Flo & Eddie repeated their belief Florida law grants them a “common law” performance royalties right for songs recorded before 1972 because of a 1943 state Supreme Court decision and changes to state law enacted in 1941. Flo & Eddie, who own The Turtles' “Happy Together” and the rest of the band's music, argued in a brief to the Florida Supreme Court that a common law pre-1972 performance right exists in the state, as part of its lawsuit against SiriusXM. The court is reviewing SiriusXM's appeal of a 2015 U.S. District Court ruling in Miami that found a performance right exists in state law after the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals delayed a ruling in the case in June (see 1606290085). Flo & Eddie said it “did not forfeit its common law copyright by selling records.” Claims “for unfair competition, conversion, and civil theft of a sound recording, that are grounded on constitutionally protected property interests under Florida's very broad definition of property as 'anything of value,' exist independently from Florida's common law copyright to perform and reproduce a sound recording,” Flo & Eddie said. “Finally, under Florida law, by creating buffer copies of Flo & Eddie's sound recordings, Sirius XM has violated Flo & Eddie's copyright in the reproduction of its sound recording, irrespective of the duration of the copy.” Flo & Eddie was expected to argue in a brief to the New York Court of Appeals that a similar common-law pre-1972 performance right exists in that state as part of the state court's review of SiriusXM's appeal of a Flo & Eddie lawsuit to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals (see 1608050059). A copy of Flo & Eddie's brief to the New York Court of Appeals wasn't immediately available.

Public Knowledge urged DOJ to appeal a U.S. District Court decision in New York that struck down a portion of the department's decision on the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and Broadcast Music Inc. consent decrees that dealt with 100 percent licensing. Judge Louis Stanton said Friday that Justice's Antitrust Division erred in its concluding statement saying the department continues to believes the existing ASCAP and BMI consent decrees mandate 100 percent licensing (see 1609190062). “The plain language of the consent decree, BMI's statements to the DOJ, BMI's marketing language about its licenses, and appellate precedent all support the DOJ's interpretation," said PK Policy Counsel Raza Panjwani in a written statement Monday. "Fractional licensing threatens to deprive the public of access to music by undermining a licensing marketplace that generates over a billion dollars in revenue annually for BMI alone, and which hundreds of thousands of business and outlets rely on to use and play music. This decision introduces uncertainty for users, opens the door to anticompetitive behavior, and should be appealed and reversed."

The National Music Publishers Association praised Songwriters of North America (SONA) Thursday for its lawsuit against DOJ over the Antitrust Division's decision in its review of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and Broadcast Music Inc. consent decrees (see 1608040066). SONA filed the suit in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., Tuesday (see 1609140027). “Songwriters and music publishers were dumbfounded” when Justice “not only decided that the outdated consent decrees would remain in place, but they took liberties with their interpretation” that the consent decrees' language mandates 100 percent licensing, said NMPA President David Israelite in a statement. DOJ's decision “unlawfully and unconstitutionally deprives creators of their rights," he said. "It also could invalidate private contracts, which is something all property owners should be extremely concerned about.”

Pandora and Warner Music Group reached a direct licensing agreement Thursday covering WMG's full music catalog. "With this agreement, we're on a path to launch the world's most personal and complete music experience that our listeners will love," said Pandora CEO Tim Westergren in a news release. Two days earlier, the company signed deals with other music labels (see 1609130048). That paved the way for its subscription plan announced Thursday (see 1609150046).

The European Commission's draft copyright law revamp proposal “is more of a regression than the reform we need to support European businesses and Internet users,” said Mozilla Chief Legal and Business Officer Denelle Dixon-Thayer in a blog post. The draft, released earlier Wednesday, would require service providers to monitor content uploaded by subscribers to ensure it's not copyright-protected. The EC proposed its expected pan-EU ancillary copyright aimed at allowing publishers to claim royalties from news aggregation services like Google News (see 1609140010). The regime “does little to address much-needed exceptions to copyright law,” Dixon-Thayer said: “It provides some exceptions for education and preservation of cultural heritage,” while a new exception for text and data mining “could ultimately restrict, rather than accelerate, TDM to unlock research and innovation across sectors throughout Europe.” There are “no exceptions for panorama, parody, or remixing,” Dixon-Thayer said. “We also regret that provisions which would add needed flexibility to the copyright system -- such as a UGC (user-generated content) exception and a flexible user clause like an open norm, fair dealing or fair use -- have not been included.”

