Post Univ. v. Course Hero, Inc.

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POST UNIVERSITY, Plaintiff, v. COURSE HERO, INC., Defendant.

Civil No. 3:21-cv-1242 (JBA)

United States District Court, D. Connecticut

August 25, 2023

RULING DENYING DEFENDANT'S PARTIAL MOTION TO DISMISS

Janet Bond Arterton, U.S.D.J.

Defendant Course Hero, Inc. moves to dismiss with prejudice the portions of Count VI of the Amended Complaint alleging violations of 17 U.S.C. § 1202(a) as to its Copyright Notice and its Watermark, arguing that the two pieces of information do not constitute false copyright management information (“CMI”) because the Copyright Notice is not distributed “in connection with” Plaintiff Post University's works, and because the Watermark is not “false”. (Def.'s Mot. to Dismiss [Doc. # 47] at 1.) Plaintiff responds that its Amended Complaint pleads with specificity multiple examples of the provision and distribution of false CMI in connection with its works. (Pl.'s Opp'n [Doc. # 50] at 6.)

For the reasons set forth below, Defendant's motion is DENIED.

I. Factual Background

A. Course Hero's Business Model

Defendant Course Hero is an “online learning platform for course-specific study resources” that offers “learning resources and tools” including “a library of study resources, organized by both school and subject[.]” (Def.'s Mem. [Doc. # 48] at 1.) Initially, these documents are “locked,” which means that the full content cannot be viewed. (Amend. Compl. ¶ 17-19, 40.) While the document remains locked, individuals can only view an alternate document called a “Preview,” which is based on the original uploaded document, created by Course Hero, and which previews some or all of the content from the original while altering, removing, or hiding other content. (Id. ¶ 18.) Alterations might include “blurring, placing opaque boxes or banners directly over the content, and removing entire pages” of the original content.” (Id. ¶ 19; see, e.g., Amend. Compl. Exh. 1 [Doc. # 31-2].) Below these Previews and at the bottom left-hand corner of the website, the words “Copyright © 2021, Course Hero, Inc.” appear in white text on a blue bar; the bottom right-hand corner states that “Course Hero is not sponsored or endorsed by any college or university.” (Exh. 1 at 4.)

(Image Omitted)

To view a document in full, visitors to Course Hero's website must have either an Educator or Student account. (Amend. Compl. ¶¶ 17-18.) Student accounts allow students to either contribute their own study resources or to pay a monthly subscription fee in order to gain access to Defendant's materials; a subscribing student has access to 30 “unlocks” through which they can view and/or download a document per month, with additional unlocks available either for purchase or to be earned through uploading study resources. (Id. ¶¶ 40.) Educator accounts allow educators to create free accounts through which they can upload and share class resources. (Id. ¶¶ 38, 45-56.) Once a document is unlocked and downloaded, a watermark on the document appears stating “This study resource was shared via CourseHero.com” in pale gray behind the text. At the bottom of the page, small black text appears that notes when a document was downloaded; for example, Exh. 7 [Doc. # 31-8] says at the bottom of each page that “This study source was downloaded by 100000824591884 from CourseHero.com on 06-14-202113:49:30 GMT -05:00” and on the line below it, “https://www.coursehero.com/file/89968964/Assignment-Weekly-Newspaperpdf/.”

B. Post University's Takedown Notices

Plaintiff Post University is a for-profit higher education institution that creates documents such as tests, quizzes, assignments, course learning material, lesson plans, study guides, and other educational resources in furtherance of its degree programs. (Am. Compl. ¶¶ 6, 10.) Plaintiff invests “substantial resources” in the creation of these resources, the maintenance of its content and to ensure the academic integrity of its programs. (Id. ¶¶ 10, 12.)

Defendant's library of documents includes study resources specific to Plaintiff available at https://www.coursehero.com/sitemap/schools/456-Post-University/. (Id. ¶ 15.) Exhibits 1-6 of the Amended Complaint are Preview documents derived from documents owned by Post University; Exhibits 7-11 are copies of original documents owned by Post University with a watermark added to the center, with additional information on when the document was downloaded from Course Hero and a Course Hero URL to the document on the bottom left; each of the documents has a registered copyright. (Id. ¶¶ 5358.) At the time the Amended Complaint was filed, the Course Hero website stated that over 23,000 documents from 189 departments at Post University had been uploaded, and Plaintiff alleges upon information and belief that there are “hundreds if not thousands” of additional Plaintiff-owned copyrighted documents available on the Defendant website hidden behind the paywall or which have been modified and displayed as Previews. (Id. ¶¶ 16, 36-37.)

