Perfect 10 v RapidShare Goes Ahead Next Month in U.S Court
File-hosting service RapidShare has seen its request to have the case against adult media company Perfect 10 heard under German law denied. Perfect 10 has accused RapidShare of being the biggest infringing paysite of all time and earning revenue from its content, an accusation the file-hoster denies. The case will now be heard in a U.S. District Court next month.
On 18 November 2009, adult media company Perfect 10 filed a lawsuit against cyberlocker service, RapidShare. Among other claims, Perfect 10′s lawsuit stated that RapidShare was guilty of infringing its copyrights and infringing on its trademark and publicity rights.
“The success of Perfect 10′s business is almost entirely dependent on its intellectual property rights. Therefore, the ongoing and massive infringements of Perfect 10′s rights [by Rapidshare], is devastating to, and threatens the existence of, Perfect 10′s business,” states the lawsuit.
It goes on to claim that RapidShare stores hundreds of thousands of unauthorized copyright images and billions of dollars worth of songs and movies on its servers, and enables “users from around the world to purchase virtually every pirated image, song and movie for $10 a month.”
“RapidShare also offers, without authorization, Perfect 10 DVDs and videos, including Perfect 10 Model Of The Year Video, which cost approximately $1,000,000 to produce,” notes the lawsuit, further adding that RapidShare infringes Perfect 10′s copyrights on 26,000 images and videos.
According to Perfect 10, they informed RapidShare on 29 May 2009 that it was hosting and “offering for sale” 800 specifically identified Perfect 10 images. They claim the file-hoster failed to respond to, or act on, that notification.
The California-based company called for a jury trial in the United States to settle the issue. RapidShare responded by requesting that the case be postponed and transferred to Europe and heard under German law. According to XBiz, that request has now been denied.
Last week a court confirmed that the hearing will take place in San Diego’s U.S. District Court next month, a case Perfect 10 owner Norm Zada feels he can win.
RapidShare claims that Perfect 10 has failed to inform them of the location of the infringing material on their servers. If it knew where the material was, the file-hoster said it would willingly remove it. Zada shrugs off responsibility for that work.
“It’s not my obligation or up to me to spend time finding those links. That’s not my problem. They need to stop selling what they don’t own,” he explains.
RapidShare denies that it sells Perfect 10 material and insists it functions purely as a storage site. Zada vehemently denies those claims.
“They’re not a storage locker. RapidShare is the greatest infringing paysite of all time,” he told XBiz. “They’re making $80 million a year that belongs to American studios and producers.”
TorrentFreak contacted RapidShare for their reaction to these accusations but they refused to comment.
