Another Standing Loss for Righthaven
Following in the footsteps of two recent previous decisions from the court involving Righthaven (previously blogged here and here), the federal district court in Nevada handed another loss to Righthaven on June 22, concluding that Righthaven lacked standing to pursue its copyright infringement action.
The district court's opinion was short and to-the-point:
Recently this Court determined that Righthaven lacked standing to pursue copyright infringement claims based on assignments made under the [Strategic Alliance Agreement (SAA)] because the SAA prevents subsequent assignments from transferring "the exclusive rights necessary to maintain standing in a copyright infringement action.["] Righthaven v. Democratic Underground, 2:10-cv-01356-RLH-GWF, -- F. Supp. 2d --, 2011 WL 2378186 at *6 (D. Nev. June 14, 2011); see also Righthaven v. Hoehn, 2:10-cv-00050-PMP-RJJ, -- F. Supp. 2d --, 2011 WL 2441020 at *6 (D. Nev. June 20, 2011). The standing issues in this case are the same as those in Democratic Underground and Hoehn. Because the issues are the same, the same analysis applies and the Court directs readers to the reasoning in those cases on the issue of standing. As the Court did in both of those cases, the Court dismisses Righthaven for lack of standing.
Given the large number of Righthaven copyright cases currently pending before the District of Nevada (according to a search of PACER on June 23, Righthaven is a plaintiff in 80 open copyright cases), similar decisions are likely to continue to issue from the court.
The case cite is Righthaven LLC v. DiBiase, Case No. 2:10-cv-01343-RLH-PAL (D. Nev. June 22, 2011).
