Songs Leps cost "In contact" in 750 000 rubles

Pavel Katkov, a senior partner of the law firm Katkov and Partners, announced that according to the decision of the 13th Arbitration Court of Appeal, the V Kontakte social network must pay 750,000 rubles. studio “Nikitin Media Digital Content” for violating the rights of the copyright holder for 10 songs by Grigory Leps. At the same time, the court did not order the network to remove the disputing tracks.

According to Pavel Katkov, who represented the studio’s interests in court, the amount of compensation (75,000 rubles for each song) is a record one, exceeding even the maximum amount of 50,000 rubles assigned in the Gala Records case against the same network.

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On the day of the hearing, another lawsuit was sent, directed by the Vkontakte social network. About the violation of the rights to the composition of the groups "Aria", "The King and the Fool" and "Hands Up" said the studio "Union". And if in the case of Nikitin Media, the court did not change the amount of compensation, in the case of Soyuz it was reduced to 10,000 rubles. for the song.

Despite monetary penalties, the court in both cases did not order Vkontakte to remove the controversial tracks from the social network.

Katkov himself comments on this situation in the following way: “But we already achieved the result -“ In Contact ”deleted files with pirated tracks, under the threat of trial and lawsuit, in the manual mode limits their re-loading, and the right holder will receive compensation for violation of his rights”.

According to him, the very fact of collecting monetary compensation indicates that the court pleaded guilty of the V Kontakte social network in violation of intellectual property rights. This may become important benchmarks for dealing with such cases in future judicial practice.

Georgy Lobushkin, a representative of the social network, states that during both trials the court recognized Vkontakte as a bona fide information intermediary and made sure of the network’s work with the rights holders and the availability of technologies to efficiently remove content, which served as the basis for rejecting the claimants ’intangible requirements (which consisted of in the removal of tracks). Contrary to this, an eyewitness who was present at the court session asserts that the judge did not mention anything like this, confining himself to a court decision on the payment of compensation and the refusal to satisfy the intangible demands of the studios.

Georgy Lobushkin does not share any information on the further intentions of Vkontakte to defend its position in court, citing the fact that in order to make any decisions, the company must study the reasoning part of the court decision.

"Megamind" requested the comments of a lawyer, the publication is updated.