sic] that unambiguously.’ <https://twitter.com/seansherlocktd/statuses/161600885435281409> accessed 13 January 2016.
83 EMI and others v UPC and others  (n 5).
through seventh84 largest ISPs in the country.85 The facts were also the same. The judgement was relatively simple – Charleton J had stated already of the injunctive relief ‘were it available, I would grant it’.86 In this case, while the original order was granted without issue, the issues to be discussed were the necessity to reapply to the court were The Pirate Bay to change its location on the internet, and which parties should bear costs. With regard to the first issue, McGovern J relied on the persuasive authority of Arnold J in 20th Century Fox Film Corporation v British Telecoms Plc,87 bringing Irish jurisprudence into line with that of England and Wales, accepting the draft order submitted to the court which eliminated the need to reapply in such a case, and using the new legislation to resolve the lacuna which had been noted in the earlier EMI v UPC88 case. The same regulations have since been used to block access to more infringing websites, such as KAT,89 in an order made in the Commercial Court in December 2013.90 Although it appeared at the time that blocking injunctions would become an accepted tool much like in the UK, no injunctions have been sought since. The reasons for this may be a potential future research project.
84 By name, these ISPs are UPC, Vodafone, Imagine, and Digiweb, Hutchinson 3G [Three] and Telefónica Ireland [O2] – only one of which [Telefónica, or O2] is the same as the six largest in the UK. Since the issuance of this injunction, Hutchinson 3G purchased Telefónica’s Irish operations (Conor Humphries and Clare Kane, ‘Telefonica sells O2 Ireland to Hutchinson’s 3 for $1billion’ (Reuters, 24 June 2013) <http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/06/24/uk-telfonica-ireland-idUKBRE95N05N20130624> accessed 14 January 2016), merging the two and creating a 40% market share, equal to Eircom. UPC also became Virgin Media, changing the shared largest companies from one (of six) to two (of five). See Virgin Media Ireland, ‘UPC Confirms Plans to Become Virgin Media in Ireland’ (Press Release, 28 August 2015).
85 The largest ISP, Eircom, was already required to block The Pirate Bay in accordance with the circumstances discussed in Chapter 3 under the section ‘Ireland’.
86 EMI v UPC (n 64).
88 EMI v UPC (n 64).
89 KAT was also the subject of a UK blocking order, as discussed earlier.
90 Tim Healy, ‘Internet firms ordered to block file-share sites’ (The Irish Independent, 3 December 2013) <http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/courts/internet-firms-ordered-to-block-fileshare-sites- 29803417.html> accessed 14 January 2016.
In October 2011, a pair of Bills were put to both houses of the US government. The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the lower house91 and the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) in the upper house were separate but complementary acts designed to grant extra powers to prevent the infringement of copyright online. Provisions of the Act included allowing the issuing of court orders to prevent advertisers from contracting with infringing websites, increasing the penalties for online copyright infringement, making streaming a criminal offence, and the creation of a power to issue a court order blocking access to copyright infringing websites.92 Although the bills were paired, the main reaction online was to SOPA, and thus this section is concerned also mainly with SOPA.
92 SOPA (n 71) sec 102(2)(A)(i).
93 Laurence H Tribe, ‘The “Stop Online Piracy Act” (SOPA) violates the first amendment’ (Scribd, December 6, 2011) <http://www.scribd.com/doc/75153093/Tribe-Legis-Memo-on-SOPA-12-6-11-1> accessed 10 August 2015.
94 Jenna Wortham, ‘Public Outcry over Antipiracy Bills Began as Grass-Roots Grumbling’ (The New York Times, 19 January 2012) <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/20/technology/public-outcry-over- antipiracy-bills-began-as-grass-roots-grumbling.html?pagewanted=1&ref=technology&_r=0> accessed 10 August 2015.
95 Jenna Wortham, ‘With Twitter, Blackouts and Demonstrations, Web Flexes Its Muscle’ 18 January 2012 <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/19/technology/protests-of-antipiracy-bills-unite- web.html?ref=technology&_r=0> accessed 10 August 2015.
96 Mark A Lemley, David S Levine and David G Post, ‘Don’t Break the Internet’ (2012) 64 Stanford Law Review Online 34.
97 Michael A Carrier, ‘SOPA, PIPA, ACTA, TPP: An Alphabet Soup of Innovation-Stifling Copyright Legislation and Agreements’ (2013) 11(2) Northwestern Journal of Technology and Intellectual Property 21.
cybersecurity.98 The massed outcry against SOPA and PIPA was successful – by the end of January 2012 the bills were removed from further voting.
In Australia, until 2015 the prevailing law with regard to the liability of ISPs was AFACT v iiNet.99 In this particular case, the appellants were 34 companies who owned a variety of copyrights in ‘thousands of commercially released films and television programs’.100 Under the representation of the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft (AFACT), they sued the second-largest ISP in the country, iiNet Limited, seeking a declaration that by allowing their users to infringe copyright, they themselves were infringing copyright. The case was dismissed in the first instance in the Australian Federal Court by Cowdry J, declaring that ‘iiNet is not responsible if an iiNet user chooses to make use of that system to bring about copyright infringement’101 and awarding costs to iiNet.
