Judge Navarro Declines to Dismiss Case Against Canadian-Based MajorWager

Righthaven Gets Legal Win in Copyright Lawsuit Campaign

For purposes of the motion for dismissal, Navarro rejected MajorWager's argument that Righthaven lacked standing to sue because it didn't own the copyright to the story at the time of the infringement. Righthaven finds infringements, obtains copyrights to those stories from the Review-Journal and then sues over the infringements on a retroactive basis.
"The plaintiff’s complaint ... provides enough evidence for the court to reach a plausible inference that rights to the article as well as past infringements were transferred to plaintiff. Absent any other evidence to the contrary, the assignor (Review-Journal owner Stephens Media LLC) appears to have successfully transferred the ownership interest..."

See: Article in full

Jonathan Fountain of Lewis and Roca LLP Explains Defenses in Recent Article

Jonathan Fountain is one of at least four Lewis and Roca attorneys in Las Vegas that have represented Righthaven defendants in litigation and settlements. Fountain recently wrote an opinion article that was published in Lexology.com, Las Vegas startup sues websites: copyright trolls and the rise of the internet police (registration required). Fountain discusses a variety of defenses, including: subject matter jurisdiction, personal jurisdiction, fair use, implied license the de minimis doctrine, champerty and barratry.

Some defendants have suggested the existence of an implied license because the Review-Journal posts its news stories on its webpage where they can be viewed for free, displays links that allow persons who view its articles to save, email, or print the articles, and also allows visitors to its site who view its articles to right-click and copy the articles when technical measures are available to prevent the articles from being copied. These defendants have also pointed out that the Review Journal does not post any terms or conditions on its website stating that copying articles is forbidden.

See: Article in full
See: Related Las Vegas Sun article