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German Constitutional Court Blocks Napster Suit
djmutex writes "In an urgent ruling, the German Constitutional Court has temporarily blocked the Napster copyright violations class action of several American recording companies and artists against Bertelsmann. The court decided that the German court in Düsseldorf, which was, according to international conventions, required to serve the writ, may not do so until the Constitutional Court has checked that the suit does not violate Bertelsmann's rights granted by the German constitution. Since, according to those agreements, the service is a precondition for both the suit to proceed in the U.S. as well as the later acceptance of the U.S. ruling in Germany, the lawsuit is for now halted. It is unclear when the Constitutional Court will definitely decide, but it is not generally famed for its tempo on final rulings, and it also stated in the press release (in German) that constitutional rights could possibly be violated if "proceedings before state courts are obviously abused to discipline competitors through public media pressure and the risk of a conviction"." Reuters has a summary.
I have not read the article, but I will declare victory for free speech. I will also make a vague jab at the DMCA, and express my deep-seated hatred for the evil RIAA.
Even though I don't speak German and I have no understanding of how the legal system works in Germany, I'll act like I know what I'm talking about when I make my ridiculously uninformed comment.
Who would have thought that the German constitution has had this law suit thrown out of court and protect a company while blatantly created a program for copyright violation, while the US constitution allows a collage student to be sued for his life savings by the RIAA for simply creating a search engine.
There is no god
If Bertelsmann buys a US company which violates US copyrights then Bertelsmann should submit to US law. If they don't like this, then they shouldn't do any business in the US.
If an american corporation does business with a foreign company which violates foreign law, then that american company should submit to foreign law. If they don't like this, then they shouldn't do any business with foreign organisations.
GPL May Not Work In German Legal System, but also this news.
The German legal system is refreshingly weird, unlike the American legal system.
The second senate of the Federal Constitutional Court forbade the court submitted damage suit of a group of US of American music author and publishing houses of the complaint guide (BF), American before US, today in the way of the provisional arrangement of the president of the higher regional court Duesseldorf for the duration of six months, at the latest up to a decision over the constitutional complaint, the Bertelsmann AG to let set in Germany. It concerns in the express procedure the following: The plaintiffs of the US-American output procedure state, the BF is in the meanwhile insolvent music exchange stock exchange "Napster" been and to that extent also for possibly copyright infringements committed by the music exchange stock exchange responsible involved. In the complaint procedure introduced as collecting complaint payment of damages at a value of 17 billion US dollar is stressed. The feed of the klageschrift is on the one hand condition for process in US American right, on the other hand one it is after German civil proceedings the condition for the later acknowledgment of the foreign judgement. The president of the higher regional court Duesseldorf granted the feed request of the plaintiffs for feed as responsible "central authority" after that Hague conventions over the feed of judicial and documents out of court abroad (HZUe) positively and issued a feed arrangement. The zustellungsversuch with the BF failed however because of nonacceptance of the document. The BF remained with their thereupon request posed for judicial decision against the feed arrangement before the higher regional court Duesseldorf without success. Hiergegen raised it in the main thing constitutional complaint. It makes an injury of its fundamental rights from art. 12 exp. 1 and art. 14 exp. 1 GG as well as from art. 2 exp. 1 GG valid. For its request for provisional legal protection it refers to the high probability of a forthcoming further zustellungsversuchs. With the feed the impairments of its fundamental right positions would occur and its business concern would negatively affect. From the reasons of the decision follows: 1. The constitutional complaint in the main thing procedure is neither inadmissibly nor obviously unfounded. The domestic legal order is not made fundamental the test yardstick for a feed after the HZUe. Exeptionally a feed request can be rejected however due to the reservation in the HZUe, if the asked state considers the feed suitable to endanger its sovereignty rights or its security. Federal Constitutional Court has decided in this connection already that the grant of legal aid does not hurt the general freedom of action in connection with the constitutional state principle by the feed of a complaint, with which requirements on punishing payment of damages are made valid after US-American right. With the fact however it remained open whether the feed of such a complaint with art. is to be agreed upon 2 exp. 1 GG in connection with the constitutional state principle, if the goal aimed at with the foreign complaint offends obviously against indispensable principles of a liberal constitutional state. If procedures before national courts in an obviously abusive way are used, in order to make with publizistischem pressure and the risk of a condemnation a market participant gefuegig, this German constitutional law could hurt. Clarifying the question, whether this border is exceeded in the available case, remains reserving the main thing procedure. This is more near implemented in the decision in detail. 2. The decision to favour of the BF is issued due to a consequence consideration. If the provisional is issued request in accordance with arrangement, although the constitutional complaint turns out unfoundedly later however than, the feed of the complaint in the way of the legal aid would have only retarded. Irreparable prejudices for the plaintiffs of US of American output procedure do not connect themselves with it recognizably. However if the decree of the provisional arrangement is omit
You know what?