98 Association for Computer Machinery US Public Policy Council, ‘Analysis of SOPAʼs impact on DNS and DNSSEC’ (2012) <http://usacm.acm.org/images/documents/DNSDNSSEC.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016.
99 Roadshow Films Pty Ltd and others v iiNet Ltd  HCA 16.
101 Roadshow Films Pty Ltd v iiNet Limited (No 3)  FCA 24 .
102 Emmett and Nicholas JJ dismissed, Jagot J dissenting: Roadshow Films Pty Ltd and others v iiNet Ltd  FCAFC 23.
104 iiNet  (n 102)  [Emmett J] (It does not necessarily follow from the failure of the present proceeding that circumstances could not exist whereby iiNet might in the future be held to have authorised primary acts of infringement on the part of users of the services provided to its customers under its customer service agreements) and  [Jagot J] (These circumstances support my conclusion that iiNet authorised the primary infringements of copyright).
105 David Brennan, ‘iiNet’s hollow victory over Hollywood’ (The Sydney Morning Herald, February 25, 2011) <http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/society-and-culture/iinets-hollow-victory-over- hollywood-20110225-1b7qa.html> accessed 14 January 2016.
107 iiNet  (n 102) .
Although the Australian Law Reform Commission did have an ongoing consultation which concluded after the iiNet decision,109 the liability of ISPs or other third parties was outside the Terms of Reference of the inquiry.110 Later in 2014, the Abbott government published a discussion paper on Online Copyright Infringement,111 which sought responses to a public consultation. One suggestion the paper made was to introduce an injunction scheme based on that of Ireland and the UK, with blocking injunctions. The consultation closed in September 2014.112 The (just over one hundred) submissions to the consultation were made available online.113 In July of 2015, the Australian Parliament passed the Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Act 2015,114 which inserted a new provision into the Copyright Act 1968115 granting the power to order blocking injunctions against ISPs. The injunctions would require ISPs to block sites outside of Australia which facilitate copyright infringement as the primary purpose of the site, regardless of whether that infringement is in Australia or not. This is a less stringent requirement than the British section 97A, as there is no requirement for actual knowledge of the infringement, nor is there any definitive information as to how the ‘primary purpose’ of a site may be defined. This is a question for the Australian courts to decide.
108 iiNet  (n 99) .
109 Australian Law Reform Commission, ‘Copyright and the Digital Economy: Final Report’ (2013) ALRC Report 122.
110 Australian Law Reform Commission, ‘Copyright and the Digital Economy’ (2012) ALRC Issues Paper 42.
111 Attorney-General for Australia, ‘Online Copyright Infringement’ (Press Release, 30 July 2014).
113 Now defunct, the submissions were available previously. Online Copyright Infringement Submissions <http://www.ag.gov.au/Consultations/Pages/OnlineCopyrightInfringement-Submissions.aspx>.
114 Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Act 2015 (Australia).
115 Copyright Act 1968 s 115A (Australia).
rapid development in Australia may bode well for a potential reintroduction of similarly framed legislation. Nonetheless, there is still a distinction to be drawn between blocking and censorship – at times a fine line to walk.
116 Article 8(3) injunctions are available in many European Member states, including Denmark, Belgium, Italy, Sweden, the Netherlands and Austria. Newzbin2 (n 44) .
119 Trans-Pacific Partnership, ‘IP Chapter’ (2015) <http://keionline.org/sites/default/files/Section-G- Copyright-Related-Rights-TPP-11May2015.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016.
120 Eleonora Rosati, ‘2015: the year of blocking injunctions?’ (2015) 10(3) Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice 147.
121 ibid, citing Cartier International AG and Others v BSkyB and Others  EWHC 3354 (Ch).
122 While this report related to sections 17 and 20 of the Digital Economy Act 2010, the technology for blocking sites would have been the same, regardless of which section the injunction was ordered under. Ofcom, ‘“Site Blocking” to reduce online copyright infringement’ (2010) <http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/binaries/internet/site-blocking.pdf> accessed 19 December 2015.
123 See, for example, the comments on Gavan Reilly’s article regarding the blocking of The Pirate Bay – Gavan Reilly, ‘High Court orders six Irish internet providers to block The Pirate Bay’ (TheJournal.ie, 12 June 2013) <http://www.thejournal.ie/high-court-order-block-pirate-bay-948503-Jun2013/> accessed 14 January 2016 – which suggest alternative torrent sites and VPN providers.
124 Cartier v BSkyB (n 119) -.
125 The Lernaean Hydra was a mythical Greek monster possessing many heads. The second labour of the demigod Heracles was to slay the Hydra, which he attempted first by removing its heads. However, the reaction was that two heads grew back for each head removed. Thus, in order to prevent this happening, Heracles cauterised the stumps of the severed heads – only then could the Hydra be defeated. Pierre Grimal, A Concise Dictionary of Classical Mythology (Stephen Kershaw ed, AR Maxwell- Hyssop tr, Blackwell 1986).
