Dailymotion ordered to pay TF1 €1.38m
December 3, 2014
From Pascale Paoli-Lebailly in Paris
French video platform Dailymotion has lost an appeal against unauthorised use of content and ordered to pay €1.38 million to broadcaster TF1.
The case concerned a complaint that it had not removed the offending content of Gad Elmaleh’s one man show in 2007 sufficiently quickly.
The Court did not agree to TF1’s request demanding all content marked with TF1 and LCI’s logos be automatically filtered.
According to Paris Court of Appeal, whose judgement has been released by Nextinpact, Orange’s subsidiary will also have to pay €16,000 to news channel LCI, €10,000 to TF1 Vidéo, €50,000 to eTF1 and €15,000 to Gad Elmaleh. Court costs amount to €90,000.
TF1 had appealed after the initial judgement ordered Dailymotion to pay €270,000 to the group.
In a Statement, the TF1 group said it applauded the decision, noting that in the first hearing in 2012, the Paris District Court entered a guilty verdict against Dailymotion to the benefit of TF1 and LCI, and that the Paris Appeal Court had increased fivefold the fines imposed.
The Court also noted that “Dailymotion has taken no action concerning users of its site specifically identified by TF1 SA as practising on a large scale the unlawful activity of posting programmes in violation of copyright.”
In the case of e-TF1, the publisher of the TF1 website, the Court considered that the confirmed breaches constituted “acts of unfair and parasitic competition” against it.
According to TF1, the decision confirms the importance given by the judiciary to the protection of rights for the entire audiovisual industry, with the Court having taken account in its deliberations of “TF1’s investments in audiovisual production and […] the production costs of news programmes.”
“The decision marks a significant step forward in the fight against content piracy. With the end of this litigation, TF1 would like to reiterate its ongoing determination to fight against the fraudulent use of its programmes as well as its commitment alongside producers and rights holders in their fight against piracy,” it declared.