Last week attorneys defending the Internet Archive in the copyright infringement lawsuit brought by four AAP publishers asked Judge John Koetl for a conference on their request that looks ridiculously expansive on its face. They want the publishers ordered to produce monthly sales for the past decade on all of their books, in granular detail by sales channel, and insist there isn’t “any particular burden in retrieving the information requested.” In their reply, the attorney for the publishers notes that, “Plaintiffs have produced a vast wealth of detailed sales and related financial data concerning the Works in Suit, totaling over […]
Legal
Judge Allows Most of Gendell’s Counterclaims to Proceed
New York State Supreme Court Judge Joel Cohen ruled on Wednesday that all but one of agent Yfat Reiss Gendell’s counterclaims against agent Peter McGuigan can move forward, rejecting McGuigan’s motion to dismiss. Most significantly, the judge ordered what is left of Foundry to “advance attorneys’ fees and expenses to Gendell.” The original counterclaim suggested that amount was already at least $150,000, which will be yet another strain on the resources of Foundry. Judge Cohen found sufficient grounds to let stand the counterclaims of defamation, tortious interference and breach of contract, dismissing only the claim of prima facie tort (which “courts […]
FTC Makes Second Request In Review of ProQuest Sale to Clarivate
On July 28 the Federal Trade Commission made a second request for information in their review of Clarivate’s pending $5.3 billion acquisition of ProQuest. Clarivate announced that as a result, the parties extended the outside date for completion of the deal to December 31. Both Clarivate and ProQuest “each have the option to extend the new outside date to April 29, 2022.” As we noted previously, second requests are generally issued for only 2 to 4 percent of Hart-Scott-Rodino transactions — and as law firm Winston & Strawn advised, “most Second Requests result in a settlement, litigation to block the transaction, or […]
Legal: Fairstein’s Defamation Claims Go Forward
US District Judge Kevin Castel in New York’s Southern District declared that Linda Fairstein has plausibly alleged instances of defamation in the 2019 Netflix series “When They See Us” and will allow the lawsuit to proceed. The judge will also allow defamation claims against director Ava DuVernay and writer and producer Attica Locke to proceed, along with civil conspiracy claims, while dismissing some other claims. Reuters
NY Judiciary Committee Looking Into Cuomo Memoir
The New York Post reported that the New York State Assembly’s Judiciary Committee is looking into whether government employees were tasked with working on Andrew Cuomo’s book, American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic, as part of their impeachment inquiry. The lawyers “clearly have evidence and interviews with staff about [former aide] Melissa DeRosa instructing them to help with the manuscript,” a source said. Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi stated, “Any state official who volunteered to assist on this project did so on his or her own time and without the use of state resources. To the extent a document […]
Maryland Libraries Propose New Digital Licensing Terms Under Potentially Unconstitutional Law
Maryland’s new vague Digital Content Law, compelling publishers to license digital books and audiobooks “on reasonable terms that would enable public libraries to provide library users with access to the electronic literary product,” is considered by publishers to be blatantly unconstitutional. But it has yet to be challenged in court, so the Maryland Library Association is moving forward in advance of implementation at the beginning of 2022 to explain what they believe comprises “reasonable terms.” While the law does not define the terms any further, the MLA believes existing terms “often may not have been defined as ‘reasonable’ by library […]