Vivid Entertainment Group, the world’s leading adult film producer, today sued Adult Entertainment Broadcast Network (AEBN) and related companies for unlawfully posting or allowing third parties to post copyrighted Vivid content on its 'PornoTube.com' website.
According to BusinessWire, Vivid requested a jury trial to hear its claims that the defendants,
Vivid contends that PornoTube’s infringement cannot be fully compensated or measured in damages. The suit asks for a permanent injunction to bar future infringement and damages of at least $4.5 million. The suit also noted that the law provides for damages up to $150,000 for each willfully infringed work....have used technological advancements to willfully infringe copyrights belonging to Plaintiff, depriving Plaintiff of the lawful rewards that accompany creativity, effort and innovation...[Pornotube.com]'s business plan depends on the uploading, posting, display and performance of copyrighted audio-visual works belonging to Vivid and others... [Pornotube] knowingly built a library of infringing works to draw Internet traffic
Vivid’s attorney Paul Cambria said
For research purposes, I visted Pornotube.com to see what kind of videos are being hosted there. The claims by Vivid does seem to be valid and that the site contains mostly copyright infringing material.Vivid has already found dozens of violations of its copyrights, and AEBN needs to know that it cannot continue pilfering Vivid’s products no matter how they might reformat or reshape it. Once they put up any material on their site and fit it into their format, they are no longer just a ‘pass through’ medium—they have become producers or distributors under the law.
Granted that there are some home made or 'amateur' pornography but according to the top all time most viewed videos, they're all professionally made and most likely infringes copyright.
Some might think that this is not important because it's porn but this case is no different than Viacom suing Youtube for $1 billion dollars. The porn industry is a big industry which brings in billions every year and they deserve equal protection and enforcement.
