CYBERSPACE—Chilling Effects, the online clearinghouse for DMCA notices, was informed about more than 12,000 cease-and desist notices sent out in 2010. Some of the notices contained one URL only, while others contained hundreds. Over the next several weeks the group plans to assess any patterns or trends that may be found in the thousands of notices, but in the meantime it has released the list of top Repeat Senders.
Not surprisingly, notices related to the alleged infringement of videos and music dominate, but two stalwart adult entities also appear on the list. Remove Your Content came in sixth, with a reported 221 cease-and-desist notices sent, and Vivid Entertainment Group came in at number 17, with 82 notices sent.
According to Wendy Seltzer, who compiled the list, “Chilling Effects receives notices from several sources, but lately, the largest sources have been Internet hosts and search engines who pass on the DMCA Notices they receive and respond to: Google, Yahoo, Digg, and most recently, Twitter. (Combined DMCA takedowns totaled 11,500 between Jan 1 and Dec 15, 2010)”
Despite the impressive showing for adult, take down notices targeting infringers of music remain the most active by a large margin.
“While the mix changes over time,” wrote Seltzer, “the most frequent senders of DMCA takedown notices remain the music industry, whose institutional members have sent a combined total averaging roughly 5 takedowns a day.”
The 2010 Top 20 Repeat Senders are, in order:
Number : Sender (Type of Infringement)
1272 : IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) (Music)
303 : Clube do Hardware (Articles)
299 : Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation (Films)
257 : Magnolia Pictures Inc. (Films)
230 : APCM—Associação Anti Pirataria de Cinema e Musica (Music)
221 : Remove Your Content, LLC: images and video (adult content)
203 : RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) (Music)
166 : Autodata Limited (Technical Manuals)
158 : Folkert Knieper (Recipe Photographs)
122 : Product Partners, LLC/Beachbody (Fitness DVDs)
117 : Sony Music/Epic Records/Michael Jackson Estate (Music)
106 : Stones Throw Records LLC (Music)
92 : Chappell & Co (Music)
88 : Microsoft Corporation (Software and Instructional Material)
88 : Globo Comunicação e Participações S/A (Video)
85 : The New York Times (Articles)
84 : Deckers Outdoor Corporation (UGG Australia) (Images of UGG Boots)
82 : Vivid Entertainment Group, LLC (Video, Adult Content)
81 : Digiturk (TV)
81 : The NBA - National Basketball Association (Video Streams)
