Re: Stealing Someone's Work
 

It doesn't matter if there's a logo or not. It's the intention of Cupid's Film to use someone else's work on their web site making it like it's one of theirs. That's what it calls plagiarism. It's not exactly the same as using copyrighted music in a production, which in fact, both are wrong.

Re: Stealing Someone's Work
 

Ok, you are right and I was wrong, end of discussion.

Re: Stealing Someone's Work
 

It's not like that... just some healthy harmless rational discussion. :) and I was wrong using the word "stealing" in the thread title too. It's too strong of a word :)

Re: Stealing Someone's Work
 

Hope you have a good lawyer who works cheap if you intend on doing that... Absolutely actionable. A good lawyer would see you in court over "besmirching" (not a legal term) the reputation of their client.

And remember, in court it isn't whether you are right or wrong, it's whether you have the legal resources (ie. CASH to PAY for your legal team) to influence the judge that you are right... or at least MORE right than the other party.

Re: Stealing Someone's Work
 

Actually, it was the intention of Cupid films to develop their website and see some kind of wedding video occupying the space until they finished the site and put their own in it's place.

You're right, however, there is a big difference between what happened on the Cupid Films website and the wholesale disregard of copyright law in the practice of using popular music in wedding videos: the former is simply in poor taste, while the latter is blatently illegal and exposes the production company to huge fines and potential lawsuits.

Re: Stealing Someone's Work
 

Actually it is a copyright violation as well as plagarism. The video that was "borrowed" is in fact copyright, even though it might not have been registered with the copyright office. The copyright on a copyrightable work pops into existence automatically the moment the work is fixed in tangible form and as such, any public exhibition or usage requires licensing from the copyright owner.

Re: Stealing Someone's Work
 

Steve, you are a very knowledgeable person and I generally agree with you, especially when you post about matters of law, but I think you have this one wrong.

First, I did not claim Cupid Films did not violate copyright, you simply surmised that because of my statement comparing the incident in question with the practice of syncing video to unlicensed music. My intended point was not "non-violation vs. copyright violation", but rather "an unfortunate blunder vs. willful disregard of another's rights."

However, in doing a bit more research, I would venture to say the video on Cupid Films website does not constitute copyright infringement. In Perfect 10 v. Google Inc, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that in-line linked use does not violate copyright. According to the court, the mere provision of HTML instructions does not create a basis for direct copyright infringement liability.