Women in Porn Dispute Win Copyright – And $12.7 Million

Twenty-two women who claim they were duped into participating in porn videos have won their case in California state court. In addition to $12.7 million in damages, a judge has awarded them copyright to the work. The women say they were lured to San Diego, which is the production headquarters of a site called GirlsDoPorn, and then pressured into signing lengthy contracts they didn’t understand, given drugs and alcohol before shoots, and led to believe the product would be marketed to a private collector or sold outside the U.S. or as a limited release DVD. All the women were between 17 and 22 at the time they signed the contracts. Buzzfeed quotes a porn industry executive – whom it characterizes as a leading voice in the industry and a legitimate producer of porn under terms of “transparency” and consent – who says getting the copyrights is a big deal. It means, she says, that they now can, “hire someone to search for all this content that they now own the copyright to and issue a [Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice] to get it taken down. I highly suggest they do that.”