Dismantling of Righthaven appears under way with loss of website

Vegasinc ^ | 12/22/12 | Steve Green

[Tom Hawks]

The court-authorized dismantling of Las Vegas copyright company Righthaven LLC appeared to be under way Thursday, with the company losing control of its website to a receiver.

As noted by the Righthaven Victims website critical of Righthaven, the righthaven.com website on Thursday was no longer operational and that domain name was “parked” at domain name hoster GoDaddy.com — apparently so it can be auctioned.

Records at Network Solutions, which tracks domain names, showed control of Righthaven’s website domain name was transferred Wednesday to Randazza Legal Group, which represents Righthaven creditor Wayne Hoehn.

However, attorney Marc Randazza said that information was incorrect and that a court-appointed receiver, attorney Lara Pearson of the Rimon Law Group in the Reno area, had control of it.

“She will arrange an auction of it in order to satisfy some of Righthaven’s debts,” Randazza said.

Pearson added Thursday, “If all goes well, I intend to put the domain name up for auction before the holiday break begins tomorrow, though I have not yet made a firm decision as to where the domain will be auctioned.”

Righthaven since March 2010 has been suing websites and website users over unauthorized uses of Las Vegas Review-Journal and Denver Post material, alleging copyright infringement.

Several defendants including Hoehn fought back and defeated Righthaven in court.

After federal Judge Philip Pro in Las Vegas found Righthaven lacked standing to sue Hoehn and that Hoehn was protected by fair use in his posting of an R-J column on a website message board, Hoehn was awarded his legal fees.

Righthaven has refused to pay those $63,720 in fees, causing the same judge to allow a receiver to auction Righthaven’s intellectual property including its copyrights and website name.

The loss of its copyrights could cripple Righthaven’s ability to sue over the copyrights it obtained from the newspapers — and to prosecute appeals of its courtroom defeats involving those copyrights in Nevada and Colorado.

[USFRIENDINVICTORIA]

I was careful to use the term "intellectual property", rather than simply "writing".

It still costs megabucks to make a blockbuster movie. Creating the software programs that enable electronic publishing still costs hundreds of millions. For that matter, almost all of the cost of computer hardware is in the intellectual property embedded within it. A huge chunk of the economies of the U.S., and other western nations is in the form of intellectual property.

That doesn't mean that reform of the laws isn't required. Clearly, copyrights for books, music, etc. are for too long a period. Sites like FR should be able to post articles for comment. Also, people should be entitled to make backup copies of their music and movie collection. Just so long as there is sufficient remuneration to cover expenses, and pay the creators for their work.

When it comes to writing -- so much crap is being published that it is now worth paying not to see most of it.

[FastCoyote]

Wow! This affects me big time regarding some writing I do. If newspapers are the record of account, how could you write a political expose?

[Jack Hammer]

Look for the erstwhile staff to be found chasing ambulances.

[basil]

Big Pingeroo!

[OneVike]

Awesome news for everyone, thanks for the heads up Tom.

This is especially great news for those of us here at FR. It was just a matter of time before they would have shut down sites like this if the courts failed to do their job. Well truth and justice has prevailed this time.

It’s also good news for all of us who do political commentary on news of the day on our blogs by gleaning what we can from the MSM as we filter away the crap to find the truth.

These Righthaven thugs were shaking down the little guys who could not fight back. I know it was the owners of the Las Vegas Review Journal who were behind this, but I am also convinced that if we could dig deep enough that we would find George Soros money and many familiar names from the higher ranks of the DNC.

We all need to stay on our toes and be wary of the continuing onslaught against our first amendment rights. The MSM wants us tho think that they and they alone should be the arbitrators of the news and thus the truth, but we will not let them.

We will prevail, because we cannot afford not to.

[OneVike]

Awesome news for everyone, thanks for the heads up Tom.

This is especially great news for those of us here at FR. It was just a matter of time before they would have shut down sites like this if the courts failed to do their job. Well truth and justice has prevailed this time.

It’s also good news for all of us who do political commentary on news of the day on our blogs by gleaning what we can from the MSM as we filter away the crap to find the truth.

These Righthaven thugs were shaking down the little guys who could not fight back. I know it was the owners of the Las Vegas Review Journal who were behind this, but I am also convinced that if we could dig deep enough that we would find George Soros money and many familiar names from the higher ranks of the DNC.

We all need to stay on our toes and be wary of the continuing onslaught against our first amendment rights. The MSM wants us tho think that they and they alone should be the arbitrators of the news and thus the truth, but we will not let them.

We will prevail, because we cannot afford not to.

[muawiyah]

Still, "writing" is the greater part of all intellectual property ~ so whatever laws are written must DEAL WITH WRITING FIRST.

Pictures will, no doubt, receive short shrift.

[abb]

The origins of “copyright.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Licensing_of_the_Press_Act_1662