Regardless of the outcome of the second trial in Oracle v. Google, “that it proceeded to this stage at all casts a long legal shadow over the entire world of software development,” said Electronic Frontier Foundation Director-Copyright Activism Parker Higgins in a blog post. Google and Oracle began a new trial Monday in the U.S. District Court in San Francisco on Oracle’s software copyright infringement lawsuit against Google. The new trial will focus on Google’s claim that its copying of the coding and names contained in Oracle’s Java application programming interface (API) technology for use in its Android mobile operating system doesn’t constitute copyright infringement under the fair use doctrine (see 1605090048). A Google win in the new trial would maintain the status quo view that copying APIs qualifies as a fair use, “and even if API labels are subject to copyright restrictions, those restrictions are not absolute,” Higgins said Wednesday. But “there is a real cost to defending fair use” and “the overwhelming majority of developers in the computer industry” don’t have financial resources like Google and Oracle to maintain an extended fair use legal battle, he said. “Beyond all those known costs, wedging a layer of copyright permissions culture into API compatibility comes with serious unknowable costs, too,” Higgins said. “How many developers will abandon ideas for competitive software because the legal risks are too great?”

Opponents of the Fair Play Fair Pay Act (HR-1733) “have chosen to stand by hometown radio stations against the giant recording labels,” NAB said Thursday in a statement responding to the Alliance for Community Media, National Federation of Community Broadcasters and other independent broadcaster stakeholders’ endorsement of the bill (see 1605110059). HR-1733 would require most terrestrial radio stations to begin paying performance royalties and would require digital broadcasters to begin paying royalties for pre-1972 sound recordings. The bill includes a carve-out that would cap performance royalty payouts at a maximum of $500 per year for commercial stations with less than $1 million in annual revenue and $100 per year for college and public broadcasting stations. “We value our relationship with musicians,” NAB said. “Hometown radio stations are sustaining legacy artists and launching the careers of new artists. By contrast, many artists are suing their recording labels for royalties that they are owed. We believe radio stations are the best friend of the artists.”

The Copyright Office’s planned May 18 and May 24 roundtables on how software-enabled products affect U.S. copyright law (see 1512150050) will include a focus on the fair use doctrine, the first sale doctrine and other exemptions to copyright protections, the CO said Monday in agendas for the two events. The May 18 roundtable in Washington, D.C., will be at the Library of Congress’ Madison Building. The May 24 roundtable in San Francisco will be at the University of California Hastings College of Law. Both roundtables also will examine the proper role of copyright law in protecting software-enabled consumer products and ownership issues associated with such products, the CO said.

The Copyright Office’s two upcoming roundtables on its study of Digital Millennium Copyright Act Section 1201 will partially focus on how to improve the CO’s triennial review process for Section 1201 exemptions and on a proposal to allow presumptive renewal of previously granted exemptions, the CO said in agendas released Wednesday. One of the CO’s Section 1201 meetings will be May 19-20 at the Library of Congress’ James Madison Building in Washington. The other will be May 25 at University of California Hastings College of Law in San Francisco, the CO said. Both roundtable discussions also will examine how Section 1201 affects consumer issues and competition, along with the section’s anti-trafficking provisions.

The New York Court of Appeals said it will consider Flo & Eddie's lawsuit against Sirius XM on the issue of whether New York law recognizes a public performance right for pre-1972 sound recordings and the scope of the state's law. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals asked the New York court in April to review the Flo & Eddie lawsuit, pausing its own review of the case because the status of pre-1972 sound recordings under New York law constitutes a “significant and unresolved issue” of state law that “is determinative” in the 2nd Circuit's eventual decision on Sirius XM's appeal of the case (see 1604130063). The New York Court of Appeals said Tuesday it will consider the state law issue “after briefing and argument,” but didn't set a schedule for considering the case in a brief memo.

The Copyright Royalty Board finalized its 2016-2020 royalty rates for noninteractive webcasters, saying in a Monday notice in the Federal Register its 2016-2020 rates would remain at 0.17 cent per performance on nonsubscription services and 0.22 cent per performance on subscription services. The CRB originally released its 2016-2020 noninteractive webcaster rates in December (see 1512170063) and released its full determination in February (see 1602120058). Publication of the noninteractive webcaster rates in the Federal Register starts the 30-day clock for parties in the proceeding to file an appeal of the CRB’s decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

The American Society for Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) generated more than $1 billion in royalty revenue in 2015, up slightly from the $1 billion-plus in revenue the performing rights organization generated in 2014, ASCAP said Thursday. ASCAP’s domestic royalty revenue rose to $716.8 million in 2015, up $61 million from 2014. ASCAP said its domestic royalty distribution to performing artists and other music creators rose to $573.5 million, up 6.2 percent from 2014. It said it returned almost 88 cents of every dollar in collected royalties back to music creators and kept the remaining 12.3 cents per dollar for operating expenses. “We are doing the best job possible for our songwriter and composer members even as we advocate for changes to the outdated music licensing laws that disadvantage songwriters in the today’s digital world,” said President Paul Williams in a news release. “While the music industry is in the midst of tremendous change, ASCAP has stayed ahead of the curve with a strategic focus on revenue growth, operational efficiencies, technology and service innovations demonstrating that the collective licensing model delivers the best value proposition in the performing rights world,” said ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews.

MPEG LA updated the coverage of its DisplayPort patent pool to include the v1.4 specification approved in March, the company said in a Monday announcement. MPEG LA’s goal “is to provide worldwide access to as much DisplayPort essential intellectual property as possible for the benefit of licensees,” it said. Its pool of DisplayPort licensors includes Hitachi Maxell, Lattice Semiconductor, Philips, Rambus and Sony, it said.

Samsung Research America of Mountain View, California, seeks registration of “Marix” as a trademark for a class of “computer software for controlling, monitoring and restricting access to televisions, desktop computers, and portable and handheld electronic devices,” said its April 19 application (serial number 87006511) at the Patent and Trademark Office. The subsidiary also wants to use the trademark for computer software to “remotely manage” those conditional-access “settings,” as well as for parental control software, the application said. Samsung representatives didn’t comment Monday.

Pandora passed the $2 billion mark in royalties for artists and songwriters, nine months after hitting the $1.5 billion royalties mark, the company said Monday. Some 80 million users spend an average of more than 23 hours per month streaming music on Pandora, it said. Pandora CEO Tim Westergren called the “rapid acceleration” of Internet radio royalty payments "promising news" for the industry, creating a “massive” revenue stream that previously hasn’t existed from radio.