A cease and desist letter is a document sent by one party, often a business, to warn another party that they believe the other party is committing an unlawful act, such as copyright infringement, and that they will take legal action if the other party continues the alleged unlawful activity. The letter may warn that, if the recipient does not discontinue specified conduct, or take certain actions, by deadlines set in the letter, the letter's recipient may be sued. [1] [2] The phrase "cease and desist" is a legal doublet, made up of two near-synonyms. A cease and desist letter issued by a government entity, called a cease and desist order, is "a warning of impending judicial enforcement". [3]
Although cease and desist letters are not exclusively used in the area of intellectual property, particularly in regards to copyright infringement, such letters "are frequently utilized in disputes concerning intellectual property and represent an important feature of the intellectual property law landscape". [2] The holder of an intellectual property right such as a copyrighted work, a trademark, or a patent, may send the cease and desist letter to inform a third party "of the right holder's rights, identity, and intentions to enforce the rights". The letter may merely contain a licensing offer or may be an explicit threat of a lawsuit. A cease and desist letter often triggers licensing negotiations, and is a frequent first step towards litigation. [2]
Receiving numerous cease and desist letters may be very costly for the recipient. Each claim in the letters must be evaluated, and it should be decided whether to respond to the letters, "whether or not to obtain an attorney's opinion letter, prepare for a lawsuit, and perhaps initiate [in case of letters regarding a potential patent infringement] a search for alternatives and the development of design-around technologies". [2]
Cease and desist letters are sometimes used to intimidate recipients and can be "an effective tool used by corporations to chill the critical speech of gripe sites operators". [4] A company owning a trademark may send such letter to a gripe site operator alleging a trademark infringement, although the actual use of the trademark by the gripe site operator may fall under a fair use exception (in compliance with, in the U.S., the protection of free speech under the First Amendment). [4]
Author Patrick Wensink used Jack Daniel's famous branding without licensing as a cover for his 2012 book Broken Piano for President. Jack Daniel's requested only future printings of the book to have the cover changed and offered compensation.
In 2017, a cease and desist letter sent by Netflix for an unauthorized Stranger Things -related bar event was noted by news outlets such as Fortune and Quartz for its humorous wording. [5]
The Philippine National Telecommunications Commission administered a cease and desist order against ABS-CBN to stop broadcasting on May 5, 2020 after its franchise expired the day before (May 4, 2020). At 7:52 pm (PHT), ABS-CBN stopped its broadcast in compliance with the NTC's letter, signing off all of its free TV and radio stations across the country (ABS-CBN Channel 2, S+A Channel 23, DZMM 630, and MOR 101.9). The said agency also gave ABS-CBN ten days to explain why its assigned frequencies should not be recalled. [6] On June 30, 2020, considering that Channel 43 was also included in the May 5, 2020 shutdown order issued by the NTC against ABS-CBN (although ABS-CBN CEO Carlo Katigbak insisted that it is part of their blocktime agreement with AMCARA Broadcasting Network), the NTC and Solicitor General Jose Calida released two alias shutdown orders against Channel 43 on digital receiver ABS-CBN TV Plus and Sky Cable's nationwide satellite service Sky Direct. [7]
Donald Trump sent a cease and desist letter to CNN asking them to retract a poll that showed him being 14 percentage points behind his opponent Joe Biden during the presidential election, [8] prompting The Atlantic to warn about attacks on the media. [9]
In 2021, Google's platform YouTube issued a significant number of cease and desist notices to the creators of various music bots on Discord, such as Rythm and Groovy. These music bots allowed users to request songs and have the bot create a queue. This was done by pulling the audio stream from various streaming and video platforms, including YouTube, and then played that audio on the Discord voice channel. Because such music bots did not play any of the advertisements included on the video-hosting site, the company alleged missing revenue for itself and the content uploaders. A spokesperson for Google told The Verge that Groovy violated YouTube's terms of service for "modifying the service and using it for commercial purposes". [10] The makers of Groovy had decided to comply with Google's request by shutting down the bot on August 30, 2021. According to estimations, the bot had more than 250 million users. [11]
In 2022, Disney issued a letter of cease and desist to the creators of Club Penguin Rewritten , a game that was created as a remake of Club Penguin after its shutdown on March 31, 2017. [12]
Google issued a letter of cease and desist to the creators of YouTube Vanced, an Android app developed as a third-party modification of YouTube. The app allowed its users to skip advertisements, among other functions. Since March 13, 2022, the app has been discontinued, with all links being removed. [13]
A declaratory judgment, also called a declaration, is the legal determination of a court that resolves legal uncertainty for the litigants. It is a form of legally binding preventive by which a party involved in an actual or possible legal matter can ask a court to conclusively rule on and affirm the rights, duties, or obligations of one or more parties in a civil dispute. The declaratory judgment is generally considered a statutory remedy and not an equitable remedy in the United States, and is thus not subject to equitable requirements, though there are analogies that can be found in the remedies granted by courts of equity. A declaratory judgment does not by itself order any action by a party, or imply damages or an injunction, although it may be accompanied by one or more other remedies.
