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Originally Posted by SilentKnight
In the last 24 hours I've seen a few misguided individuals here on GFY step up and attempt to defend Guba's copyright infringement and theft practices by claiming that its all 'perfectly legal'.
Mostly I dismiss these wingnuts as individuals who don't create their own content in the first place and aren't even in a position to suffer financial damage as a result of Guba's practices. Therefore most are just talking out of their asses.
Their tactical approach is, "If its NOT legal, then why haven't they been hit with major lawsuits yet?"
Two thoughts on this:
1) Who's to say they haven't already faced lawsuits, and/or settled out-of-court between lawyers? Have the defenders of Guba done any legal research to establish whether Guba's been sued in the past?
2) If Guba's actions are perfectly legal - then why have they not turned around and attempted to sue for libel those who openly and publicly accuse them of infringement and theft?
After all, if you own and operate a legal, upstanding and reputable business...wouldn't YOU go after someone for libel or defamation who publicly accuses you of theft and contemptible business practices?
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Here is the probable answer, at least for US entities. Guba LLC is incorporated in Delaware; accordingly, any US citizen wanting to sue them for copyright infringment has to show that they have registered their copyright before the US Copyright Office as a prerequisite to bring an infringement suit against another US citizen. However, if this has not been done within three months of first publication of the work and infringement has already occurred, then the infringer does not have to face the prospect of statutory damages. That means the copyright holder will have to show and prove actual damages - a very expensive task. Not to mention, if the registration is not timely, the infinger is not responsible for any of the copyright holder's attorney fees.
In short, because people will spend thousands to make a video or web site but won't spend $150 to $200 bucks to pay a lawyer to fill out a $30 registration application with the Copyright Office (which often can be done without the use of a lawyer, to be fair), they are told that the cost of the suit will be somewhere between, say, 30k to 100k out of pocket, at the least, for litigation costs - experts to show the value of the infringed content, etc. - and attorneys fees before they might see a penny from the suit. Having to pay the attorney fees out of pocket, instead of making the infringer pay them, is the main reason why you see so few suits in the US from adult content being stolen, and why the infingers are so confident they will get away with it. They are counting on the content makers not properly protecting their intellectual property. Playboy is a perfect example of someone doing it right; they register their content and have won several lawsuits against people infinging both their copyrights and trademarks.
There is also the mechanism provided by the DMCA. Contact the hosting company and complain that your copyrighted works are being used improperly. At the least, the infinger should be made to take down the materials, even if they don't face an infringement suit.