shouting loudly

The company holding the copyright for George Orwell’s 1984 has begun legal saber rattling over the pro-Obama “Hillary 1984” ad that was created by Phil de Vellis and posted on YouTube earlier this month.

Rosenblum Productions, who purchased the rights to Orwell’s book in 1981, have already established themselves as over-zealous copyright owners who pursue bogus claims. In their press release, they brag of having prevented Apple’s re-airing the initial ‘1984′ ad (“The commercial never aired on television again.”), and they boast of having settled a federal lawsuit with CBS over the show Big Brother.

All 3 are obvious fair uses of Orwell’s work–or there’s virtually no such thing as fair use. We can only hope that de Vellis will stick to his legal guns, because he’ll win handily. As Cory notes on BoingBoing, “Apparently, these people weren’t paying attention when the carpetbaggers who bought out the Woody Guthrie estate tried to shut down Jib-Jab’s ‘This Land’ parody, and got their asses handed to them.”

Relatedly, pay no attention to Rosenblum’s alleged or real successes in reaching previous out-of-court settlements. Apple’s ad was surely intended as a Super Bowl exclusive, and CBS probably just decided it was cheaper to buy off the plaintiffs than to sue and win.

More importantly, as noted by Attorney Merl Ledford III (see my next blog post for context), “The Evidence Code sections are quite clear: settlement negotiations of all kinds may not be used to prove the validity of any claim or defense.” Out-of-court settlements set no precedent. If the Apple or CBS cases had gone to trial, however, Rosenblum would have already lost their pants.