Internet-Downloading Copyright Rulings

Default Judgment. The U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland entered a default judgment, without a hearing, in favor of several TV-production studios that sued an individual for making their TV shows available to unauthorized peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharers. Disney Enterprises Inc. v. Delane, DKC 2005-1291. The studios accused the defendant, who operated www.btefnet.net, of making the plaintiffs' shows available to others through BitTorrent P2P software, which directs a user's computer through the Internet to the location of digital files. The court noted in its default-judgment ruling: '[Defendant] Delane used his [software] trackers and Web site to facilitate the reproduction and distribution of those copyrighted works and the site allowed users to sort torrents by the title of television shows available for download. Delane could view, in real-time, a list of all of the files his trackers were helping to distribute, he exercised total control over the infringing activity on his torrent site, and decided exactly what torrents were indexed on the site and what files his trackers were helping to distribute. Finally, these acts of infringement by Delane were willful, intentional, and purposeful.'