I hope we'll see such rulings (even not yet definitive) more often. Media conglomerates may have bought half of America and a third of the European Parlement, they are still some people left whose jobs are to be sure that laws have to be in sync with the higest values of the constitution of their country. They is only one Supreme Court in the US, there are one in EACH country of the EU that could be a counter-power to each stupid law.
Christophe (Don't hesitate to point out my spelling and grammar mistakes, I want to learn - Thanks).
Like the miranda stuff, gun possession amendement, weird law about punishing hacker/copyright infringer with more prison than a raper/thief and in some case murderer, the fact you can sue if you are in the wrong mood, 12 people which know nothing of the law , and can swallow any good discourse by defense/offense especially on "expert" debat, have to swear on the bible in court (?!) and I pass many of them.
it can all be resumed in : "different history , different culture, different law system". Do not try to understand. Accept it.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
First they oust Windows in Munich, then they do all kinds of crazy things that are good for the general public such as this. Now They're protecting people's rights. It seems like Germany is the place where all /.ers should move to. Although, then what would you complain about?
-I DDoSed your mom.
thats like suing people who owned stock/bought service from enron/worldcom.
;p
here is the company that funded the program, that shared the file, that stole money from the artist who is now eating from the gutter.
I meant "refreshingly weird" as a compliment, as opposed to "who forgot to flush the toilet?!" weird, which describes the US legal system.
Who would have thought that the German constitution has had this law suit thrown out of court and protect a company while blatantly created a program for copyright violation, while the US constitution allows a collage student to be sued for his life savings by the RIAA for simply creating a search engine.
The US Constitution had nothing to do with that guy. He caved at the pressure and offered the RIAA everything in return. I bet the EFF would have backed him legally and the RIAA would have dropped the case or settled for a slap on the wrist and filtering of the search engine instead of all the guy's gil.
Also, lets not warp things out of perspective. His search engine wasn't without sin. A search engine to catalog shared files across a college campus. Yea, that has a lot more practical applications then simply warez, mp3z, and pr0n doesn't it?
I don't agree with the RIAA in their argument he was responsible for what others shared. I also don't agree with him caving in and then complaining. I doubt it would have held up in court. But we'll never know will we?
BTW. That last question was rhetorical incase you felt like answering it.
It is unclear when the Constitutional Court will definitely decide[...]
I'm a German, but since IANAL, my legalese isn't up to scratch, so I might be wrong here, but I think that in the press release it says something about a 6 month time frame:
Der Zweite Senat des Bundesverfassungsgerichts hat heute[...] der Präsidentin des Oberlandesgerichts Düsseldorf für die Dauer von sechs Monaten, längstens bis zu einer Entscheidung über die Verfassungsbeschwerde untersagt, die [...] Schadensersatzklage [..] zustellen zu lassen.
Rough translation:
"The 2nd chamber of the constitutional court today ruled that the president of the Düsseldorf court may not serve the writ for a six month time period, or at the utmost until there's been a decision about the constitutional complaint."
Now there's probably a lot been lost in the translation, but to me this sounds like the court isn't allowed to serve the writ until either the constitutional court has made a decision or 6 months have passed.
But again, IANAL and I may very well have mis-interpreted (and thus mis-translated) that part.
Jens
Well obviously the difference doesn't lie in the Constitutions of the United States and Germany but in the way the courts handle a situation like this.
/. front page or in the Economic Times you'd see that it's not so much about the People vs. the Corps but about the fact that in Germany you can't carry about a case in the media and expect that it is still constitutional to proceed with the case, as well as the fact that media pressure and threats of court orders don't fly there.
In the United States a Corporation has the rights of an individual.
Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad
Under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, corporations are treated as individuals; therefore, their taxes should be assessed at a smaller value, the same way it is done for individual property owners.
This case is often cited in other cases because it stands for the principle that the word person in the Fourteenth Amendment applies to corporations as well as natural persons and both are entitled to the equal protection of the laws under the Constitution.
So in the United States the issue wouldn't be about corporations against the people, but about the rights of an individual to copywritten materials.
If you were to read the description of the situation on the
"The Federal Constitutional Court said it stopped the delivery because it could not rule out that the lawsuit, filed by a group of U.S. music publishers in Manhattan, would violate Bertelsmann's constitutional rights in Germany.
"If lawsuits in (foreign) courts are obviously misused to bend a market player to one's will by way of media pressure and the risk of a court order, this could violate the German constitution," the court said in a statement late on Friday."
What does this exactly mean, considering that Napster is history?
Wake up, people. We are in global competition and some people are NOT playing fair.
There are peer to peer networks for the sharing of legal music. In some cases they use digital signatures to ensure the files are legit. Here's the ones I've found so far:
- Furthur Network
-
konspire[2b]
-
Monotonik's BitTorrents - zip files with ~300 MB of MP3s
If you know of any others please let me know.Request your free CD of my piano music.
