To a group of movie investors, Keeper of the Pinstripes sounded like an ideal business venture. Capitalizing on nostalgia for old-timers Yankee baseball, the film was to depict the “interior and exterior of the ‘old’ Yankee stadium [for one] final public appearance,” and tell the story of “a mysterious room hidden within the depths of [...]

The critical debate over film versus television rages on. It’s a fight ’til the death. Who will be the winner? Stay tuned…

Check out this New York Times article about the growing film industry in Nigeria and its impact on culture, identity, and the economy of Africa. The article also discusses the uncertainty of who owns the copyright in this booming business. For the copyright discussion, look to page 6.   Thank you to staffer Matthew Mann [...]

Although Warner Brothers may have settled the lawsuit with Mike Tyson’s tattoo artist over the use of Tyson’s tattoo in the movie, The Hangover Part II, they are now facing a new lawsuit from Louis Vuitton.  Perhaps, you remember Zach Galifianakis’s line, “Careful, that is a Louis Vuitton,” in the movie.  Turns out that executives [...]

After the studio settled claims with Mike Tyson’s tattoo artist for infringement of his copyright over the tattoo for the Hangover II, a second contender has entered the ring in order to bring another copyright suit against the film. According to Hollywood Reporter, the litigant, Michael Alan Rubin, has offered no proof of access; an [...]

From NYMag: “Last year, Voltage Pictures announced that it was planning to sue tens of thousands of Internet users who’d downloaded The Hurt Locker via BitTorrent, and 24,583 defendants were named when the production company filed its lawsuit several months ago. Unfortunately, things haven’t gone so well since then, and Voltage has voluntarily dropped more [...]

While it seems like everyone wants a piece of Netflix in a bad way (we can look to a recent SNL roast of the video store of the 21st century as an example), Dreamworks thinks that dealing with the company is a safe bet. The $30 million per picture streaming deal marks the first time [...]

Rapper 50 Cent, also known as Curtis Jackson, is out of court today and back in da club after a federal judge in New Jersey dismissed a copyright suit brought against him. Shadrach Winstead of Newark had claimed that his 2008 autobiography, “Preacher’s Son – But the Streets Turned Me Into A Gangster,” provided much [...]

Well, so much for just making the service more expensive. Today Netflix announced that its DVD-only package will no longer be named Netflix, and will instead be called Qwikster. Netflix’s streaming service, however, will continue to be known as Netflix. On Netflix’s blog, CEO Reed Hastings explained the change saying that “streaming and DVD by [...]

First, songwriter Mason Hall filed a copyright infringement suit against Lionsgate in a Georgia district court last week.  Hall claims Lionsgate’s documentary More Than A Game, which chronicles LeBron James’s rise to glory during his high school days, used Hall’s song composition entitled, “We Ready” without a license.  (Here’s the music video for the version [...]