TMZ.com reports on news that Mario Lavandeira, aka Perez Hilton is being sued by a Hollywood photo agency for $7.5m US for copyright infringement. (I believe I read elsewhere the agency was X17).
Admittedly Perez goes a lot further than other blogs in posting pictures taken from elsewhere, however the case could present a chilling effect moment for bloggers who use photographs from other sites under fairuse if Perez loses. Indeed, success could result in a raft of similar lawsuits against blogs and blog networks who use photographs in a similar way. One to watch.
Perez is actually being sued by 7 photo agencies together. The first major cooperative effort.
Splash News, one of the agencies, has a lot about why they are doing this on their blog. They are annoyed specifically that the pictures are being taken, but more so because he doesn’t credit them and won’t remove pictures if asked.
So, we’ll see how it all falls out.