So does this mean that Texas schools, prisons, universities, hospitals etc can freely copy and use commercial software, films, books and other similar works?
It seems like under this precedent the University of Houston could just create their own copies of whatever textbooks they want for their students, potentially even selling those copies.
I guess that any out of state company would be able to sue Texas in federal court, where Texas' weird laws do not apply, and they cannot invoke sovereign immunity. But if the company is incorporated in Texas and only does business in the state, I guess the answer is yes?
Not a lawyer or anything, but this is my reading. Since no interstate commerce is happening here, the photographer cannot sue in federal court.
Edit: I think what I wrote above is wrong, having read a link in one of the other comments. All the same, my guess is that states are not going to be skipping payment on Windows licenses and taking on Microsoft in the courts. But they
may be able to continue picking on little guys who have no power, as it has ever been.
> Olive tried the approach after the University of Houston rejected his claim that the public university should pay for a photo it used without permission in web and print publications, contending the university has sovereign immunity, a well-established legal principle that protects a state from getting sued.
Terrifying. So the University of Houston claims they can just steal whatever they want?
It's sovereign immunity. Any state agency can do whatever it wants and claim immunity unless the Feds get involved. The Feds can do whatever they want full stop.
The only constraint is that the state can allow itself to be sued, and therefore you have some recourse that way.
So wait, universities can patent things, but then have sovereign immunity from infringing copyright?
I know the other parts of government are prohibited from being able to get copyright or patents, so that means sovereign immunity makes sense in a heavy-handed way, but allowing both ownership and immunity seems... like having your cake and eating it too.
The US (federal) District Court for the Eastern District of Texas has that reputation, due to local rules which attracted patent cases (IIRC, recent case law has restricted the kind of forum shopping involved in that), but that has little to do with the laws or judicial system of the State of Texas.
> Olive tried the [unlawful “taking”] approach after the University of Houston rejected his claim that the public university should pay for a photo it used without permission in web and print publications, contending the university has sovereign immunity, a well-established legal principle that protects a state from getting sued.
Fun fact, the government opinion for patents for the government and its contractors is also that the federal government cannot be found to infringe on patents either. At most they say they voluntarily choose to provide reasonable compensation. This especially applies if the use of a patent is deemed to be in the interest of national security.
The US government has sovereign immunity, just like Texas claims here. The difference is that a Federal court can overrule a state's SI.
Nobody can overrule the federal government's SI, meaning the federal government cannot be sued for any reason unless it agrees to be sued and forfeits SI in that case.
I was under the impression that sovereign immunity only applied to suing of state actors (ie employees / officials, etc) but I guess it can be applied writ-large to entire institutions as well based on the copyright infringement ruling?
Sounds like a job for the state legislature to handle - writing out an exception to immunity for infringement. Otherwise why would anyone bother attempting to do licensed work in Texas at all?
The immunity from copyright and patent claims is critical to universty researches. Without it basic research would get mired in patent and copyright claims.
Many would be eventually ruled as fair use but that requires a judge to make a judgement as to the fair use factors. SI just requires the judge to see that it is the uni of Texas.
The uni doesnt care about the photographers licence fee. It cares about not getting by a phama company because a researcher happened to use a chemical that was under patent.
I'm kind of curious about whether he'd have options to pursue this under the DMCA. Are there legal grounds for the University to ignore takedown notices? I'm seeing things that say the university has immunity against being sued for infringement (not sure quite why, state vs federal jurisdiction), but that's a different thing.
This makes no sense. Imagine that SpaceX took a photograph on the moon, and then a university freely used the image in its marketing materials. Would that make sense? Would it make any more sense if the university had a space program? No.
SpaceX isn’t the greatest example here. They commonly release their photos into the public domain with a Creative Commons waiving all copyright and related or neighboring rights to their work. Though the point still stands with photographers and photo releases in general.
Reading the article solves one mystery, but brings up another.
The photographer for some reason did not pursue this as a copyright infringement claim. Instead he argued that it was an eminent domain case where the state had seized his private property and was, according to Texas state law, required to compensate him for the seized property.
It would be sufficient at this point for the state to rule that copyright infringement is not the same as eminent domain seizures, rule against him, and order him to pay the defendant's costs for filing a frivolous case.
Instead they oddly ruled instead that the school has sovereign immunity from lawsuits, and ordered him to pay their costs.
It is strange if the state can not be held accountable in court for eminent domain seizures despite the state law to the contrary.
It is strange that they ruled that way rather than ruling that copyright infringement is not a domain seizure.
It is strange that the plaintiff filed this case this way.
>The photographer for some reason did not pursue this as a copyright infringement claim.
The reason is that state institutions have sovereign immunity from copyright infringement lawsuits.
>Instead he argued that it was an eminent domain case
His only recourse was to argue that the infringement was an unconstitutional exercise of government power and sue on constitutional grounds rather than statutory grounds.
>It would be sufficient at this point for the state to rule that copyright infringement is not the same as eminent domain seizures, rule against him, and order him to pay the defendant's costs
According to the article, that's what the court did.
>Instead they oddly ruled instead that the school has sovereign immunity
The article doesn't say that.
