The first version of a tortured lawsuit against the five largest trade publishers and Amazon, alleging that the publishers conspired to have Amazon extract tough terms from them, failed quickly and was withdrawn and “amended.” It rested primarily on allegations of abusive most favored nations clauses. So Amazon produced redacted contracts to demonstrate that the “MFN conspiracy theory was utterly baseless. Separate and apart from its mischaracterization of the purpose and effect of MFN provisions, the simple fact is that none of Amazon’s and the Publisher Defendants’ wholesale purchase agreements for print books contains any of the price or non-price […]
Legal
Legal: Publishers and Internet Archive Ask for Three-Month Extension
In a joint letter to Judge John Koeltl, both parties in the trade publishers’ copyright infringement lawsuit against the Internet Archive asked for a revised schedule extending the discovery deadlines for the second time, postponing everything by another three months. Fact discovery was due to have been completed by September 24. The parties report “extensive progress on discovery…. But looking ahead, it has become clear that more time is required to process the voluminous documentary evidence produced in this case. It inevitably takes a lot of time to review and synthesize such large volumes of documents and more time is […]
Legal: Gendell Wants Contempt Order Over Fee Payment
Yfat Reiss Gendell’s attorney has asked the court to find Peter McGuigan in contempt for not paying her legal defense fees, as ordered in August. She asks for immediate payment of the reduced amount McGuigan’s attorney asked the court to impose — close to $60,000 — along with daily fines and costs. In the accompanying documents, Gendell shows that the $32,000 in fees to another law firm that McGuigan has challenged relates to an earlier dispute — presenting the bill, from a year ago, “for services rendered to Foundry in connection with Foundry’s ‘wind down.'” Epstein Becker provided legal services […]
McGuigan Asks for Court Order to Pay Foundry Authors
Since the dispute between former Foundry partners Yfat Reiss Gendell and Peter McGuigan first surfaced, the most far-ranging impact has been on authors, experiencing delayed payments and stalled sub-rights activity. On Wednesday, McGuigan filed notice of an instant motion asking the court to order Gendell to approve outstanding payments due to authors at a hearing already scheduled for September 21. McGuigan also asks the court to order going forward that Gendell “review and object for a material reason, or approve all future payments posted on the bank website, within three (3) calendar days thereafter, without exception.” Accounts from Foundry bookkeeper […]
Copyright Office Concurs that Maryland’s Library Lending Law Is “Likely…Preempted” By the Copyright Act
Register of Copyrights and director of the US Copyright Office Shira Perlmutter formally responded to US Senate ranking member on the subcommittee on intellectual property Thom Tillis’s request for an analysis of Maryland’s recently-enacted law regulating library lending of ebooks and similar efforts pending on other states. Tillis was clearly looking for confirmation of his inference “that these state legislative efforts would appear to directly conflict with the Copyright Act’s clear language” and “preemption rules that situate copyright law exclusively at the federal level.” Perlmutter concurs, noting, “We conclude that under current precedent, the state laws at issue are likely […]
Legal: The Next Foundry Fight Is Over Fees
Recent filings show at least part of the cost of the long-running dispute between former Foundry partners Yfat Reiss Gendell and Peter McGuigan: Following a court order that Foundry “advance attorneys’ fees and expenses to Gendell” to defend against the suit brought by McGuigan and Foundry, Gendell’s attorneys at Sher Tremonte submitted bills for “$157,181.49 in fees and expenses through our firm in connection with the defense of this action.” They contend “we have been conservative in identifying the fees for which we are seeking advancement,” omitting “work associated with defendants’ counterclaims [and] their opposition to plaintiffs’ motion to dismiss.” […]