Perfect

10, INC. V. GOOGLE, INC. 653 F.3d 976 (9th Cir. 2011)

Purchase the Printed Copy at bsmsphd.com

Nature of the Case

To access this section all you need to do is click here and register.

Facts

P creates (and copyrights) photographic images of nude models for commercial distribution. P began offering them for viewing on a password-protected, paid-subscription website, 'perfect10.com.' Perfect 10's subscription website generates revenue from subscribers who pay a monthly fee to view the copyrighted images in a 'members' area,' which members access through a unique username/password combination. D operates numerous web-based services. Its search engine uses an automated web crawler, to obtain copies of publicly available webpages and images for use in its search index. D stores the text of a web page in its cache. D also offers Blogger, which hosts blogs created by users on Google's server. Blogger account holders may upload images from the web onto Google's server in order to post them on their blogs or may use a hyperlink to images hosted on other servers. In order to obtain the protections of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), D developed a copyright-infringement notification policy for each of these Internet services. Under D's notification policies, the takedown notice must include, among other things, the URL for the infringing material. D forwards the takedown notices to the website 'chillingeffects.org,' a nonprofit, educational project run jointly by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and various law schools, which posts such notices on the Internet. Even if Google removes P's images from its search results, a person can still find the URL for the allegedly infringing images on chillingeffects. org. P moved for a preliminary injunction against D claiming it was entitled to an injunction because D's web and image search and related caching feature, its Blogger service, and its practice of forwarding P's takedown notices to chillingeffects.org constituted copyright infringement. P argued that it was entitled to an injunction based upon D's alleged violation of the rights of publicity assigned to P by some of its models. The court denied the motion for preliminary injunctive relief. It held that P had not shown that it was likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of such relief and that it had failed to satisfy any of the other requirements for a preliminary injunction. P appealed.