Two programmers have created every possible melody in MIDI to help creators stifled by lawsuits.
Two programmer-musicians wrote every possible MIDI melody in existence to a hard drive, copyrighted the whole thing, and then released it all to the public in an attempt to stop musicians from getting sued.
Often in copyright cases for song melodies, if the artist being sued for infringement could have possibly had access to the music they’re accused of copying—even if it was something they listened to once—they can be accused of “subconsciously” infringing on the original content.
Sounds like a clever attempt to hack the system. I’m not sure if that will actually hold up in court but it’s creative.
Facebook filed a federal lawsuit in California against OneAudience, saying it improperly harvested its user data.
The social media company claims that OneAudience harvested users’ data by getting app developers to install a malicious software development kit, or SDK, in their apps. SDKs are packages of basic tools that make it easier and faster for developers to build their apps.
Oddly, Facebook isn’t suing itself.
The IRS is suing Facebook for US$9 billion, saying the company kept profits in subsidiaries based in Ireland.
The IRS argues that Facebook understated the value of the intellectual property it sold to an Irish subsidiary in 2010 while building out global operations, a move common among U.S. multinationals…Under the arrangement, Facebook’s subsidiaries pay royalties to the U.S.-based parent for access to its trademark, users and platform technologies. From 2010 to 2016, Facebook Ireland paid Facebook U.S. more than $14 billion in royalties and cost-sharing payments, according to the court filing.
If the IRS succeeds this would be one of Facebook’s biggest fines.
ISPs are suing Maine over a privacy law that will go into effect this July, saying it violates their free speech rights. The law would force them to obtain user consent before collecting and selling their data.
Two weeks ago Facebook settled a lawsuit alleging that it violated Illinois privacy laws. Now, Clearview AI is also facing a class action lawsuit in the state.
The lawsuit, filed yesterday on behalf of several Illinois citizens and first reported by Buzzfeed News, alleges that Clearview “actively collected, stored and used Plaintiffs’ biometrics — and the biometrics of most of the residents of Illinois — without providing notice, obtaining informed written consent or publishing data retention policies.”
Not only that, but this biometric data has been licensed to many law enforcement agencies, including within Illinois itself.
All this is allegedly in violation of the Biometric Information Privacy Act, a 2008 law that has proven to be remarkably long-sighted and resistant to attempts by industry (including, apparently, by Facebook while it fought its own court battle) to water it down.
Apple and Broadcom are required to pay the California Institute of Technology US$1.1 billion in damages over patent infringement.
M. Night Shyamalan is being sued over his Apple TV+ show Servant after another director accused him of copying her show.
A bunch of cable companies including Comcast sued the state of Maine to block a law that would require an a la carte offering of cable.
Cardiologist Joseph Wiesel from New York University is suing Apple, claiming the company used his patented heartbeat-monitoring technology.
Former Apple store employee Robert Shaw is suing Apple over his claim that the company fired him because of his disability.
A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit against Apple accusing the company of using selling user data from the iTunes Store.
A Russian man is suing Apple for US$15,300 over allegations that using his iPhone turned him gay because of the cryptocurrency Gay Coin.
Social Technologies LLC filed a lawsuit against Apple today, saying that it owns the federal registration for the word Memoji in the U.S.
Edward Snowden recently published a book called Permanent Record. The United States filed a civil lawsuit against him and his publisher, saying that he violated nondisclosure agreements because he didn’t submit the book to the CIA and NSA for pre-publication review.
The United States’ lawsuit does not seek to stop or restrict the publication or distribution of Permanent Record. Rather, under well-established Supreme Court precedent, Snepp v. United States, the government seeks to recover all proceeds earned by Snowden because of his failure to submit his publication for pre-publication review in violation of his alleged contractual and fiduciary obligations.
GlobalFoundries accused TSMC of patent infringement involving 16 patents. Apple is cited in three of them.
Walmart is suing Tesla in a multi-million dollar lawsuit, alleging that the latter’s solar panels caused fires on as many as seven stores.
Corellium is a mobile device virtualization company that offers iOS and Apple’s apps in the cloud. Apple is suing the company for damages.
Two Apple users have filed a class action iCloud lawsuit against the company for misleading terms of service.
Apple faces another class action lawsuit over the iPhone throttling fiasco starting in January 17 filed on behalf of 18 people.
I wasn’t going to bother with Xiaomi’s new “Mimoji” until I learned the company is threatening to sue journalists who call it a copycat without providing evidence. It sounds like it’s only writers in China and not journalists in other countries, but that shouldn’t matter.
As Gizmochina notes, PR head Xu Jieyun posted the app’s naming timeline, and said that the “functional logic difference between the two products is huge.” It also promised “the next phase of action” against people who said it was copying Apple’s Memoji without proof.
