Legal News

Brave New Films Goes Big, Bravely Files Suit Against Radio Host

By Dan Slater

So far this year Stanford’s Fair Use Project has taken on an author and the estate of a beloved musician. Now they’re going after a talk show host.

With the copyright battle between Premise Media, Yoko Ono and EMI just recently extinguished, the Fair Use Project is back at it. On Friday, with the help of Bingham McCutchen, the Fair Use Project’s Tony Falzone, representing Brave New Films, filed a suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California against talk radio host Michael Savage and Talk Radio Network.

At the center of the suit is a video called “Michael Savage Hates Muslims” (viewable at NoSavage.org), in which Savage expresses his disdain for Muslims and Islam.

Radio talk show host Michael Savage at his home Monday, Dec. 3, 2007, in Tiburon, Calif. (AP Photo/John Storey)

In January, Brave New Films uploaded the video, which reportedly takes one-minute of audio excerpts from Savage’s show, to its YouTube channel. Recently, Talk Radio Network allegedly sent a takedown notice to YouTube demanding the removal of the video. TRN’s notice resulted in YouTube removing the video and also temporarily disabling Brave New Films’ entire YouTube channel. Here’s a report from the L.A. Times.

According to YouTube, copyright law requires the company to terminate accounts that repeatedly infringe, and Brave New Films had problems with Viacom last year when they used material from the “Colbert Report.” (The Viacom complaint was eventually dropped.) Suspensions can be lifted if one or more of the claims are retracted.

Phil Newmark, a producer at Talk Radio Network, told the LAT that “Michael never sent a complaint to YouTube about anything. This did not come from him in any way, shape or form.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on October 13, 2008 (boomark / email).