A copyright is the legal protection extended to the owner of the rights in an original work. Original work refers to every production in the literary, scientific, and artistic domains. The Intellectual Property Office (IPOPHL) is the leading agency responsible for handling the registration and conflict resolution of intellectual property rights and to enforce the copyright laws. IPOPHL was created by virtue of Republic Act No. 8293 or the Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines which took effect on January 1, 1998, under the presidency of Fidel V. Ramos.
TV Patrol is a Philippine television news broadcasting show originally broadcast by ABS-CBN and currently broadcasting on Kapamilya Channel, A2Z, ABS-CBN News Channel, TeleRadyo Serbisyo and ALLTV. Originally anchored by Noli de Castro, Mel Tiangco, Robert Arevalo and Frankie Evangelista, it premiered on March 2, 1987 on the network's primetime slot replacing Balita Ngayon. De Castro, Karen Davila, Bernadette Sembrano, and Henry Omaga-Diaz currently serve as the anchors. It is the longest-running Filipino-language news program.
ABS-CBN is a Philippine commercial broadcast network that serves as the flagship property of the ABS-CBN Corporation, a company under Lopez Holdings Corporation owned by the López family. The network is headquartered at the ABS-CBN Broadcasting Center in Quezon City, with additional offices and production facilities in 25 major cities including Baguio, Naga, Bacolod, Iloilo, Cebu, Davao, and Bulacan, where ABS-CBN's production and post-production facility in Horizon IT Park is located. ABS-CBN is colloquially referred to as the Kapamilya Network; its brand was originally introduced in 1999 and was officially introduced in 2003 during the celebration of its 50th anniversary, and was used until it was forced by the National Telecommunications Commission to cease and desist from free-to-air broadcasting due to the lack of congressional franchise. ABS-CBN is the largest media company in the Philippines and oldest television broadcaster in Southeast Asia.
The Tetris Company, Inc. (TTC) is the manager and licensor for the Tetris brand to third parties. It is based in Nevada and is owned by Tetris creator Alexey Pajitnov and Henk Rogers. The company is the exclusive licensee of Tetris Holding LLC, the company that owns Tetris rights worldwide.
DWWX-TV was the flagship VHF station of Philippine television network ABS-CBN. The station was owned and operated by ABS-CBN Corporation with its studio and transmitter located at the ABS-CBN Broadcasting Center, Sgt. Esguerra Avenue corner Mother Ignacia Avenue, Diliman, Quezon City. It was the first and oldest television station in the Philippines. The station served as the originating channel of the network's national television programming, which broadcast to all its regional stations.
Kapamilya Channel is a 24-hour Philippine pay television network operated by ABS-CBN Corporation, a company under Lopez Holdings Corporation owned by the López family. The network is headquartered at ABS-CBN Broadcasting Center in Quezon City. A separate high definition 1080i resolution channel began broadcasting the same day.
AMCARA Broadcasting Network was a Philippine television broadcast company. The company is located in Katipunan Avenue, Loyola Heights, Quezon City. The company is majority-owned by the heirs of Arcadio M. Carandang, one of the pioneers of Philippine television who worked for ABS-CBN.
A legal threat is a statement by a party that it intends to take legal action on another party, generally accompanied by a demand that the other party take an action demanded by the first party or refrain from taking or continuing actions objected to by the demanding party.
Failon Ngayon was a 2009 Philippine television news magazine show broadcast by ABS-CBN, hosted by Ted Failon. The program premiered on October 24, 2009, and prior to its cancellation, it aired every Saturday on the network's Yes Weekend! block.
MOR Entertainment is a new media radio service owned and operated by ABS-CBN Corporation.
ABS-CBN Sports and Action, was a free-to-air television network based in Quezon City. It was owned by ABS-CBN Corporation with some of its programs produced and licensed by ABS-CBN Sports. In Metro Manila, Sports + Action broadcast terrestrially and through DTT through DWAC-TV, the frequency once used by the defunct national television network Studio 23 until its closure on January 16, 2014, with most of its UHF affiliate stations in the provinces owned by AMCARA Broadcasting Network. It began its operations on January 18, 2014, yet it did not become the company's sole channel for sports until the shutdown of subscription-based counterpart Balls by the end of 2015. Its simulcast high-definition channel was exclusively available on Sky Cable, Destiny Cable and Sky Direct since 2016, while its international feed carried worldwide through The Filipino Channel. Sports + Action's programming is composed primarily of sports coverage such as MPBL, ABL, UAAP, NCAA, Pinoy Pride fights, BVR, PVL and ONE Championship. The program line up of Sports + Action included other sports-related programming, news coverages and blocktimers. S+A broadcast Mondays to Saturdays from 5:00 am to 1:00 am and Sundays from 4:00 am to 1:00 am.
