3 Count: Grand Theft Copyright

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1: Apple Drops iPhone Copyright Lawsuit Against Cyber Startup Corellium

First off today, Thomas Brewster at Forbes reports that Apple has settled a lawsuit with the cybersecurity company Corellium, putting an end to their two-year-long battle.

The story began in 2018 when Correllium announced that it was going to allow researchers to create virtual iPhones on their computers as a way to test for security vulnerabilities. This prompted Apple to file a lawsuit in August 2019 alleging both direct copyright violations and violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) for the circumvention of copyright protection tools.

Applied had previously dropped the original copyright claims but the case was speeding toward a trial on the DMCA claims. However, just before a trial could happen, the two sides have reached a settlement and brought the case to a halt. Details of the settlement are not known and both sides have refused comment.

2: Oh, Where Does the Seuss-Star Trek Copyright Battle Go Next?

Next up today, Blake Brittain at Reuters reports that a San Diego Federal court has denied a motion of summary judgment filed by the Dr. Seuss Enterprises, setting the stage for a a trial about a Dr. Seuss/Star Trek mashup.

The case was filed by the estate against ComicMix LLC over the mashup book Oh, the Places You’ll Boldly Go, a book that combined a visual aesthetic similar of Dr. Seuss’ work with elements from Star Trek. The estate had hoped to have the case decided on a summary judgment and filed for one, however, the judge argued that elements of this case needed to be decided by a jury.

This is actually the second run of this case. Originally, the judge had decided in favor of ComicMix but that decision was overturned on appeal, sending it back to this court for a potential trial. That trial is the next potential step for this case.

3: GTA Mods Site Reportedly Hit with Takedown Request from Take-Two

Finally today, Ian Harris at PCGamesN reports that video game make Take-Two Interactive has filed several DMCA takedown notices against various mods for Grand Theft Auto games that they say illegally used content from other games in the franchise.

The site LibertyCity.net plays host to a wide variety of fan-made mods for Grand Theft Auto games, but several of those mods have been taken down following the complaint. According to Take-Two, these mods included elements that were just ports from other games that they hold the rights to.

The move comes after projects to reverse-engineer GTA3 and Vice City were pulled from GitHub following similar takedown notices from Take-Two.

The 3 Count Logo was created by Justin Goff and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

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