126 This is discussed in Chapter 3.
From 2010-2015, copyright enforcement saw much global development. For film, TV and music industries, tackling piracy and infringement was in strong focus, with a variety of approaches taken, including seeking to take down infringing files, disable the infringing websites (such as in Newzbin1128), and seeking ISPs blocking the websites (as in Newzbin2129). The UK is invested in learning from the example of others, and conducts research comparing different approaches to online copyright infringement.130 This 2015 IPO research paper demonstrates the UK’s commitment to not only monitoring the approach of other countries to copyright, comparing both public spend131 and legislative vs voluntary models,132 but also actively trying to learn from them.133 The results of this paper will then be used to inform future legislation and policy, leading to more effective and smarter ways of managing copyright.
127 For more on this, see Chapter 7.
130 IPO, ‘International Comparison of Approaches to Online Copyright Infringement: Final Report’ (2015) <https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/404429/International _Comparison_of_Approaches_to_Online_Copyright_Infringement.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016.
134 In the UK, only the largest ISPs are subject to the blocking orders, thus avoiding the blocks requires only seeking internet subscriptions from smaller providers.
135 Lauinger and others (n 37).
injunctions are effective at blocking access to a particular site, a clone or related site will inevitably appear before too long.
137 Lauinger and others (n 37) 13.
138 As mentioned in Chapter 3, Spotify had 60 million subscribers as of 2014: Stuart Dredge, ‘Spotify financial results show struggle to make streaming music viable’ (The Guardian, 11 May 2015) <http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/may/11/spotify-financial-results-streaming-music- profitable> accessed 16 October 2015; Netflix had 62 million members in mid-2015: Netflix, ‘Netflix to Announce Second-Quarter 2015 Financial Results’ (Press Release, 12 June 2015).
139 See, for example, the CCUK television spot mentioned in the previous chapter, which points consumers toward legitimate avenues of content consumption. The Drum, ‘Ad for Creative Content UK’ (YouTube, 23 October 2015) <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWWAFM284Yk> accessed 15 December 2015.
140 Lauinger and others (n 37).
141 For more on this, see Chapter 7.
143 The IFPI’s 2009 Digital Music Report showed a dramatic increase in music revenues from 2004 to 2009, with tenfold growth in revenue: IFPI, ‘Digital Music Report 2009’ (2009).
144 Tablet and e-reader ownership increased from 2010-2014, with 32% of survey participants owning an e-reader in 2014. Pew Research Media, ‘E-Reading Rises as Device Ownership Jumps’ (2014) <http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-media//Files/Reports/2014/PIP_E-reading_011614.pdf> accessed 30 November 15.
145 eg CLA, FEP and Guardian Media on Working Group 2: Commission, ‘List of Participants in Working Group 2 – User-Generated Content and Licensing for Small-scale Users of Protected Material’ (2013) <http://ec.europa.eu/licences-for-europe-dialogue/sites/licences-for-europe-dialogue/files/131213_wg2- list-of-participants.pdf> accessed 30 November 2015; EMMA, ENPA, PLS, Reed Elsevier on Working Group 4: Commission ‘List of Participants in Working Group 4 – Text and Data Mining’ (2013) <http://ec.europa.eu/licences-for-europe-dialogue/sites/licences-for-europe-dialogue/files/131213_wg4- list-of-participants.pdf> accessed 30 November 2015.
146 Hargreaves Submissions: Association of Learned and Society Publishers, ‘ALPSP response to Independent Review of Intellectual Property and Growth’ (2011) <http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140603093549/http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview-c4e-sub- alpsp.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016; European Publishers Council, ‘Submission from the European Publishers Council to the Independent Review of Intellectual Property and Growth – The Hargreaves Review – March 2011’ (2011) <http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140603093549/http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview-c4e-sub- europepub.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016; International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers, ‘STM Submission for the Independent Review of Intellectual Property and Growth’ (2011) <http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140603093549/http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview-c4e-sub- istm.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016; Professional Publishers Association, ‘Independent Review of Intellectual Property and Growth PPA Response – March 2011’ (2011) <http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140603093549/http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview-c4e-sub- ppa.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016; Publishers Licensing Society, ‘Independent review of Intellectual Property and growth PLS response to call for Evidence’ (2011) <http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140603093549/http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview-c4e-sub- pls.pdf> accessed 14 January 2016; Publishers Association, ‘Driving Innovation: Delivering Growth’ (2011) <http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140603093549/http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview-c4e-sub- thpa.pdf> accessed 16 December 2015.
the operation of their industry easier, but also to ensure that their business models are not affected by the need to implement new licensing exceptions due to market failure. This is demonstrative of the fractured nature of publishing – while film, TV, and music are largely consumer-focused, for publishing, there is a more split focus, with distinctions between academic/professional, fiction, education, journals, newspapers, and professional publications, thus splitting the focus of the industry147 – this may further explain their slower reaction to adopting enforcement mechanisms.
147 This split is visible in distinctions such as the fact that the PA Statistics Yearbook (Publishers Association, ‘PA Statistics Yearbook’ (2013)) does not cover magazine or newspaper publishing, or even in the existence of the CLA and the NLA simultaneously.

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