Norm Zada, publisher of pornographic magazine
Perfect 10, is trying to get an injunction from a district court in Los Angeles against search specialist Google Inc to stop it from providing links and thumbnails of its copyrighted pornographic images. The lawsuit against Google was filed in November 2004.
According to the magazine, Google is using the images as a magnet to lure Internet surfers to its search engine and cashing in on them to generate advertising revenue. “Google is directly infringing on our copyrights. They are copying and showing our work on their Web site. They are also placing ads on these Web sites that are infringing on our work,” said Zada.
The magazine brought about a similar lawsuit against Amazon.com in June 2005. Amazon.com allegedly displays thumbnails of copyrighted images belonging to
Perfect 10 through its search engine A9.com.
“(Google.com and Amazon.com) are giving away exactly what we are selling. There is no business that can survive if someone comes along and gives away their product,” Zada said. He added that the two companies are ‘displaying hundreds of thousands of adult images, from the most tame to the most exceedingly explicit, to draw massive traffic to its Web site, which it is converting into hundreds of millions of dollars of advertising revenue.’
On being contacted, Google Inc denied any copyright infringements. “We believe the lawsuit is without merit and we will defend ourselves against it vigorously,” a Google spokesperson said.
The lawsuit is against the two search engines because they give links to sites that have larger images that purportedly belong to
Perfect 10. According to Zada, he is unable to sue other Web sites that host these photographs because they are in other countries. He added that Yahoo and MSN search engines also do the same but due to lack of resources he is unable to bring legal action against them and the Web sites that copy
Perfect 10 images. “We don't have the resources to sue everybody,” said the publisher.
