Ek tha Tiger in copyright controversy !!

After a series of movies like Jannath 2 and Desi Boyz, now it is the turn of Salman Khan starrer Ek Tha Tiger. According to reports Salman's blockbuster has met with a copyright infringement case after one Mr Anand Pande has filed a complaint with Mumbai police alleging that the producers have stolen his script and made it into a movie without providing him adequate compensation.

However Hindustan times report that Neelesh Mishra, Co-writer of Ek Tha Tiger has vehemently denied the charges of copying and even challenged Anand Pande to prove his charges.

Mumbai Police have already lodged an FIR against the producer Aditya Chopra and Director Kabir Khan. Anand Pande has also filed  a complaint against them with the Film Writers Association.

Pnade has earlier approached the Mumbai Highcourt who directed the police to launch an FIR on the issue.

Source

Barfi ! faces the Murfy Trademark issue.

A day before release of Barfi !, the upcoming movie of Anurag Basu, the British manufacturers Murphy Radio sent the notice to the producers UTV group and Ishana films, alleging trademark infringement. In the notice, the company has claimed that the makers have used 'Murphy', 'Murphy Radio' and 'Murphy Munna' in the title song as well as in the film without taking an NOC (no objection certificate) from them. 

The notice, sent through advocate Sujeet G Kurup, says, “The company Murphy Enterprises owns at least 32 trademarks under several classes. If the notice is not taken seriously, the company will file a legal suit against the Barfi team, bringing a stay on the movie release, or further perusal claiming damages worth Rs. 50 crore.”

The main point of controversy is over the song Ala Barfi, the lyrics of which are: “Barfi jo amma ji ki kokh mein tha soya/ Amma ne murphy ka radio mangaya/ barfi munna jaisa lalla/ amma ka tha sapna/ Munna jab haule haule duniya mein aaya/ Baba ne Ceylon wala station lagaya/ Radio on hua, amma off hui/ Toota har sapna.”

However, UTV responded positively, by saying “We are clear there has been no infringement whatsoever, and are in the process of responding to the notice.”

 

Source

Copyright tussle compels Google to alter search results

It may be a thrash for the torrent hosting websites. But, it was a victory day for the big media companies as they won a battle against online piracy on Friday. The event of their victory emerged when Google agreed to alter its search algorithms to favour web sites that offered legitimate copyrighted movies, music and television.

With the beginning of next week, algorithms of the Google would take into account the number of valid copyright removal notices, that are received by the web sites. As a result, the web sites facing multiple, valid complaints about copyright infringement may appear lower in Google search results.

The move of Google came as victory news for the entertainment industry, as it was, for years pressurising Google and other Internet sites to act against online piracy.

This announcement from Google came after more than six months of a much heated tussle between big media companies and technology companies. The entire tussle involved the proposed legislation intended to crack down on pirated online content, particularly by rogue foreign Web sites.

However, Google has denied removing pages from copyright-infringing web sites from its search engine unless it receives a valid copyright removal notice from the rights’ owner.

According to the statements of Google, it had received copyright removal requests for over 4.3 million web addresses in the last 30 days, according to the company’s transparency report, which was more than what it received 2009.