Showing posts with label disney. Show all posts
Showing posts with label disney. Show all posts

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Licensing Litigation: "Hollywood Accounting" of Licensing Royalties Loses Bigtime: Jury Finds Disney Owes $269.2 Million

Who Wants to Be A Millionaire, per Wikipedia here.

Celadon licensed the show to Disney, seeking a 50-50 profits split.  Using "Hollywood Accounting" (link to great Wikipedia article on the practice). Disney managed to pocket $269.2 million that it owed to a licensor, according to a jury.

A percentage of the net profits is considered in Hollywood to be a percentage of nothing, since studios simply make up the math to always eliminate net profits by funnelling these monies to their friends.

Nice to see that a jury saw through it all...


Disney-Celador Lawsuit Verdict: Disney Ordered To Pay 'Millionaire' Makers $269.2 Million

Purchase Copyright Litigation Handbook from West here

Friday, May 14, 2010

Fair Use Friday: An Old Favorite - Fair(y) Use Tale


This explanation of copyright and fair use has been viewed almost 10 million times on YouTube, so you've probably seen it.   But it's great and fits in well with my two previous fair use video posts here and  here.

Reminder, fair use is an unsettled field, expensive to litigate, be careful out there from the US Code Chapter 17 (the Copyright Act): 

§ 107. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use


How Current is This? Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include—

(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;

(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.