SONY CORP. v. UNIVERSAL CITY STUDIOS, INC.

No. 81-1687.

464 U.S. 417 (1984)

SONY CORPORATION OF AMERICA ET AL. v. UNIVERSAL CITY STUDIOS, INC., ET AL.

Supreme Court of United States.

Reargued October 3, 1983

Decided January 17, 1984


Attorney(s) appearing for the Case

Dean C. Dunlavey reargued the cause for petitioners. With him on the briefs were Donald E. Sloan and Marshall Rutter.

Stephen A. Kroft reargued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief was Sondra E. Berchin.*

Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the Association of American Publishers, Inc., et al. by Charles H. Lieb and Jon A. Baumgarten; for the Authors League of America, Inc., by Irwin Karp; for CBS Inc. by Lloyd N. Cutler, Louis R. Cohen, and George Vradenburg III; for Creators and Distributors of Programs by Stuart Robinowitz and Andrew J. Peck; for the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and Moving Picture Machine Operators of the United States and Canada, AFL-CIO, by Leo Geffner; for the Motion Picture Association of America, Inc., by Richard M. Cooper, Ellen S. Huvelle, and William Nix; for the National Music Publishers' Association, Inc., by Jon A. Baumgarten; for the Recording Industry Association of America, Inc., by James F. Fitzpatrick, Cary H. Sherman, and Ernest S. Meyers; for Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, Inc., by I. Fred Koenigsberg; and for the Writers Guild of America, West, Inc., et al. by Paul P. Selvin, Jerome B. Lurie, and Paul S. Berger.

Briefs of amici curiae were filed for the State of Missouri et al. by John Ashcroft, Attorney General of Missouri, and by the Attorneys General for their respective States as follows: Charles A. Graddick of Alabama, John Steven Clark of Arkansas, Michael J. Bowers of Georgia, Tany S. Hong of Hawaii, Tyrone C. Fahner of Illinois, Thomas J. Miller of Iowa, William J. Guste, Jr., of Louisiana, William A. Allain of Mississippi, Michael T. Greely of Montana, Rufus L. Edmisten of North Carolina, William J. Brown of Ohio, Jan Eric Cartwright of Oklahoma, Dennis J. Roberts II of Rhode Island, John J. Easton of Vermont, Gerald L. Baliles of Virginia, and Bronson C. La Follette of Wisconsin; and for the Committee on Copyright and Literary Property of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York by Michael S. Oberman and David H. Marks.


JUSTICE STEVENS delivered the opinion of the Court.

Petitioners manufacture and sell home video tape recorders. Respondents own the copyrights on some of the television programs that are broadcast on the public airwaves. Some members of the general public use video tape recorders sold by petitioners to record some of these broadcasts, as well as a large number of other broadcasts...

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