"No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider."
This raises a question for me. Does that mean that Techdirt (a provider of an interactive computer service) is not the publisher or speaker of this article because it was provided by Cathy Gellis (another information content provider).
If so, does that mean that anyone libelled by an article in any online-only publication only has recourse against the author of the article?
Or will a court rule that Cathy Gellis was acting in her capacity as an employee of Techdirt and therefore Techdirt has liability?
If so, at what point does an identified person cease to be acting on behalf of their employer and start to be writing on their own behalf using their employer as a provider of an interactive computer service?
I'm guessing there is real caselaw on this question.
The intent of the public performance right law is that you can't buy a record and then play it in public without paying the songwriter and singer for each performance.
Playing music in private is not a public performance.
Streaming is going to be interesting. The substantive question is "who is performing it?". With a radio, for example, the answer is "the radio station" - which makes it a public performance by the radio station, for which they pay public performance rights. If you put a radio in a public place (e.g. a shop) then you, the radio-owner are also making a public performance, and you have to pay performance rights too.
With streaming, either the performer is the streaming service, performing the song to the public - in which case it is a public performance, or it is the listener at home, in which case it is not a public performance, but it is a distribution of the song from the service to the listener and then a private performance by the listener.
That's what the courts will have to establish. It's not obvious to me which one they will choose.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by Richard Gadsden.
"No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider."
This raises a question for me. Does that mean that Techdirt (a provider of an interactive computer service) is not the publisher or speaker of this article because it was provided by Cathy Gellis (another information content provider).
If so, does that mean that anyone libelled by an article in any online-only publication only has recourse against the author of the article?
Or will a court rule that Cathy Gellis was acting in her capacity as an employee of Techdirt and therefore Techdirt has liability?
If so, at what point does an identified person cease to be acting on behalf of their employer and start to be writing on their own behalf using their employer as a provider of an interactive computer service?
I'm guessing there is real caselaw on this question.
Public performance
The intent of the public performance right law is that you can't buy a record and then play it in public without paying the songwriter and singer for each performance.
Playing music in private is not a public performance.
Streaming is going to be interesting. The substantive question is "who is performing it?". With a radio, for example, the answer is "the radio station" - which makes it a public performance by the radio station, for which they pay public performance rights. If you put a radio in a public place (e.g. a shop) then you, the radio-owner are also making a public performance, and you have to pay performance rights too.
With streaming, either the performer is the streaming service, performing the song to the public - in which case it is a public performance, or it is the listener at home, in which case it is not a public performance, but it is a distribution of the song from the service to the listener and then a private performance by the listener.
That's what the courts will have to establish. It's not obvious to me which one they will choose.