>It is strange if the state can not be held accountable in court for eminent domain seizures
It can be, but copyright infringement is a tort, not a property transfer, so not covered under the takings clause.
>It is strange that the plaintiff filed this case this way.
It was his only option if he wanted to present his case in court.
Sovereign immunity is the legal doctrine that the government can't be sued for anything unless it specifically allows you to do so. In this case, Texas state law does not have a provision that allows it to be sued for copyright infringement. So, the photographer could not file a claim for copyright infringement, either in state or federal court. That's why he tried the novel approach of suing them under the "takings" clause of the US Constitution. The Bill of Rights is a specific case where the government has allowed itself to be sued for violating those provisions. Under Supreme Court precedent, most provisions of the Bill of Rights apply to the states as well as to the federal government.
[+] [-] caf|6 years ago|reply
It seems like under this precedent the University of Houston could just create their own copies of whatever textbooks they want for their students, potentially even selling those copies.
[+] [-] asdfasgasdgasdg|6 years ago|reply
Not a lawyer or anything, but this is my reading. Since no interstate commerce is happening here, the photographer cannot sue in federal court.
Edit: I think what I wrote above is wrong, having read a link in one of the other comments. All the same, my guess is that states are not going to be skipping payment on Windows licenses and taking on Microsoft in the courts. But they may be able to continue picking on little guys who have no power, as it has ever been.
[+] [-] m463|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] erichurkman|6 years ago|reply
Terrifying. So the University of Houston claims they can just steal whatever they want?
[+] [-] hfkajshfaks|6 years ago|reply
The only constraint is that the state can allow itself to be sued, and therefore you have some recourse that way.
[+] [-] FireBeyond|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] r00fus|6 years ago|reply
I know the other parts of government are prohibited from being able to get copyright or patents, so that means sovereign immunity makes sense in a heavy-handed way, but allowing both ownership and immunity seems... like having your cake and eating it too.
Who's the judge I wonder...
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Mathnerd314|6 years ago|reply
They directly sued for copyright infringement rather than trying to use eminent domain.
[+] [-] userbinator|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dragonwriter|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tedivm|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lloydde|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deogeo|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smalley|6 years ago|reply
Fun fact, the government opinion for patents for the government and its contractors is also that the federal government cannot be found to infringe on patents either. At most they say they voluntarily choose to provide reasonable compensation. This especially applies if the use of a patent is deemed to be in the interest of national security.
[+] [-] michaelhoffman|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vokep|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drivingmenuts|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Ace17|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dahfizz|6 years ago|reply
Nobody can overrule the federal government's SI, meaning the federal government cannot be sued for any reason unless it agrees to be sued and forfeits SI in that case.
How do people not know this?
[+] [-] sailfast|6 years ago|reply
Sounds like a job for the state legislature to handle - writing out an exception to immunity for infringement. Otherwise why would anyone bother attempting to do licensed work in Texas at all?
[+] [-] qtplatypus|6 years ago|reply
Many would be eventually ruled as fair use but that requires a judge to make a judgement as to the fair use factors. SI just requires the judge to see that it is the uni of Texas.
The uni doesnt care about the photographers licence fee. It cares about not getting by a phama company because a researcher happened to use a chemical that was under patent.
[+] [-] fencepost|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] test6554|6 years ago|reply
Could they post full feature films on their websites?
[+] [-] sk5t|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dang|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] merryandrew|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] skunkworker|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Fjolsvith|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hfkajshfaks|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] droithomme|6 years ago|reply
The photographer for some reason did not pursue this as a copyright infringement claim. Instead he argued that it was an eminent domain case where the state had seized his private property and was, according to Texas state law, required to compensate him for the seized property.
It would be sufficient at this point for the state to rule that copyright infringement is not the same as eminent domain seizures, rule against him, and order him to pay the defendant's costs for filing a frivolous case.
Instead they oddly ruled instead that the school has sovereign immunity from lawsuits, and ordered him to pay their costs.
It is strange if the state can not be held accountable in court for eminent domain seizures despite the state law to the contrary.
It is strange that they ruled that way rather than ruling that copyright infringement is not a domain seizure.
It is strange that the plaintiff filed this case this way.
[+] [-] blacksqr|6 years ago|reply
The reason is that state institutions have sovereign immunity from copyright infringement lawsuits.
>Instead he argued that it was an eminent domain case
His only recourse was to argue that the infringement was an unconstitutional exercise of government power and sue on constitutional grounds rather than statutory grounds.
>It would be sufficient at this point for the state to rule that copyright infringement is not the same as eminent domain seizures, rule against him, and order him to pay the defendant's costs
According to the article, that's what the court did.
>Instead they oddly ruled instead that the school has sovereign immunity
The article doesn't say that.
>It is strange if the state can not be held accountable in court for eminent domain seizures
It can be, but copyright infringement is a tort, not a property transfer, so not covered under the takings clause.
>It is strange that the plaintiff filed this case this way.
It was his only option if he wanted to present his case in court.
[+] [-] ccleve|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LurkersWillLurk|6 years ago|reply