You’ve got to be kidding me. The US Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that Congress can remove works from the public domain and re-copyright them in order to bring the the pieces into compliance with international copyright schemes. Yeah, because that doesn’t run completely against the spirit of copyright law or anything. More »
Hollywood apparently tried to make a federal case about Cablevision launching a virtual DVR, a cable box with no local hard drive that still lets you “record” shows to watch later, and even fast forward through commercials. Hollywood studios got mad because they deemed it unfair re-broadcasting of content. The Supreme Court looked at the case and took a pass—by not hearing it, they are allowing Cablevision and others to proceed with development unhindered. I like the concept of a driveless DVR, but I don’t like the cable company keeping my shows—stuff I’ve already recorded—under lock and key. [NY Times]
In case you missed it, Channel 9′s new crime drama, Underbelly, was banned from being broadcast in Victoria by the Victorian Supreme Court on Monday as it may influence the result of a murder trial currently underway. The show is a “based on the true story” type show about the 10 year gang war in Melbourne.
But what makes this story really interesting is that within 30 minutes of it being aired last night throughout the rest of Australia, the show was popping up on torrent sites for people to download. Including people from Victoria. According to the SMH, “this morning more than 600 people were already downloading the show from one site”.