The very fact that shareholders cannot be sued for investing in a company is one of the cornerstones of the entire world's economy.
The worst you can do to the shareholders is to sue the corporation so that it has to dissolve in bankrupcy, so that the shareholders lose their investment.
There are only a few ways to "pierce the corporate veil". One of those is for the corporation to not pay its taxes. If the corporation does that, the tax authorities can levy the money from the personal assets of anyone with a fiduciary interest in the corporation.
There are other ways the corporate veil can be pierced, which all more or less involve the attempt to use the corporation as an attempt to protect yourself from being prosecuted for illegal activity.
IANAL, but I own a corporation, and I'm pretty sure no form of civil tort provides for piercing the corporate veil.
Request your free CD of my piano music.
It's not about people or buisinesses, and also not about whether Napster is legal. The press release says: a) The lawsuit may violate essential constitutional principles by seeking to abuse the law to kill a competitor b) If the lawsuit is delayed, nobody will loose anything, but if it proceeds, Bertelsman may suffer from irrecoverable damages. Therefore, it would be inappropriate if the constitutional court would let the lawsuit proceed without deciding on (a) first.
Like I said, I haven't used it in a while so I don't know how good the servers are anymore. Anyone interested should look at Napigator for some more info.
~Tommy Boomfiger http://www.gotapex.com/forums
To clear up some stuff, this ruling has very little or nothing to do with legality of P2P services. It is about the huge amount of sums companies have to pay others for doing things out of contract. In the US, comps have to pay huge amounts to individuals or other comps as a FINE for what they have been doing which exceeds the damage by far. This is not possible in Germany. You have to proof that there has been a DAMAGE for you, and you have this DAMAGE repaid only. Now, this is what you have to understand to understand the ruling. Below I will roughly translate what our constitutional court said : The country court in Duesseldorf is not allowed to hand in the charge against Bertelmann until further notice. The charge, handed in by Bertelsmann rivals EMI and Universal for 17 Million Dollars MIGHT be against fundamental basics of our justice system. To stop the charge being overhanded, this INTERIM order has been made. The very high amount to get money beyond your damages is not GENERALLY against our constitution. But if trials in front of german courts are misused in an obvious way to gather public attention and press coverage and the risk of being sentenced to make the opponent give in, this might break the german constituion. Wether this has been the case THIS TIME, if to be cleared in the MAIN TRIAL. If this question is answered yes, the charge is not allowed in germany and german courts can't deal with it. Bertelsmann sees itself endangered in it's by the constitution granted rights of possesion and freedom of occupation. Hope this clears it up a bit George
...constitutional rights could possibly be violated if "proceedings before state courts are obviously abused to discipline competitors through public media pressure and the risk of a conviction".
:-)
Now, if that isn't a neat description of the whole SCO strategy, I don't know what is. If ony SCO had filed in Germany, we'd have their assess
This isn't about napster, it is about EMI and Universal using napster and demanding ridiculous amounts of money to put pressure on Bertelsman. Then they'd probably go for some kind of settlement which has nothing to do with napster at all.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
The american legal system allows to demand ridiculous sums of money, also there's this weird case-law which to my understanding means, that one wrong decision in one court has to be repeated by every other american court, and also that lawyers have to consider not only the given law but any case which might have some remote similarities to the case at hand.
In this case the german court halted the process to decide first if it is constitutional to put a competitor under pressure by demanding the unusually high sums the US-system allows for.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
"I seem to have mastered a certain amount of control over physical reality."
Anyone else see this whole lawsuit as step in the right direction. To me it seems that "the soldiers are fighting among themselves in the trenches". EMI and Universal suing Bertellsman, maybe the RIAA affiliates can sue each other into oblivian.
The RIAA's Days are numbered. They're desperate, and it's beginning to show. I've said it before and I'll say it again, if they lose one of the 911 lawsuits they've filed against uploaders, it'll be the death of them (it sets a legal precedent for a viable defense and/or dismissal). This fighting between member organizations is great. Hopefully virgin can sue columbia next, and then sony can go after time warner. How much in lawyer fees is this costing each company?
Yay for the eventual rule of the people, and Keep up the good fight
Let's get one thing perfectly clear, I did not vote for George W Bush, and I do not endorse what he does or says.
"
And yet, corporations don't have the responsibilities of an individual. We have the death penalty for individuals, but not for corporations.
This has always seemed rather backwards to me. A single individual can cause a lot of trouble and damage, especially in an age of nuclear and biological weapons. However, the amount of damage that can be caused by a corporation is much greater, yet the punishments for corporations in America are effectively limited to fines.
Survival of the fittest seems to be fine for businesses, but individuals are much more limited in their behavior.
What American company are you talking about?
EMI is British and Universal is French. The RIAA is 80% foreign-owned and Warner Music (the only US label) is not listed in the suit.