Judge: Posting of complete editorial to website forum doesn’t violate copyright law

Wired.com
Righthaven’s campaign of copyright infringement lawsuits has suffered another setback after a federal judge ruled that a man didn’t violate copyright law when he posted a complete Las Vegas Review-Journal editorial to an online forum. David Kravets writes that the judge agreed that the posting of the editorial was “fair use” because there was no evidence that it harmed readership on the paper’s website. Righthaven’s case wasn’t helped by the fact that just five of the editorial’s 19 paragraphs were the author’s own opinion — not enough for the judge to consider it a “creative work.” Righthaven was seeking $150,000 in damages. || Earlier: Judge rules that Righthaven can’t sue on behalf of Review-Journal