Author Elaine Scott has filed a lawsuit which says that Scribd
"shamelessly profits from the stolen copyrighted works of
innumerable authors".
Scribd hosts digital documents and Scott found that one of her
books was hosted there without her permission and without any
payment being made to her.
She claimed in the suit that the Scribd website's own statistics
showed that it had been downloaded more than 100 times.
US law allows facilitators of internet publishing to escape
liability for copyright infringement if they had no role in
creating the content, do not moderate it and if they take
infringing material down as soon as they are notified about it.
Scribd chief executive has said in interviews quoted in Scott's
law suit that the company does take copyright infringing material
off the site when it is notified. Scott's suit says that the
company should still be punished.
"They incorrectly believe that they are immune from liability,"
the suit says. "According to their view … a copyright holder must
now devote substantial time to monitoring the content of
innumerable websites and sending out takedown notices to receive
protection from the law."
The suit asks the Court to assert that Scribd is not protected
by that immunity and that it is a publisher and not just a service
provider. It says this is the case because it can control what goes
on the site and because it receives financial benefit, through
advertising, that is related to the documents published.
Scribd has said that when a copyrighted work is removed from its
site it is added to its database so that subsequent copies of that
work can be recognised and removed without the author's
involvement.
Scott claims this in itself is copyright infringement. "This
system of infringement is presented as an example of how Scribd
helps 'protect the rights of authors'," says her suit. "The
copyright protection system is built and maintained without
compensation to the authors of the works that provide the only real
value for the copyright filter."
Scott's suit wants the court to award her damages and to prevent
Scribd from "continuing to operate their website in a manner that
promotes copyright infringement".
The suit also opens the possibility that other authors will join
Scott and turn it into a class action, where many people in a
similar situation join together in a single case. In a section
outlining the potential for others to join it the suit calls Scribd
the "YouTube for documents".
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