Thread: ALIPAC Responds to Ambush Lawsuit Filed by RightHaven

ALIPAC Responds to Ambush Copyright Lawsuit

September 1, 2010

CONTACT: Americans for Legal Immigration PAC
(866) 703-0864 WilliamG@alipac.us

ALIPAC is responding to an ambush lawsuit filed by RightHaven LLC & Las Vegas Review-Journal alleging copyright infringement by William Gheen and the national illegal immigration fighting group Americans for Legal Immigration PAC which hosts the largest archive of information in existence on the topics of border security and illegal immigration.

"We stand ready to defend our free political speech and the free speech of all Americans against predatory companies like RightHaven and biased newspapers that would use the courts to try to generate revenue and silence the free speech of Americans," said William Gheen President of ALIPAC. "We intend to defend our organization, our rights, and our good name with every possible resource."

"RightHaven is suing ALIPAC over an article titled "'Latino Summit': (US Senator) Reid addresses Hispanic Iissues", which ran in the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Feb. 18, 2010. The article describes US Senator Harry Reid's promises to a Latino group that he would support a form of Amnesty for illegal aliens in America. The article also describes how many Democrats are backing away from Reid's Amnesty legislation due to "recent loss of several high-profile seats to Republicans"

Senator Reid is in a close race with Republican challenger Sharon Angle who has recently been described by a new political action committee called Immigrants List as "among the biggest obstacles to immigration reform" Amnesty.

RightHaven is asking a judge to give them full control of ALIPAC's Internet domain www.ALIPAC.us which would allow them to shut down the entire website over the article about Senator Reid's support for Amnesty.

ALIPAC's first notice of a copyright dispute came in the form of a Google alert indicating a court document had been filed, followed by an e-mail of inquiry from a reporter for the Las Vegas Sun. Righthaven LLC is a new company formed in March of 2010 that goes around filing lawsuits without warning against bloggers hoping for a quick settlement of $3-$5,000.

ALIPAC archives articles from online publications as part of the group's rights under the Fair Use Act and as expressions of the group's members freedom of political speech. In the six years ALIPAC has been in operation no other media outlet or company has chosen to challenge ALIPAC's rights in court, although materials from all major news publications are archived at www.ALIPAC.us

In the few cases where source publications have requested the removal of materials, those requests have been granted by ALIPAC. ALIPAC received no request from Las Vegas Review-Journal or RightHaven, just an Ambush lawsuit.

ALIPAC's archives have revolutionized the Internet's long term memory on subjects regarding illegal immigration. The archives are utilized without charge by American citizens, lawmakers, candidates, reporters, law enforcement agents, students, and others seeking greater knowledge about this important national issue.

"For American citizens to make proper choices and to be able to understand a complex political issue like illegal immigration, they need full access to articles and information across a period of many years," said William Gheen. "Our non-profit political action committee will not stop providing this service to American citizens as our volunteer work is a critical element of the national political debate. We are seeking legal representation today to defend our rights and to look into filing lawsuits against Righthaven and the Las Vegas Review-Journal for attempting to violate our civil rights and trying to prevent our public participation."

"We will not allow ourselves or the online communities of America debating political issues to be intimidated or silenced by the aggressive legal ambush tactics of Righthaven and Las Vegas Review-Journal," said William Gheen.

Americans for Legal Immigration PAC will be reaching out to supporters across America for financial and legal assistance in this matter. ALIPAC is America's third largest grassroots organization fighting for secure borders. With over 30,000 supporters nationally, the group does not intend to pay Righthaven a single dime, much less the thousands of dollars they usually extort from bloggers who cannot afford to defend themselves. For more information or to support ALIPAC please visit www.ALIPAC.us

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I'd heard about this a few months ago and wondered when they would be going after Alipac.

How can they go after ALIPAC when the story is credited with a source link?

