{"id":1274,"date":"2014-08-02T22:23:59","date_gmt":"2014-08-03T02:23:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/?p=1274"},"modified":"2014-08-02T22:25:34","modified_gmt":"2014-08-03T02:25:34","slug":"the-intern-ate-my-homework","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/?p=1274","title":{"rendered":"The Intern Ate My Homework"},"content":{"rendered":"

For most people who are familiar with snow, July and August means hot, lazy days at a beach or pool with an adult beverage in hand. For Ed it is all that and more. \u00a0Summer is the season when copyright infringers and their lawyers<\/em> blame summer interns for…well, for just about everything<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In July alone Ed’s office received nine<\/strong>\u00a0reply letters from infringers or their lawyers blaming a summer intern for some form of copyright infringement. \u00a0It really doesn’t matter at what time of year the infringement occurred or whether the infringer is a Fortune 500 company or the local network affiliate. If some web designer is not being blamed then it is some unnamed, hapless unpaid, unidentified intern. \u00a0No “suit” has ever erred.\u00a0No matter how they cut it or phrase it, the company is responsible and liable for whatever their interns do.<\/p>\n

Here is a prototypical letter “explaining” how the infringement occurred. \u00a0Each sentence is taken from an actual letter authored by a lawyer representing an infringer. Some letters employ one, or more, or most, of these amazingly lame excuses.<\/p>\n

———————————————————————-<\/em><\/p>\n

We are so pleased you brought this matter to our attention. \u00a0Upon receipt of your letter dated ___________, our client\u00a0immediately\u00a0removed the image form its site\/publication\/other.<\/em><\/p>\n

In response to your specific requests:<\/em><\/p>\n

1. \u00a0The image was apparently taken off Google images by one of our summer interns but we have no records to determine whether we are correct;<\/em>
\n 2. \u00a0We do not have any information on the whereabouts of our intern(s) but we are trying to locate him\/her to obtain the information regarding usage that you seek;<\/em>
\n 3. \u00a0Our intern was unpaid and worked from home. We have no records of his\/her backgrounds;<\/em>
\n 4. \u00a0Our intern did not obtain any licenses or model releases as he\/she was not our employee; \u00a0\u00a0<\/em>
\n 5. \u00a0Our intern told us we could use the images and we relied on him\/her;
\n6. \u00a0No we do not know whether our intern was an adult or not;
\n7 \u00a0 We do in fact employ interns who perform services in the City of Mumbai and who we have never actually met;
\n8. \u00a0No, we do not have a photo editor or anyone supervising licensing, because we trust our interns who are all seeking Masters Degrees.
\n9. \u00a0We trust this resolves this matter. \u00a0(Not really)<\/em>
\n 10. Please apologize to your client and tell him\/her no malice was intended.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

———————————————————————-
\n<\/em>
\nWhy any company would risk liability and trust these matters to some unqualified teenager baffles judges and juries alike. They find these excuses very hard to believe (imagine?). \u00a0Ed likes to explain that interns are “employed” even if they work “for free”.<\/p>\n

We know 99% of all infringing companies will never receive a lawyer’s letter and so for many companies, infringing pays as a business model. Why pay for the milk when no one comes after you when you steal the milk? Why pay for photos when less than one in a hundred has a lawyer contact you?<\/p>\n

But on the rare occasion when they are caught with their hand in the cookie jar, \u201cstuff\u201d flows downhill, and that\u2019s why interns, rather than the executives who are responsible, gets blamed. In high school some students tried to pawn off not handing in an assignment that was due, because their dog ate their homework, so obviously they shouldn\u2019t be penalized. Guess what? Blaming the dog didn\u2019t work then and blaming the intern doesn\u2019t work today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For most people who are familiar with snow, July and August means hot, lazy days at a beach or pool with an adult beverage in hand. For Ed it is all that and more. \u00a0Summer is the season when copyright infringers and their lawyers blame summer interns for…well, for just about everything. In July alone […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,15,20],"tags":[342,341],"class_list":["post-1274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-be-aware","category-legal","category-stuff-you-should-know","tag-excuses","tag-interns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1274"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1274\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1279,"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1274\/revisions\/1279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecopyrightzone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}