Copyright

Most art piracy cases never reach the courts because infringement is difficult to prove or artists can't afford expensive lawsuits. Admirers of the late Lorser Feitelson's paintings, for example, have noted a similarity between his "lineform" abstractions and the twisted ribbon-like design on Coca-Cola cans, but the likeness has never been legally challenged. Neither has the similarity between one of Matt Mullican's images and the logo on Max Studio clothing.

Google Inc. won preliminary approval of a settlement of copyright lawsuits by publishers and authors in which it will pay $125 million to resolve claims over the company's book-scanning project. U.S. District Judge John Sprizzo in New York issued the order tentatively approving the deal and scheduled a hearing for June 11, when he will further consider the pact's fairness. Mountain View, Calif.-based Google has said the settlement, announced Oct. 28, will enable it to make millions of books searchable and printable online.

Warning: Copyright threats on DVDs and TV broadcasts may be misstating the law. A high-tech trade group made that charge Wednesday to the Federal Trade Commission, alleging deceptive trade practices for the scary copyright warnings before movies and during sports broadcasts. The Computer and Communications Industry Assn. said it was trying to protect the public's legal rights from overzealous media companies, which in turn said they were simply trying to protect their content.

Who would have thought copyright law could be so interesting? Just ask Esti Miller of Culver City. She has plenty to say on the subject. Miller's essay on the North American Free Trade Agreement recently won the prestigious American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers' Nathan Burkan Memorial Competition. Miller compared NAFTA with the 1957 Treaty of Rome, which established the European economic community, and the subsequent 1992 Maastricht Treaty on European Union.

A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit alleging that Google Inc.'s Web search systems infringe a publisher's copyright, a minor victory for the company, which faces numerous suits charging that its services trample the rights of authors. In a ruling issued March 10 and made known Thursday, Judge R. Barclay Surrick of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania rejected 11 allegations contained in a civil complaint by Gordon Roy Parker of Philadelphia.

President Reagan signed legislation Monday to expand copyright protection of U.S.-produced literary and artistic works, calling the event "a watershed for us." Reagan signed the 1988 Berne Convention Implementation Act at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in a ceremony attended by congressmen and members of the artistic community who had worked to get the legislation passed.

A U.S. appeals court has rejected a bid by Internet activists to roll back federal laws that extended copyright protection over "orphan works," or books and other media that are no longer in print. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court decision to dismiss Kahle vs. Gonzales, which argued that legal changes made in the 1990s had vastly extended copyright protections at the expense of free speech rights.

Software makers asked Congress to make it easier to track down people who copy their products over the Internet, joining the entertainment industry in an effort to stiffen copyright protections. The Business Software Alliance, a lobbying group whose members include Microsoft Corp. and Apple Computer Inc., said Internet service providers like America Online should be required to reveal the names of customers who may be distributing copyright software through "peer to peer" networks such as Kazaa.

President Clinton on Tuesday signed legislation that would allow for punishment of people who post copyrighted works on the Internet, even if they don't make money off the site. The measure extends copyright law to permit prosecution of individuals who "with criminal intent" seek to infringe others' copyrights, whether or not they make money off the posting, said bill sponsor Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.). The bill doesn't alter the "fair use" doctrine of copyright law, Goodlatte said.

EBay Inc. has begun monitoring items for sale on its site for possible copyright infringement in response to pressure from software makers and intellectual property interests. The new program has removed about 12 listings per day for software, movies, music and other copyrighted content since it began in December. The software industry's anti-piracy trade group and manufacturers of copyright products, such as Microsoft Corp., pushed for the change.