By Matthew Vadum -- BombThrowers——Bio and Archives--July 20, 2017
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The rights of contention in this case range from the complicated to the downright bizarre. The court must decide whether Peta has a close enough relationship with Naruto to represent him in court, what the value would be to provide a community of macaques with a written notice of copyright, and whether Naruto is actually losing out by not being the formal copyright-holder. “There’s no case that suggests that the copyright infringement itself is injury,” said Judge N Randy Smith. “What’s your injury? There’s no way to acquire or hold some money, which the copyright would give. There’s no loss as to reputation. There’s not even any allegation that the copyright could have benefited somehow Naruto.” There’s also the question over whether Peta has identified the correct monkey. Slater claims the macaque in the photograph is a female, and it a completely different age to the six-year-old Naruto Peta is representing. “I’m bewildered at the American court system,” Slater told the Guardian. “Surely it matters that the right monkey is suing me.”
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Matthew Vadum, matthewvadum.blogspot.com, is an investigative reporter.
His new book Subversion Inc. can be bought at Amazon.com (US), Amazon.ca (Canada)
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