The high court in Johannesburg has found that Fin24 infringed the copyright of one Moneyweb article in 2013, after copying and republishing a substantial part of an original article, and was ordered to pay damages to Moneyweb.
Judge Daniel Berger did not find similar infringements in six other articles and ordered Moneyweb to pay 70% of Fin24’s costs.
These were the main findings in the copyright infringement case Moneyweb instituted in 2013 against Fin24, after Fin24 copied and republished content from various Moneyweb articles. Moneyweb argued that copyright was infringed in seven articles. The article Fin24 was found to have infringed on Moneyweb’s copyright is titled: “Angloplats’ Griffith responds to Shabangu outburst”.
Commenting on the ruling, Moneyweb editor Ryk van Niekerk said although it was disappointing that the court found that copyright was only infringed in one of the seven articles, one article was “one article too many”.
Van Niekerk added that the court vindicated Moneyweb’s position that reports on news events are protected by copyright. “Fin24 contended that there is no copyright in reports about news events and if this was found to be true, it would have been devastating for journalism.”
Moneyweb will respond with more detail once it has studied the 64-page judgment.
News24 editor Adriaan Basson, speaking for Media24, said the company was relieved by the judgment. He said Media24 always believed that it did not infringe Moneyweb’s copyright in all seven cited cases and the court vindicated this view.
“Significant investment was made to bolster News24’s original content and journalism,” said Basson. “The appointment of a 16-strong national team of journalists and multimedia content producers, in addition to the more than 60-strong editorial team we already had in our Cape Town and Johannesburg offices, strengthens our ability to deliver original content, breaking news and analysis to our readers…”
Media24 CEO Esmaré Weideman said in a statement the company took note of the court’s ruling that Fin24 had infringed copyright in one article. “We accept the court’s decision and pride ourselves on ethical journalistic practice. Overall this ruling is a huge victory for Fin24. It proves that aggregation and original reporting both have a place in modern journalism.
“The ruling vindicates our conviction that our conduct was fair and lawful,” says Weideman. “The fact that the court ordered Moneyweb to pay 70% of Media24’s cost speaks for itself.”
Discovery and reporting do not move public domain news elements into a monopolised private domain and to suggest otherwise, as Moneyweb did, would be contrary to the public interest in news dissemination, she added.
- This article was originally published on Moneyweb and is used here with permission