Stability AI, Midjourney should face artists' copyright case, judge says; Reuters, May 8, 2024

Blake Brittain, Reuters; Stability AI, Midjourney should face artists' copyright case, judge says

"A California federal judge said he was inclined to green-light a copyright lawsuit against Stability AI, Midjourney and other companies accused of misusing visual artists' work to train their artificial intelligence-based image generation systems.

U.S. District Judge William Orrick said on Tuesday that the ten artists behind the lawsuit had plausibly argued that Stability, Midjourney, DeviantArt and Runway AI copied and stored their work on company servers and could be liable for using it without permission...

Orrick also said that he was likely to dismiss some of the artists' related claims but allow their allegations that the companies violated their trademark rights and falsely implied that they endorsed the systems.

The case is Andersen v. Stability AI, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, No. 3:23-cv-00201."

Trademark infringement award for Sturgis rally set aside; Associated Press via Minneapolis StarTribune, March 14, 2017

Associated Press via Minneapolis StarTribune; 

Trademark infringement award for Sturgis rally set aside

"A federal judge has vacated a nearly $1 million trademark infringement award made to the owners of the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally brand.

Sturgis Motorcycle Rally Inc., which owns the Sturgis logo, sued Walmart and a Rapid City retailer for allegedly improperly using the Sturgis trademark on merchandise. A jury awarded $912,500 to SMRI following a civil trial in October 2015, the Rapid City Journal reported (http://bit.ly/2mnnZYY ).

Federal Judge Jeffrey Viken upheld SMRI's trademark rights, but set aside the jury award against the defendants."

‘Zappa Plays Zappa’ Pits Zappa vs. Zappa; New York Times, 4/29/16

Ben Sisario, New York Times; ‘Zappa Plays Zappa’ Pits Zappa vs. Zappa:

"This month, the Zappa Family Trust, which owns the rights to Mr. Zappa’s music, informed Dweezil that he did not have permission to tour as Zappa Plays Zappa — the name is a trademark owned by the trust — and that he risked copyright infringement damages of $150,000 each time he played a song without proper permission.

“My last name is Zappa; my father was Frank Zappa,” Dweezil said. “But I am not allowed to use the name on its own. I’m not allowed to use a picture of him. I’m not allowed to use my own connection with him without some sort of deal to be struck.”"