Australian Federal Court Awards Damages To Artist For False Copyright Claim

New submitter BarryHaworth writes "In a decision handed down earlier this month, the Australian Federal Court awarded damages to Aboriginal artist Richard Bell over a false claim of copyright infringement. The claim related to a take-down notice claiming copyright infringement from film footage used in a trailer for a film being made by the artist. The court declared Mr. Bell the owner of the copyright and awarded him $147,000 in damages for lost sales of paintings and catalogues. At time of writing, YouTube does not appear to have caught up with the decision."

Comments

I wish this would happen in the USA

[MetalliQaZ]

... just one big case would be enough to bring some sanity to our system.

Re:The defendant didn't show up

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it meaningless? It sets precedence. The next case in that jurisdiction is more likely to go the same way; that seems meaningful to me.

Re:The defendant didn't show up

[OzPeter]

And didn't bother having counsel show up.

And lives on the other side of the world to the court's jurisdiction.

Hooray for a meaningless judgement.

Yep .. the respondent didn't show up and also ignored the judges order to basically explain why she held copyright. So it seems that she cried wolf and couldn't back her claims up.
 
While Bell may find it a bit hard to collect from Tanya Steele, I'd say that she has now lost out on a lot of future work - who'd want to employ someone on a "work for hire" basis if after the fact they are going to dick with you over who owns copyright?
 
So in a sense it is a meaningless judgement, but I think it will have real world repercussions.