U.S. and European advertising, media and technology organizations announced Thursday the formation of a coalition to develop new global standards for online ads. In a joint news release, the 17-member Coalition for Better Ads -- including the Association of National Advertisers, Google, Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) and Washington Post -- said it will create "consumer-based, data-driven standards ... to improve the consumer ad experience," develop technology to implement such standards and solicit consumer and business feedback. "Members recognize that there is room for improvement with the current online advertising, as indicated in part by the emergence of ad blocking,” said Nancy Hill, CEO of American Association of Advertising Agencies, another member. She said the ad industry needs to find out why consumers aren't responding to such ads and fix it. In a speech last week, IAB CEO Randall Rothenberg criticized the ad-blocking industry, but conceded the ad industry hasn't responded to increasing consumer dislike and distrust of online ads (see 1609090057). NAI CEO Leigh Freund said in the release that when consumers have a bad experience with ads, it affects publishers, ad tech companies, agencies and advertisers. Fixing the issue "in a structured way" will put consumers first and hold the industry accountable, she said. Other coalition members are BVDW Germany, Digital Context Next, Direct Marketing Association, European Publishers Council, GroupM, IAB-Europe, IAB-Tech Lab, News Media Alliance, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and World Federation of Advertisers.

The Copyright Office issued a rulemaking notice Thursday that would allow an author, claimant to a copyright or representative to ask the CO to remove “extraneous and unnecessary” personally identifiable information from online versions of their copyright's application. PII that would be eligible for removal includes driver's license numbers, Social Security numbers, banking information and credit card information, the CO said in the Federal Register. The CO would retain the extraneous PII in offline and hard-copy versions. The new rule would codify an existing CO practice of deleting extraneous PII on request, the office said. The CO hasn't charged a fee for removing extraneous PII, but would begin to impose a $130 fee for such requests under the proposed rule. Requests for reconsideration of previously denied PII removal requests will cost $60, the CO said. The NPRM wouldn't permit removal of an author's or claimant's name because the CO is required to preserve non-extraneous information as a matter of public record, the office said. Anonymous and pseudonymous works are covered by copyright for 95 years after the work's original publication or 120 years after the work's year of creation. Works published under the author's real name are covered under copyright until 70 years after the author's death. Extraneous PII began appearing more frequently online by 2007 as third parties began “harvesting” information collected via the CO's online registration system and then posting that information on “alternative” websites, the CO said. Comments are due Oct. 17.

Songwriters of North America led the filing Tuesday of a lawsuit against DOJ over the Antitrust Division's controversial decision in its review of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and Broadcast Music Inc. consent decrees, as expected (see 1608040066). SONA sued on behalf of songwriters Michelle Lewis, Tom Kelly and Pam Sheyne. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., also targets Attorney General Loretta Lynch and Antitrust head Renata Hesse. It follows an earlier BMI legal challenge of DOJ's concluding statement in the case and an ASCAP-led lobbying effort in Congress. Language in DOJ's ruling clarifying that the department continues to believe the existing decrees mandate 100 percent licensing is a violation of songwriters' property rights because of the language's negative effect on songwriting partnerships, the songwriters said in the complaint (in Pacer). The language “is an illegitimate assertion of agency power in gross violation of plaintiffs’ due process rights, copyright interests and freedom of contacts, and needs to be set aside,” the complaint said. DOJ didn't comment Wednesday.

Customs and Border Protection copyright protection during pendency of a copyright owner's application with the Copyright Office (see 1608250024) will last nine months, CBP said. There's also potential for a single additional 90-day extension, said a Monday news release. The new policy is a result of the customs reauthorization law.

Sentinel Worldwide CEO Steve Tepp criticized Public Knowledge's report claiming the Copyright Office's recent rulemakings and policy recommendations exhibit a pro-rightsholder bias at the expense of consumers. The PK report, released last week (see 1609080084), is an “unprecedented and unfounded” attack on the CO “in a transparent bid to bully, berate, and discredit [the CO] in furtherance of the drastic policy goals PK has failed to achieve for decades,” Tepp said in a Medium blog post Monday. “PK has led a relentless campaign that portrays reasonable policy differences as evidence of impropriety.” Tepp is a former CO senior counsel-policy and international affairs. PK criticizes the CO because of recent instances in which the federal government didn't follow the office's policy recommendations, but “there are also many examples where courts accepted and even relied on [the CO's] analysis, sometimes in opposition to the assertion of copyright protection and sometimes in support of it,” Tepp said. “Even PK relies on the judgement of [the CO] when it suits their purposes.” PK's “two dimensional 'Us vs. Them' approach reflects a lack of sophistication that, in itself, indicates that the organization is unqualified to judge the performance of” the CO, Tepp said. “On any given day the Copyright Office is confronted with the differing and often competing perspectives of a rainbow of participants in the copyright system.” The "moral outrage directed at our report is astonishing," a PK spokeswoman said. "Our report does not impugn the integrity of individual [CO] staff. Regulatory capture is a widely recognized risk for government agencies. Examining structural capture at the Copyright Office has nothing to do with 'bullying,'" as Tepp claims. "It’s not the role of the office to act as an advocate for any particular stakeholders in contentious debates," the PK spokeswoman said. "Accountability to the larger public interest is critical for any agency."