Some Thoughts on TF1-DailyMotion Ruling from Paris Court of Appeals. This is a follow-up to my previous post on the TF1/DailyMotion ruling from the recent Paris Court of Appeals (see here).
YouTube Scores a Victory against TF1 in French Court. In a lengthy (by French standards at any rate: 34 pages) decision handed down yesterday (May 29), the Paris High Court dismissed French broadcaster TF1's lawsuit against YouTube.
The suit dates back to 2008 and involves numerous clips from TF1 (and related entities) that were posted on YouTube. A group of plaintiffs (all part of the TF1 Group) brought an action against the Google subsidiary alleging copyright infringement, infringement of so-called related (or neighbouring) rights, trademark infringement, unfair competition and parasitical conduct. The IPKat: TF1 v Dailymotion: meet third generation hosting providers. Some may think that the past few weeks have been fairly intense for internet service providers (ISPs) in the UK alone, with Arnold J clarifying, first, that blocking orders can be issued against websites that advertise and sell counterfeit goods [here] and, then, issuing the biggest blocking order to date in this country [here].
Apparently things have also been busy in France, especially this week with the Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris ordering major French ISPs to block access to the Pirate Bay and the Cour d'Appel de Paris clarifying the liability regime for second generation video-sharing platforms. Fellow blogger and expert in all things ISPs and French, Alberto Bellan, provides a thorough and thoughtful analysis of the latter. Here's what Alberto writes: "The background to this dispute was not dissimilar to many other proceedings against video-sharing platforms' operators that IP lovers have been following for a number of years. Background An ownership claim? Quel dommage? The 1709 Blog: News from France. On December 2nd, the Paris Court of Appeals handed down its ruling in the long running litigation between the French commercial TV broadcaster TF1 and DailyMotion, the "French YouTube".
The Court, while rejecting TF1's argument that DailyMotion was the publisher of the content posted to its site by users (and holding, to the contrary, that it was, in respect of such content, entitled to the safe harbour protection as hosting entity), did find that DailyMotion failed in its duty to act promptly upon proper notification to remove the infringing conetent. TF1 (and its various subsidiaries) was therefore awarded €1.3M in damages. On December 4th, the Paris High Court released its decision in a site blocking case brought by SCPP (the recorded music industry's representative body) in relation to the notorious Pirate Bay sites.
In accordance with Section L.336-2 of the Intellectual Property Code, the action was brought against the ISPs (and not the site operators themselves). France: DailyMotion Pays Damages for Late Removal of Infringing Materials. Recently, the Paris Court of Appeals handed down a decision awarding €1.3M in damages to the French commercial TV broadcaster TF1 against DailyMotion, which failed its duty of promptly removing infringing materials from its platform.
However, the Court stated that DailyMotion enjoys limitation of liability as a hosting provider and is not required to proactively monitor users' infringing activities. Likewise the lawsuit Viacom v. YouTube in the U.S., TF1 engaged DailyMotion in a longlasting legal battle in France. TF1 started proceedings in 2007 against DailyMotion after finding available on the video-sharing platform content included in TF1's catalog. The infringing materials ranged from episodes of Heroes, Martin Scorsese's The Departed, to other satirical and political shows broadcasted by TF1.
Dailymotion hébergeur condamné à 1,2 million d’euros de dommages-intérêts Ardailymotion021214.