Murdoch Tells Supreme Court California Ripped Him Off

The U.S. Supreme Court is considering Frederick L. Allen, et al. v. Roy A. Cooper, III, Governor of North Carolina, et al, which will resolve whether state governments have sovereign immunity from copyright claims. In an amicus brief, Rupert Murdoch’s Dow Jones & Company claimed it was “a principal victim of what must stand as the most egregious exemplar of copyright infringement by a state.” In 2017 blogger published a story telling how CalPERS, the state agency that administers California’s pension fund, was reproducing articles in full from The Wall Street Journal and other publications. According to Dow Jones, which didn’t authorize the use of its articles, there were approximately 9,000 Wall Street Journal articles on the site. Dow Jones reached a $3.4 million settlement, but the company’s lawyers say the scope of the infringement would ordinarily have resulted in a penalty “exceeding eight figures,” if CalPERS hadn’t been able to assert that sovereign immunity wholly exempted it from any liability. The case the Supreme Court is considering tests the interplay of various constitutional amendments as well as the powers of Congress, and many outside parties are filing amicus briefs.