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Most interesting comment to that article: Thankfully all DMCA requests are filed under penalty of perjury. If he claims that he owns the copyrigh

Most interesting comment to that article: Thankfully all DMCA requests are filed under penalty of perjury. If he claims that he owns the copyright to material he doesn’t own, he has now opened himself up to civil litigation. Really. Seems so: http://www.aaronkellylaw.com/Internet-Law-and-Intellectual-Property-Articles/Consequences-of-filing-a-false-DMCA-Takedown-Request.shtml http://www.aaronkellylaw.com/Internet-Law-and-Intellectual-P...

anotherjesse 16y ago
By policing and issuing a dmca notice dropbox seems to be risking their status from "carrier/hoster"? IANAL but the dmca provides hosting sites protection against users who infringe. By actively checking for infringement of users having dropship could they be openning themselves to legal complications if they lose "hoster" status?
- rhizome 16y ago
  You're mixing up your concepts, thinking of common carrier status that is used for communications networks. DMCA takedowns were designed so that hosting companies could avoid contributory copyright infringement accusations only. Common-carrier was designed, for example, to prevent telephone companies from being accused of contributing to crimes hatched on their wires.
deleted 16y ago
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xnerdr 16y ago
Would the civil litigation be against the company or the person? What sort of penalties are involved in such cases? If they lose, would the winner basically own a chunk of dropbox? (sorry, none American and not a lawyer)
rprasad 16y ago
Not an invalid DMCA request, even assuming one was sent out. Copyright applies to original and derivative works, though multiple parties may own copyrights to a derivative work. In America, derivative works include software programs which are inseparably reliant on code or features (including APIs) of another program. It's basically the same argument that WordPress and Drupal make in regard to themes, plugins, etc., falling under the same open source licenses (i.e., copyrights) as the platforms themselves. In this case, dropship is entirely reliant on unique features of Dropbox. This makes it a derivative work, and would mean that Dropbox has copy rights over dropship. The programmer of dropship also has copyrights over dropship to the extent that the code is an original work, but Dropbox's rights trump his b/c they own the rights to the original underlying work.
- dctoedt 16y ago
  > In America, derivative works include software programs which are inseparably reliant on code or features (including APIs) of another program. ... In this case, dropship is entirely reliant on unique features of Dropbox. This makes it a derivative work, and would mean that Dropbox has copy rights over dropship. I don't think that's true; if you've got any case authority, I'd certainly like to remedy my ignorance of it. "Derivative work" is defined in the Copyright Act: [1] "A 'derivative work' is a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a 'derivative work'." [Emphasis added] I don't recall ever having seen any kind of ruling that sending API-compliant messages to another computer via the Internet, for processing by code already running on the other computer, somehow constitutes creating a derivative work of that code. And I don't see how, in any normal case, the owner of the code on the other computer could claim that the API message sender had caused an infringing copy of the code to be made. If I were representing the API message sender, I'd likely argue that the owner of the code -- by (putatively) licensing the computer operator to configure the code to listen for and process API messages -- had consented to whatever copying might have occurred. [1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000101----000-.html http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_0...
- dman 16y ago
  IANAL but I do not see how you could be correct. I request any lawyer reading this to please chime in.

anotherjesse 16y ago

By policing and issuing a dmca notice dropbox seems to be risking their status from "carrier/hoster"? IANAL but the dmca provides hosting sites protection against users who infringe. By actively checking for infringement of users having dropship could they be openning themselves to legal complications if they lose "hoster" status?

rhizome 16y ago
You're mixing up your concepts, thinking of common carrier status that is used for communications networks. DMCA takedowns were designed so that hosting companies could avoid contributory copyright infringement accusations only. Common-carrier was designed, for example, to prevent telephone companies from being accused of contributing to crimes hatched on their wires.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

xnerdr 16y ago

Would the civil litigation be against the company or the person? What sort of penalties are involved in such cases? If they lose, would the winner basically own a chunk of dropbox? (sorry, none American and not a lawyer)

rprasad 16y ago

Not an invalid DMCA request, even assuming one was sent out. Copyright applies to original and derivative works, though multiple parties may own copyrights to a derivative work. In America, derivative works include software programs which are inseparably reliant on code or features (including APIs) of another program. It's basically the same argument that WordPress and Drupal make in regard to themes, plugins, etc., falling under the same open source licenses (i.e., copyrights) as the platforms themselves. In this case, dropship is entirely reliant on unique features of Dropbox. This makes it a derivative work, and would mean that Dropbox has copy rights over dropship. The programmer of dropship also has copyrights over dropship to the extent that the code is an original work, but Dropbox's rights trump his b/c they own the rights to the original underlying work.

dctoedt 16y ago
> In America, derivative works include software programs which are inseparably reliant on code or features (including APIs) of another program. ... In this case, dropship is entirely reliant on unique features of Dropbox. This makes it a derivative work, and would mean that Dropbox has copy rights over dropship. I don't think that's true; if you've got any case authority, I'd certainly like to remedy my ignorance of it. "Derivative work" is defined in the Copyright Act: [1] "A 'derivative work' is a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted. A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or other modifications which, as a whole, represent an original work of authorship, is a 'derivative work'." [Emphasis added] I don't recall ever having seen any kind of ruling that sending API-compliant messages to another computer via the Internet, for processing by code already running on the other computer, somehow constitutes creating a derivative work of that code. And I don't see how, in any normal case, the owner of the code on the other computer could claim that the API message sender had caused an infringing copy of the code to be made. If I were representing the API message sender, I'd likely argue that the owner of the code -- by (putatively) licensing the computer operator to configure the code to listen for and process API messages -- had consented to whatever copying might have occurred. [1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000101----000-.html http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_0...
dman 16y ago
IANAL but I do not see how you could be correct. I request any lawyer reading this to please chime in.