Pearson Education and Other Publishers Have Settled Their Copyright Infringement Case against Unauthorized eBook Distributor
Academic publishers Pearson Education, Inc.; Elsevier Inc.; Cengage Learning, Inc.; Bedford; Freeman & Worth Publishing Group, LLC d/b/a Macmillan Learning; and McGraw-Hill Global Education Holdings, LLC (collectively, “Plaintiffs”) and Raheim J. Mofield, a/k/a James Reynolds, individually and d/b/a www.worldmediaincorporated.com (collectively, “Defendants”) have settled their copyright dispute.
As we reported on October 21, 2019, Plaintiffs filed a Complaint against Defendants in early October based on Defendants' sales of allegedly pirated eBooks. According to the Complaint, Defendants operated a website where users could browse, purchase, and download unauthorized copies of eBooks, including Plaintiffs' textbooks. Plaintiffs claim that when they sent infringement notices to Defendants and to Google (whose search functions pointed users toward the infringing content), Defendants failed to cease their piracy and even disputed Plaintiffs' ownership of at least one work.
Following the filing of the complaint, Defendants failed to file a response, and on February 11th, 2020, the Court sent a letter to Plaintiffs giving them permission to file for entry of default against Defendants. Plaintiffs did so on February 24th, but instead of filing for default judgement when the Court encouraged them to on April 27th, Plaintiffs and Defendants opted to settle the case. A Notice of Settlement and Stipulation for Entry of Judgment was filed, and on April 30th, judgment was entered, including an injunction stipulating that Defendants must cease their infringement, reproduction, and sales of Plaintiffs' works.