Fox for copyright infringement on account of other functions of that service. A permanent injunction limited various aspects of TVEyes’s service.[1]
This appeal shares features with our decision in Authors Guild v. Google, Inc., 804 F.3d 202 (2d Cir. 2015) (“Google Books”). That case held that Google’s creation of a text‐searchable database of millions of books (including books under copyright) was a fair use because Google’s service was “transformative” and because integral features protected the rights of copyright holders. However, we cautioned that the case “test[ed] the boundaries of fair use.” Google Books, 804 F.3d at 206. We conclude that defendant TVEyes has exceeded those bounds.
TVEyes’s re‐distribution of Fox’s audiovisual content serves a transformative purpose in that it enables TVEyes’s clients to isolate from the vast corpus of Fox’s content the material that is responsive to their interests, and to access that material in a convenient manner. But because that re‐distribution makes available virtually all of Fox’s copyrighted audiovisual content‐‐including all of the Fox content that TVEyes’s clients wish to see and hear‐‐and because it deprives Fox of revenue that properly belongs to the copyright holder, TVEyes has failed to show that the product it offers to its clients can be justified as a fair use.
Accordingly, we reverse the order of the district court to the extent it held that some of the challenged TVEyes functions constituted a fair use. We affirm the order to the extent that it denied TVEyes’s request for additional relief. Furthermore, because the district court’s issuance of an injunction was premised on the incorrect conclusion that much of what TVEyes offered was a fair use, we remand for the district court to revise the injunction in light of this opinion.
I
TVEyes is a for‐profit media company. It offers a service that allows its clients to efficiently sort through vast quantities of television content in order to find clips that discuss items of interest to them. For example, a client in
- ↑ Fox does not challenge on appeal the dismissal (on summary judgment) of its claims alleging “hot news” misappropriation and “direct competition” misappropriation.
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