Part of what makes this case interesting is how Genius claims to have caught Google with its hand in the cookie jar. It’s rather clever—Genius applies a watermark of sorts to its lyrics, by way of alternating apostrophes (straight and curly single-quote marks). This makes it easy to see if other sites are scraping its data.
To drive the point home, the watermark spells “red handed” when converted to Morse code, as in being caught red-handed.
misappropriating content from Genius’s website, which they have exploited—and continue to
exploit—for their own financial benefit and to Genius’s financial detriment. When repeatedly confronted by Genius with incontrovertible evidence regarding
their conduct, Defendants assigned blame elsewhere but otherwise continued their unlawful
behavior,” the lawsuit states (PDF).
John Bergmayer, legal director with the consumer advocacy group Public Knowledge, told the site Genius’ case does not look all that strong. At the same time, he says Google should still take the claims seriously because of its size and power. It sounds like he’s saying Google is at risk of being found guilty in the court of public opinion, though it’s not entirely clear.
Either way, Genius is hoping to hit Google’s pocket book for $50 million, which is a drop in the bucket for the sultan of search. It’s also seeking a permanent injunction against LyricFind that would prevent the company from copying its lyrics and licensing the data to third parties, including Google.
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