Legal Question in Intellectual Property in Connecticut

Re: copyright infringement

Mr. Graves and Mr. Burdick have quite thoroughly answered your question. I have only one additional comment.

It appears that you made your friend a copy of these materials under the impression it was a "fair use", not realizing that you were infringing upon the rights of the copyright owner. Consequently, I believe that it would be difficult for the copyright owner to prove that you willfully infringed when you made this copy.

Therefore, even if the copyright owner is a zealot when it comes to protecting its rights, you can state that you thought the copy you gave a friend was covered by "fair use"; now that you know it is not, you will not do it again; and you are willing to pay them the price of the copied materials.

Re: copyright infringement

This actually could spin out of control, although it really shouldn't. Your making a copy for your own use is permissible but giving it to your friend was technically an infringement of the copyright held by the seminar company. On a practical level, if your friend tells the company that he will pay for an additional set of materials for himself as well as ordering the copies about which he first inquired, the company is likely to drop the matter. However, if the company really is a crusading zealot, your friend could be sued and would have to provide your name in pre-trial discovery.

Another practical solution is to have your friend simply stop responding altogether (you can order the additional materials that he wants) in hopes that the company has better things to do than chase him about possession of an unauthorized copy of their materials....

And, hopefully, you learn from the anxiety over this episode that it is a bad idea to pass around unauthorized copies of copyright-protected matter.

Best wishes,

LDWG

Re: copyright infringement

I agree with all that Mr. Graves has advised.

There is another solution, which is to sell your authorized copy to the other person and prepare a bill of sale to that effect and each of you keep a copy and simply send a copy of it to the lawyer with an apology. Then the lawyer can go to his client and say he "won" and you can go on about your business.

I agree with Mr. Graves that you should consider this a wake-up call on why it is risky to pass around unauthorized copies of copyrighted materials.