14 DAY TRIAL // Another major court case is going to reach its end soon. This time, the battle is between the MPAA and Hotfile.
The movie studios are hoping to get about a quarter billion in damages from the file hosting service for nearly 3,450 pirated video files, including “The Karate Kid,” “Prison Break,” “Friends,” “Fringe,” “Lost,” Heroes” and “Glee,” but also “The Matrix” and “Bambi.”
Originally, the case covered over 3,800 movies and TV shows, but following an agreement between the two parties, the number was lowered quite a bit.
The case between the two has been going on for a couple of years already, but next week, a jury panel will be asked to decide just how much Hotlife must pay the movie studios, since they have already won summary judgment on the issue of DMCA defense and vicarious liability, as TorrentFreak points out.
The fine for each of the 3,448 titles could vary between $750 / €552 and $150,000 / €110,400, which means that they could be ordered to pay anywhere in between $2.6 million / €1.9 million and $517 million / €380 million.
According to the case files, Hotfile will not protest its liability for the infringements of its users, but it can claim that other files may have been “space shifted” by users.
“Defendants reserve their right to argue that files on the Hotfile system [other than the 3,448 files in suit] may have been ‘space shifted’ by Hotfile users. Plaintiffs reserve their right to argue the contrary, including that ‘space shifting’ is neither a relevant nor legally viable theory of fair use with respect to any copyrighted files on the Hotfile system,” the stipulation reads, according to the aforementioned source.
Something new about the case is that the MPAA and its witnesses are banned from using several words in court, including “piracy,” “theft” and “stealing.”