Plaintiff sent Defendant a take-down letter on January 6, 2021 identifying 64 instances of materials it believed in good faith were copyrighted materials that were owned by Post University, and notifying Defendant that additional copyrighted materials were likely to exist on the website. (Id. ¶ 47.) Defendant responded to the letter informing Plaintiff that a ticket had been generated to address the issue, and on January 12, 2021, Defendant emailed Plaintiff informing them that all identified copyrighted documents were removed. (Id. ¶¶ 4849.) Plaintiff sent a second take-down letter to Defendant on February 24, 2021 identifying another 35 instances of Plaintiff's copyrighted documents appearing on Defendant's site, and additionally offering to negotiate for free access to the Study Resources for the purpose of locating additional copyrighted materials owned by Plaintiff on Defendant's website. (Id. ¶ 50.) Plaintiff explained that it was difficult, if not impossible, for it to police whether Defendant's website was hosting its copyrighted documents due to the access restrictions. (Id.) Once more, Defendant took the identified copyrighted documents off of its website but did not address Plaintiff's offer or suggest that any further steps were taken to determine if other copyrighted materials owned by Plaintiff were still up on the website. (Id. ¶ 52.)

The Amended Complaint brings nine counts; however, the motion to dismiss concerns only the specific allegations in Count IV that Defendant's Copyright Notice and Watermark violated 17 U.S.C. § 1202(a).

II. Legal Standard

“To survive a [12(b)(6)] motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Sarmiento v. United States, 678 F.3d 147, 152 (2d Cir. 2012) (quoting Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009).) The “plausibility” requirement is “not akin to a probability requirement,” but it “asks for more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678. In other words, a valid claim for relief must cross “the line between possibility and plausibility.” Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 557 (2007). The “plausibility standard is not akin to a ‘probability requirement,' but it asks for more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678. The Court must “accept as true all factual allegations and draw from them all reasonable inferences.” Hernandez v. United States, 939 F.3d 191, 198 (2d Cir. 2019). Although it is “not required to credit conclusory allegations or legal conclusions couched as factual allegations,” id., motions to dismiss “assess the legal feasibility of a complaint” and are not the place to “assay the weight of the evidence which might be offered in support” of the merits. Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan Bd. v. Teva Pharm. Indus. Ltd., 432 F.Supp.3d 131, 151 (D. Conn. 2019).^[1]

III. Discussion

Congress enacted the DMCA in 1998 “to strengthen copyright protection in the digital age.” Universal City Studios, Inc. v. Corley, 273 F.3d 429, 435 (2d Cir. 2001). “Fearful that the ease with which pirates could copy and distribute a copyrightable work in digital form was overwhelming the capacity of conventional copyright enforcement to find and enjoin unlawfully copied material, Congress sought to combat copyright piracy in its earlier stages, before the work was even copied.” Id. The purpose of protecting CMI under the DMCA is “to facilitate licensing of copyright for use on the Internet and to discourage piracy.” S. REP. 105190 at 92 n.18 (1998). Under 17 U.S.C. § 1202(c), copyright management information includes

any of the following information conveyed in connection with copies or phonorecords of a work or performances or displays of a work, including in digital form, except that such term does not include any personally identifying information about a user of a work or of a copy, phonorecord, performance, or display of a work:

(1) The title and other information identifying the work, including the information set forth on a notice of copyright.

(2) The name of, and other identifying information about, the author of a work.

(3) The name of, and other identifying information about, the copyright owner of the work, including the information set forth in a notice of copyright....

(6) Terms and conditions for use of the work.

(7) Identifying numbers or symbols referring to such information or links to such information . . .

The relevant provision of the DMCA at issue in this motion, 17 U.S.C. § 1202(a), provides that “[n]o person shall knowingly and with the intent to induce, enable, facilitate or conceal infringement[,] (1) provide copyright management information that is...