* Comments32 Comments

Websites, bloggers make moves to avoid Righthaven lawsuits

By Steve Green (contact)

Monday, Aug. 9, 2010 | 1:50 a.m.
Beyond the Sun

* Boston Herald: Legal shark sues Boston bloggers

Sun archives

* Righthaven continues suits over R-J copyrights; 91 total (8-6-2010)
* State Democratic Party fighting R-J copyright lawsuit (8-5-2010)
* Legal attack dog sicked on websites accused of violating R-J copyrights (8-4-2010)
* Some targets of Righthaven lawsuits fighting back (8-4-2010)
* Are website copyright violations hurting newspapers' bottom line? (8-4-2010)
* Defendants in R-J copyright lawsuits speak out (8-4-2010)
* Five more R-J copyright lawsuits filed (8-3-2010)
* R-J mob source hit with copyright suit (7-27-2010)
* More copyright lawsuits filed over Review-Journal stories (7-23-2010)
* Conservative website among 3 sued over R-J copyrights (7-20-2010)
* 3 suits over alleged R-J copyright infringements bring total to 72 (7-16-10)
* 5 more suits filed over alleged R-J copyright violations (7-15-10)
* Nevada Democratic Party hit with R-J copyright lawsuit (7-9-10)
* 5 more websites face R-J copyright lawsuits (7-8-10)
* Six more suits filed over R-J copyrights (7-1-10)
* Three more websites hit with R-J copyright suits (6-29-10)
* R-J copyright suit filed against newspaper source (6-25-10)
* 3 more R-J copyright suits filed; defendant responds (6-10-10)
* 8 more websites sued over R-J copyrights; 34 total (6-5-10)
* Former news anchor among targets of new R-J copyright suits (5-30-10)
* 4 more copyright suits over R-J stories brings total to 22 (5-28-10)
* 4 more sites sued over alleged R-J copyright infringements (5-20-10)
* 14th website sued over R-J copyright allegations (5-17-10)
* More suits over alleged R-J copyrights bring number to 13 (5-14-10)
* Suits accuse groups of posting copyrighted R-J stories (5-5-10)
* Two more websites sued over posting of R-J stories (5-3-10)
* Sixth copyright suit filed over R-J stories on websites (4-26-10)
* 3 copyright suits filed over R-J stories on Web sites (4-16-10)
* Suits accuse 2 groups of posting copyrighted R-J stories online (3-17-10)

As word spreads around the country about the copyright infringement lawsuits filed over online Las Vegas-Review Journal stories, some bloggers and attorneys are advising website operators to immediately take steps to protect themselves from such suits.

Las Vegas company Righthaven LLC, headed by Las Vegas attorney Steven Gibson, through Friday had acquired a portfolio of 119 copyrights to individual stories from Review-Journal owner Stephens Media LLC -- and since March has filed 91 lawsuits against website owners throughout North America over the unauthorized re-postings of many of those stories.

Beyond the obvious procedure of not displaying unauthorized Review-Journal stories on their websites, and instead posting a link, some website operators recently learning of Righthaven have been scurrying to remove R-J stories from their archives that in some cases may extend back for several years.

And there's a legal point that is being stressed. Under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), website owners to avoid liability in some instances must designate a contact and register their contact information with the U.S. Copyright Office.

This point apparently hasn't been well known among bloggers and website operators.

A website called beforeitsnews.com, which says it's a community of individuals reporting on what's going on around them, said in a recent post:

"People around the Internet have been perplexed at the actions of Righthaven, which has been outright filing lawsuits against hundreds of blogs and forums.

"Most webmasters wish to obey copyright laws and the 'norm' around the Internet has been for people who have a copyright problem to first file a DMCA takedown notice giving the webmaster time to remove the infringing material.

"Then if the webmaster refuses they can sue them.

"In fact we all thought that was a requirement and were shocked that these guys are actually suing people with no prior notice at all.

"We've been wondering how they can get away with that legally and it turns out an obscure section of the DMCA concerning the 'safe harbor' noticing procedures requires -- in order for a website to qualify for 'safe harbor' and thus require a copyright complainant to first give the webmaster notice and time to take down the material before suing them -- (amongst other things) that each website register their contact information with the United States Copyright office," the post said.

