Justia Intellectual Property Opinion Summaries

The case revolves around a dispute between two competitors in the construction equipment market, I Dig Texas, LLC, and Kerry Creager, along with Creager Services, LLC. I Dig Texas used copyrighted photographs of Creager's products, which were made in China, in its advertisements to emphasize its own products' American-made status. This led to claims under the Copyright Act and the Lanham Act.Previously, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma granted summary judgment to I Dig Texas on Creager's federal claims and remanded all of the state-law claims to state court. Creager had claimed that the use of its photographs constituted copyright infringement and that the accompanying text misrepresented the origin of I Dig Texas's products.The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed the lower court's decision. The court found that Creager failed to present evidence of any profit from the use of its photographs, which was necessary to establish a claim for copyright infringement. The court also found that I Dig Texas's advertisements were not literally false under the Lanham Act. The advertisements were ambiguous as to whether a product is considered American-made when it is assembled in the United States but uses some foreign components. The court concluded that such a claim is not literally false because the claim itself is ambiguous. The court also affirmed the lower court's decision to decline supplemental jurisdiction over the remaining state-law claims and remand these claims to state court. View "I Dig Texas v. Creager" on Justia Law

This case revolves around a copyright dispute between Whyte Monkee Productions, LLC and Timothy Sepi (Plaintiffs) and Netflix, Inc. and Royal Goode Productions, LLC (Defendants). Plaintiffs sued Defendants for copyright infringement, alleging that Defendants had used clips from eight videos filmed by Mr. Sepi without permission in the documentary series "Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness". The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the Defendants, concluding that seven of the videos were works made for hire and thus Mr. Sepi did not own the copyrights. The court also found that the use of the eighth video constituted fair use and did not infringe on Mr. Sepi’s copyright.On appeal, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals held that Plaintiffs waived their argument regarding the first seven videos as they presented a new theory not raised in the lower court. Accordingly, the appellate court upheld the district court's judgment regarding these videos. However, regarding the eighth video, the appellate court ruled that the district court erred in determining that Defendants were entitled to summary judgment on their fair use defense. The court concluded that the first factor of the fair use analysis favored the Plaintiffs instead of the Defendants, and that the Defendants failed to provide any evidence demonstrating the absence of a market impact, which is necessary to apply the fourth fair use factor. Therefore, the appellate court affirmed the lower court’s judgment as to the first seven videos, reversed the judgment as to the eighth video, and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Whyte Monkee Productions v. Netflix" on Justia Law