Intellectual Property
You'd like to move the tracks you bought from Rhapsody to a personal stereo like Apple's iPod, but the copy protection prevents you. Creating or using the software necessary to make the switch could put you behind bars.
You want to distribute your band's music, but the P2P system that's revolutionized your ability to reach listeners is being sued out of existence, a company claiming to own a patent to all streaming media technology is demanding licensing fees, and record labels are breathing down your neck over the samples you've looped.
You want to criticize Vivendi Universal on your website or blog, but the plug's been pulled on your "vivendisucks" domain name because of its unflattering reference to the company's trademark.
EFF fights to preserve balance and ensure that the Internet and digital technologies continue to empower you as a consumer, creator, innovator, scholar, and citizen.
Intellectual Property Cases
- Online Policy Group v. Diebold
- Kelly v. Arriba Soft
- Sapient v. GellerEFF is fighting back against Uri Geller -- the "paranormalist" famous for seemingly bending spoons with his mind -- on behalf of a YouTube critic who was silenced by Geller's baseless copyright claims.
- Electric Slide Litigation
- Elektra v. Barker
- Bowers v. Baystate
- J.K. Harris v. Taxes.com Litigation
- Marvel v. NCSoft
In The News
- PC WORLD | January 18, 2008 Could Traffic Filtering Get AT&T Into Trouble?
- IN THESE TIMES | January 18, 2008 Save the Dramatic Chipmunk
- WIRED NEWS | January 11, 2008 DRM Is Dead, But Watermarks Rise From Its Ashes
- SCOTTSDALE NEWS | January 06, 2008 Cabby takes on record industry over copying
- HARVARD CRIMSON | January 03, 2008 ‘Think Secret,’ Apple Settle On 2005 Leak Case
- HARVARD CRIMSON | January 03, 2008 ‘Think Secret,’ Apple Settle On 2005 Leak Case
- NEW YORK TIMES | December 31, 2007 In the Fight Over Piracy, a Rare Stand for Privacy
- NEW YORK TIMES | December 29, 2007 Piracy and Privacy
Other Resources
- May 15, 2008 The Lost Art of Orphan Works
- Chilling Effects[chillingeffects.org]
- The Endangered Gizmos list
Related Issues
- Patents
- Digital RadioRIAA's Attempt to Control Recording From the Radio
- No Downtime for Free Speech CampaignLearn about how copyright claims can inhibit free speech
- File SharingFile Sharing and Peer to Peer issues
- Broadcast FlagA mandate would force all future digital televisiontuners to include "content protection" (aka DRM) technologies.
- Digital VideoDigital Video Restrictions
- DMCADigital Millennium Copyright Act
Whitepapers
- 2006 Unintended Consequences: Seven Years under the DMCA
- 2006 IAAL*: What Peer-to-Peer Developers Need to Know about Copyright Law
- 2005 When Push Comes to Shove: A Hype-Free Guide to Evaluating Technical Solutions to Copyright Infringement on Campus Networks
- 2005 Digital Rights Management: A failure in the developed world, a danger to the developing world
- 2005 Fair Use and Digital Rights Management: Preliminary Thoughts on the (Irreconcilable?) Tension between Them
- 2003 Digital Rights Management: The Skeptics' View
Deeplinks Posts
- August 28, 2008 EFF Urges Copyright Office to Fix Digital Music Mess, but Carefully
- August 28, 2008 Required Reading for "User-Generated Content" Sites: Io Group v. Veoh
- August 18, 2008 What If the Kindle Succeeds?
- August 13, 2008 Condition or Covenant, and Why Should You Care?
- August 04, 2008 Victory for DVRs in the Cloud
- July 29, 2008 Senators Announce New Intellectual Property Enforcement Bill
- July 29, 2008 Paper Catalog + Computer Database = Patent? Um, No.
- July 25, 2008 When the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups Principle Doesn't Apply
Press Releases
- August 18, 2008 Innocent Customers Potentially Dragged Into Legal Battle Over Satellite TV
- January 31, 2008 EFF Takes Aim at Bogus Online Gaming Patent
- November 15, 2007 EFF Wins Reexamination of Bogus Internet Subdomain Patent
- November 13, 2007 EFF Supports Consumer Right To Repair, Resell Patented Goods
- October 23, 2007 EFF Wins Reexamination of Bogus Patent
- September 11, 2007 EFF Wins Protection for Security Researchers
- August 29, 2007 Back to School for Reading, Writing, and RIAA Lawsuits?
- August 22, 2007 EFF Challenges Bogus Patent on Internet Subdomains