ABS-CBN TV Plus is a Philippine ISDB-T encrypted digital terrestrial television provider owned and operated by ABS-CBN Convergence, a subsidiary of ABS-CBN Corporation. The service distributes digital set-top boxes with freemium and free-to-view digital TV channels, Broadcast Markup Language, Emergency Warning Broadcast system, and pay per view services to selected areas in the Philippines. In order to avail the service, users must buy an ABS-CBN TVplus set-top box and activate it through ABS-CBNmobile SIM card; activation requirements for the digital channels through other mobile networks later became available around the second quarter of 2018.
Magandang Buhay is a Philippine morning talk show that premiered on April 18, 2016, and airs every Monday to Friday at 09:00 (PST). The show was originally broadcast on ABS-CBN until the network's shutdown in 2020. It is currently broadcast on Kapamilya Channel and A2Z, with delayed telecast on TV5.
Movie Central was a Philippine pay television channel created by ABS-CBN and one of the freemium channels of ABS-CBN TVplus. The channel's programming consists of mainly foreign and Hollywood movies. It was the second digital terrestrial television-exclusive movie channel after Cine Mo!, which also airs Hollywood and foreign movies in original English audio. Movie Central operated daily from 7:00 AM to 1:00 AM of the following day. It was available for a free-trial basis from July 30, 2018, to May 5, 2020, alongside O Shopping, Asianovela Channel, Jeepney TV, and Myx.
The renewal of the congressional franchise of the Philippine media network ABS-CBN to continue broadcasting was a dispute between the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte and the media conglomerate arising on the terms and conditions of the franchise renewal agreement. Amid the controversy, the Congress of the Philippines, country's legislature, was unable to renew the franchise before its expiration date. The congressional franchise expired on May 4, 2020, as the Philippines was dealing with the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the enhanced community quarantine in Luzon. The next day, exercising constitutional powers, the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) then issued a cease-and-desist order demanding ABS-CBN to cease all of its free TV and radio broadcasting immediately. ABS-CBN complied with the government order and shut down all of its radio stations and free television channels later that day. On June 30, 2020, the NTC released two alias cease-and-desist orders against ABS-CBN TV Plus and Sky Direct.
"Bawal Lumabas (The Classroom Song)" or simply "Bawal Lumabas" (transl. You can't go out) is a single by Filipina actress and recording artist Kim Chiu. The chorus of the song came from her statement during the live chat event "Laban Kapamilya" as she tried compare ABS-CBN's shutdown to classroom rules. Her comparison went confusing and incoherent instead.
A2Z is a Philippine free-to-air blocktime broadcast television network based in Quezon City, with its studios located in Ortigas Center, Pasig. It serves as a flagship property of ZOE Broadcasting Network in partnership with ABS-CBN Corporation as its main content provider through a blocktime agreement. A2Z's flagship television station is DZOE-TV which operates on channel 11, and channel 20. The network's name is an abbreviation derived from the first letter of the names of two parent companies, ABS-CBN and ZOE, and the channel number of the now-recalled frequency of the former network.
All TV is a Philippine free-to-air broadcast television network serving as the flagship property of Advanced Media Broadcasting System (AMBS) and based in Metro Manila, with its broadcast facilities and studios located at Starmall EDSA-Shaw at EDSA corner Shaw Boulevard, Mandaluyong and Starmall Las Piñas IT Hub along Alabang–Zapote Road corner CV Starr Avenue, Las Piñas; its transmitter is located at the Millennium Transmitter site, Sgt. Esguerra Ave, Diliman, Quezon City. All TV's flagship television station is DZMV-TV, which carries the VHF Channel 2 and UHF Channel 16 previously used by ABS-CBN under DWWX-TV, after its broadcast franchise lapsed in 2020. It operates on weekdays from 8:00 am to 11:15 pm PHT, and on weekends from 8:00 am to 11:00 pm PHT.
Gamaliel Asis Cordoba is a Filipino lawyer who was the longest-serving Commissioner of the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) from 2009 until 2022. He is currently the Chairperson of the Commission on Audit (COA) replacing former Solicitor General Jose Calida. His appointment was confirmed by the Commission on Appointments (CA) on November 29, 2022.