Corbis Sues Amazon for Copyright Infringement

Gedvondur writes "The story ran in the WSJ today, that the Gates-owned image company, Corbis, is suing Amazon.com for copyright violations (PDF link). Apparently the suit was without warning to Amazon. Amazon will use the DMCA to defend itself. Link goes to copy of the WSJ article on Corbis's site."

Comments

Amazon uses DMCA to defends itself

[cpc]

"Amazon's Mr. Curry said the Corbis lawsuit was "without merit with respect to Amazon" because the company isn't liable for copyright infringements by its merchant partners under the DMCA."

Looks like the DMCA is a swiss army knife...

Re:an interesting test of the DMCA vs. the DMCA

[ocelotbob]

Actually, a more likely, though somewhat unfortunate at least from a personal freedom standpoint, is that the DMCA wins on both counts. From what it sounds like, Corbis' suit against Amazon is on shaky ground in that they didn't give them a chance to rectify the situation before the suit was filed. Amazon's going to claim the safe harbor provisions of the DMCA apply to this case, as they simply provide a marketplace for the information; much like an ISP, they only provide the linkspace, and don't pay much mind to the sites unless a problem is brought to their attention. Chances are, the court's going to agree with this defense, and either dismiss the case against Amazon, or a jury is going to find Amazon not liable due to the safe-harbor clause.

This leaves the actual sellers. They are commiting copyright violations, and as they are removing encryption used to protect copyrighted images without authorization, they will be slammed by the DMCA. Thus there is no battle royale with the DMCA against the DMCA, as the two different clauses of the DMCA are going to be used with what will be two different parties.