Television Academy Wins Injunction Against Conspiracy Theorist

The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences won an injunction against Crowdsource the Truth for its use of an image of the Academy’s copyrighted and trademarked Emmy award statuette in a “Crony Awards” video, a New York federal judge ruled.

Crowdsource the Truth, which is owned by Multimedia System Design Inc., lost by default judgment after it didn’t obtain new representation when its previous attorney John Snyder withdrew in July 2021.

Crowdsource must also pay attorneys’ fees for the Academy, Judge Valerie Caproni of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York found. Crowdsource “traffics in wild conspiracy theories,” she previously said.

Jason Goodman, the sole owner of Multimedia Systems Design, faces additional sanctions for willfully violating a protective order by disclosing confidential discovery material. For the next two years, Goodman must notify all courts and parties where he is involved in lawsuits that he violated the order here, the court said.

Goodman had copied an email address the Academy had marked as confidential in a message he sent to other individuals who weren’t involved in the case, Caproni found.

Crowdsource produced a video in June 2020 “honoring the countries that downplayed the seriousness” of the Covid-19 pandemic, which included an image of the Emmy statuette holding a coronavirus model instead of an atom.

The Academy sued Crowdsource, alleging copyright and trademark infringements. Crowdsource argued that its use of the image falls under the fair-use exemption, but the court disagreed.

Caproni ruled that Crowdsource’s image wasn’t transformative and didn’t “poke fun” or provide commentary about the Academy. She also found the Academy adequately alleged that it “suffered actual and reputational harm” through the association of the Emmy award and Covid-19 conspiracies.

Caproni ruled on Feb. 16 that the Academy couldn’t include claims of defamation against Goodman in its proposal for default judgment. The Academy alleged that Goodman had engaged in a “smear campaign” on YouTube and Twitter to intimidate members of the Academy.

Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner LLP represented the academy.

The case is Nat’l Acad. of Television Arts and Sciences, Inc. v. Multimedia Sys. Design, Inc., S.D.N.Y., No. 1:20-cv-07269, 2/22/22.