Court Rules for Copyright Owners on Infringements by Streaming Music Service

Copyright owners of sound recordings secured a significant win in Atlantic Recording Corp. v. Spinrilla, LLC. The decision by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia was issued on November 30. At issue in the case was an online streaming and downloading service offering mixtapes that in many instances contained copyrighted sound recordings. Plaintiff copyright owners filed infringement claims against Defendants Spinrilla and its owner involving 4,082 works. 

The District Court's decision in Spinrilla rightly recognized that an online service provider is liable for direct infringement for unauthorized Internet streaming of a copyrighted sound recording at the request of its user. In particular, the court determined that a sound recording constitutes a public performance of a copyrighted work. According to the court, the "reasoning and interpretation of the language and underlying purpose of the Copyright Act" – reflected in the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in ABC v. Aereo, Inc., 573 U.S. 431 (2014) – "apply equally to online music streaming services such as Spinrilla's and is consistent with a number of Circuit and district court decisions." The court also observed that "online music streaming services are not among the specific examples of activities the Aereo Court expressly noted fell outside the reach of its holding."

 

Although the Eleventh Circuit has not squarely addressed whether direct infringement claims require a copyright owner establish so-called "volitional conduct" by the alleged infringer, the court wrote that "even if volitional conduct is required to prove direct infringement, the cases on which Plaintiffs rely have all held that the affirmative act of streaming constitutes direct infringement of the copyright holder’s exclusive right of performance regardless of the fact that the the [sic] streaming occurs at the request of the user." 

 

Free State Foundation President Randolph May and I have addressed the issue of the volitional conduct requirement in infringement cases in two Perspectives from FSF Scholars papers: "The Constitutional Foundations of Strict Liability for Copyright Infringement" and "Volition Has No Role to Play in Determining Copyright Infringements."  In this case, the District Court's articulation of the doctrine – based on the assumption that it applies – appears reasonable.

 

Additionally, the District Court correctly concluded that an online service provider that seeks legal immunity from infringement claims under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 must first register an agent for receiving takedown notices with the U.S. Copyright Office. Defendants in the case did not register their agent with the Copyright Office until after Plaintiffs filed their lawsuit, and so the Court determined the defendants were ineligible for DMCA safe harbors for the infringements. 

 

In June 2020, FSF President May and I addressed needed reforms to the safe harbors provision in our Perspectives paper "Copyright Office Report Should Spur Modernizing the DMCA."

 

The District Court in Spinrilla has yet to make a judgment on damages.