Ryan Gile, a Las Vegas intellectual property attorney with the firm Weide & Miller Ltd., made the same point Friday on his blog vegastrademarkattorney.com.

Gile also wrote:

"Many people who post content online may be under the impression that they can lawfully post all or part of an article originally published in the R-J so long as appropriate credit to the R-J is given (as well as possibly a link back to where the article appeared on the R-J’s website). In actuality, such actions may constitute copyright infringement.

"The R-J just accepted this type of copyright infringement for the longest time as an unfortunate byproduct of the Internet. However, earlier this year, the R-J apparently had a change of heart and is now aggressively going after anybody who posts any of its copyrighted content online," Gile wrote.

The Las Vegas office of the law firm Lewis and Roca LLP, which is representing some of the Rigthhaven defendants, says on its website:

"Lewis and Roca has represented defendants in a substantial number of the cases filed by Righthaven to date in settlement negotiations and litigation. Lewis and Roca has formed a team to handle these cases in an efficient and effective manner. In addition to representation against Righthaven, Lewis and Roca can provide advice on steps individuals and companies can take to minimize the risk of liability for copyright infringement, including protection under the safe harbor provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act."

Some of the Righthaven defendants, in the meantime, are trying to organize so they can share in the legal costs of fighting the lawsuits against them. This effort is being led by David Burnett and Clayton Cramer, officials with the Idaho-based ArmedCitizen.com website that was sued by Righthaven.

The ArmedCitizen site, which posted stories about citizens using weapons in self defense, said it shut down after it was sued by Righthaven in order to avoid more legal trouble.

In a letter to some Righthaven defendants, Burnett writes:

"I understand you have been sued by Righthaven. Me too. So have roughly 90 other bloggers and websites. Basically, Righthaven is finding websites and bloggers who don't have enough money to afford quality legal representation and is trying to score quick settlements.

"We don't have to lie day down and take it.

"... I am in touch with attorneys who are willing to represent not just me or us, but a collective of Righthaven victims. We may even be able to motion to consolidate the cases. There are also some strong arguments we're exploring to raise against Righthaven's suits, which may mean they don't just win by default. ... We will be better off standing together than standing alone."

And at least three websites have been created to offer information on Righthaven. These are in addition to a Facebook page called "stop the LVRJ/RIGHTHAVEN witch hunt!"

The websites are righthavenlawsuits.com, www.scribd.com/righthavenlawsuits and righthavenvictims.blogspot.com.

Review-Journal Publisher Sherman Frederick explained the Righthaven initiative in a May 28 blog.

CLICK THE LINK BELOW to access all the archived stories mentioned at the top

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/au ... aven-laws/

Originally Posted by SicNTiredInSoCal

How can they go after ALIPAC when the story is credited with a source link?

because they are saying that no one has rights to cut and paste stories off their websites to another, even if a link is there, because in their eyes, it will take viewers away from coming to their website.

Originally Posted by jamesw62

Originally Posted by SicNTiredInSoCal

How can they go after ALIPAC when the story is credited with a source link?

because they are saying that no one has rights to cut and paste stories off their websites to another, even if a link is there, because in their eyes, it will take viewers away from coming to their website.

I'm no expert, but I have built and maintain 5 website for my businesses and I would think they might welcome having theirs linked to one like ALIPAC with the amount of traffic it gets. Does that not still benefit the sites we link to? I thought the link was enough to credit the person or organization etc that wrote it? Maybe something changed when I was asleep or something....

no because they will say that by posting the entire story that no one will visit their site after reading the whole story.

if they are going to be this nit picky. im not sure they will have alot of viewers anymore anyways.


GO READ THIS

i found this. and it includes an email

Las Vegas Trademark Attorney

A blog dedicated to exploring, discussing, and sharing with the world the latest news and legal developments in trademark law -- Published by Ryan Gile.

http://www.vegastrademarkattorney.com/2 ... haven.html

, Righthaven is finding websites and bloggers who don't have enough money to afford quality legal representation and is trying to score quick settlements.

James

It is standard on many other forums to only post the main feature of the story with a link , not the whole article

There have been several copyright issues over posting whole stories.

sucks