Source: http://cpip.gmu.edu/2015/09/16/ninth-circuit-gets-fair-use-wrong-to-the-detriment-of-creators/
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 16:28:58+00:00

Document:
The Ninth Circuit’s opinion in Lenz v. Universal is out, and it’s a doozy. The main issue in the case is whether a rightholder has to consider fair use before sending a DMCA takedown notice. Section 512 requires the sender to state that she “has a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.” Section 107 says that “the fair use of a copyrighted work . . . is not an infringement of copyright.” The question is whether fair use, which “is not an infringement” under Section 107, is therefore “authorized by . . . the law” under Section 512.
The court concludes that Section 512 “unambiguously contemplates fair use as a use authorized by the law.” This means that rightholders in the Ninth Circuit are now obligated to consider and reject fair use before sending a takedown notice. The court’s new spin on the DMCA places additional obstacles in the way of rightholders—particularly individual creators. The system is already confusing and onerous, and now it burdens people who are not lawyers with the duty to reach legal conclusions. The DMCA notice and takedown regime is a joke, often providing creators and rightholders less than a few minutes of relief before infringing works are reposted, and this opinion only makes the problem worse. But rather than rehash commentary you can read elsewhere, I want to highlight one startling error in the court’s reasoning.
Fair use traditionally has been treated as an affirmative defense to a charge of copyright infringement See Campbell v. Acuff–Rose Music, Inc., 510 U.S. 569, ––––, 114 S.Ct. 1164, 1177, 127 L.Ed.2d 500 (1994) (stating that “fair use is an affirmative defense”). In viewing fair use as an excused infringement, the court must, in addressing this mixed question of law and fact, determine whether the use made of the original components of a copyrighted work is “fair” under 17 U.S.C. § 107. See Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enters., 471 U.S. 539, 560, 105 S.Ct. 2218, 2230, 85 L.Ed.2d 588 (1985) (citing Pacific & Southern Co. v. Duncan, 744 F.2d 1490, 1495 n. 8 (11th Cir.1984), cert. denied, 471 U.S. 1004, 105 S.Ct. 1867, 85 L.Ed.2d 161 (1985)).
Although the traditional approach is to view “fair use” as an affirmative defense, this writer, speaking only for himself, is of the opinion that it is better viewed as a right granted by the Copyright Act of 1976. Originally, as a judicial doctrine without any statutory basis, fair use was an infringement that was excused—this is presumably why it was treated as a defense. As a statutory doctrine, however, fair use is not an infringement. Thus, since the passage of the 1976 Act, fair use should no longer be considered an infringement to be excused; instead, it is logical to view fair use as a right. Regardless of how fair use is viewed, it is clear that the burden of proving fair use is always on the putative infringer.
The Ninth Circuit here cut out the first half of the footnote, where the Eleventh Circuit quotes binding Supreme Court precedent explicitly saying that “fair use is an affirmative defense” and then explains what must be done when analyzing such an “excused infringement.” Even worse, the Ninth Circuit uses an ellipsis to cut out the part in the second half of the footnote where Judge Birch, who authored Bateman, makes clear that he’s “speaking only for himself” when he says that fair use is not an “infringement to be excused.” The Ninth Circuit pretends to be adopting the Eleventh Circuit’s reasoning, when in fact it’s rejecting it.
I believe that fair use should be considered an affirmative right under the 1976 Act, rather than merely an affirmative defense, as it is defined in the Act as a use that is not a violation of copyright. See Bateman v. Mnemonics, Inc., 79 F.3d 1532, 1542 n. 22 (11th Cir.1996). However, fair use is commonly referred to as an affirmative defense, see Campbell v. Acuff–Rose Music, Inc., 510 U.S. 569, 590, 114 S.Ct. 1164, 1177, 127 L.Ed.2d 500 (1994), and, as we are bound by Supreme Court precedent, we will apply it as such.
Judge Birch fully understands that fair use is an affirmative defense and that binding Supreme Court precedent compels him to “apply it as such.” And twice he has followed that precedent when writing for the Eleventh Circuit. Yet, the Ninth Circuit here makes it sound like it’s agreeing with the Eleventh Circuit in holding that fair use is a right and not an affirmative defense.
It’s simply disingenuous for the Ninth Circuit to claim that fair use is not an affirmative defense in the Eleventh Circuit. It is an affirmative defense there and in every other circuit because the Supreme Court has said it’s so. Judge Birch doesn’t get to overrule the Supreme Court, and neither does the Ninth Circuit. Yet, that’s what it purports to do here in Lenz v. Universal.

References: v. 
 v. 
 § 107
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.