Filed under: Celebrity News
Oprah Winfrey is being sued by the author of political booklet, "How America Elects Her Presidents."
Charles Harris claims in a lawsuit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Pennsylvania that in 2008, as Winfrey began supporting Barack Obama's presidential campaign, Harris sent 10 copies of his booklet to "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in hopes of gaining publicity. He followed up with several inquiries.
Harris got no response, but according to the complaint, on the February 16, 2009 show, Winfrey allegedly read aloud exact questions that were included in the book.
Harris claims that the readings were plagiarism and constituted copyright infringement, which "caused and will continue to cause Plaintiffs to suffer substantial injury, loss and damage to its property and exclusive rights ... and further has damaged Plaintiffs' business reputation and goodwill, diverted its trade and caused a loss of profits all in an amount not yet ascertained."
Please read the rest on Yahoo! News.
As Oprah is seeking to draw more publicity to herself as the time to launch OWN nears, Mr. Harris might think that this is a good time to go after her. Otherwise it seems strange to wait over a year to sue a woman worth as much money as Oprah for a mere $150,000.
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Plus, there is something called "fair use," which allows media types like Oprah to use small portions of copyrighted material in their creations as part of the normal course of making communications for the public. If Mr. Harris is smart enough to write a book about politics that Oprah would quote, he must be smart enough to know what fair use is. It is unlikely that Winfrey went beyond the limits of the fair use of his booklet as defined by law.
Given this likelihood, perhaps Harris does not want any money at all. While Oprah Winfrey would prefer that the world be focused on her OWN network launch, Harris has diverted some of that attention onto himself. That is at least worth $150,000 in publicity. He is likely patting himself on the back for a mission accomplished.