Today marks an important milestone in the history of Usenet. We’ve announced that the US District Court for the Central District of California once again ruled in our favor in our long running defense against a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by Perfect 10.
On Thursday, the magistrate judge for the case ruled that we presented the court with extensive evidence against Perfect 10, showing discovery noncompliance, numerous violations of court orders, and pervasive failures by Perfect 10, its attorneys and its witnesses. The court is now in the process of determining the reasonable amount of monetary sanctions and whether these sanctions should be assessed against Perfect 10 and/or its counsel.
We’ve always rejected the veracity of Perfect 10’s allegations and believed strongly in our position. As a result, we forced Perfect 10 to litigate this case on the merits. In November, the court granted us a series of summary judgment decisions on the various copyright claims in the case, rejecting all the different theories and claims that Perfect 10 had asserted. The rulings followed extensive discovery and fact finding.
Perfect 10’s response to our approach was to engage in a pattern of systematic abuse of the discovery process and outright disregard of the court’s orders. We are pleased with the magistrate judge’s ruling and we look forward to the Court’s final determination on monetary sanctions to be assessed. In addition to the recent rulings, the court had previously dismissed Perfect 10’s allegations of trademark infringement, publicity rights violations, and unfair competition. The court also earlier specifically ruled that Perfect 10 had not shown fault in Giganews’ process of handling notifications of claimed infringements or our repeat infringer termination policy.
We’re happy about this win not only for Giganews, but for the good people of Usenet who have enjoyed our services for so many years.
Copies of Thursday’s findings are available here: https://truck.it/p/fogjd4KOcz
