The Embroidery Software Protection Coalition (ESPC) was a United States embroidery industry

trade group A trade association, also known as an industry trade group, business association, sector association or industry body, is an organization founded and funded by businesses that operate in a specific industry. An industry trade association partic ...

. Its primary activity was the investigation and prosecution of alleged acts of

copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the copyright holder, s ...

. The group drew media attention for its campaign of settlement demands against individual buyers as well as sellers of embroidery patterns and software. It drew further attention with a 2006 defamation suit against two individual Internet critics, in which it attempted to subpoena the identities of every subscriber of the critics' electronic mailing list.

eBay buyer infringement claims

On August 3, 2005, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas approved the dismissal of a lawsuit brought by the ESPC and ESPC member companies against

eBay eBay Inc. ( ) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that facilitates consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales through its website. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 and became ...

and

PayPal PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system in the majority of countries that support online money transfers, and serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper ...

, pursuant to a stipulation agreement between the parties. On September 6, 2005,

WNDU-TV WNDU-TV (channel 16) is a television station in South Bend, Indiana, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is owned by Gray Television alongside Elkhart-licensed Heroes & Icons affiliate WSJV (channel 28). Both stations share studios on the c ...

reported that the ESPC was mailing settlement demands to individual eBay buyers. According to one such demand letter, dated October 17, 2005, the buyers were identified by personal records provided by eBay and eBay sellers. The October 17 letter further claimed that buyers, by purchasing and possessing unlicensed copies of embroidery software or patterns, had violated United States copyright law. "By purchasing the counterfeit goods, they're encouraging the pirates to stay out there and put the legitimate businesses out of business," said Carole Faulkner, attorney for the ESPC, in the September 6 WNDU-TV report. A

University of Notre Dame The University of Notre Dame du Lac, known simply as Notre Dame ( ) or ND, is a private Catholic university, Catholic research university in Notre Dame, Indiana, outside the city of South Bend, Indiana, South Bend. French priest Edward Sorin fo ...

law professor disagreed, telling WNDU-TV "copyright laws make it illegal to distribute copies, not buy them".

Defamation suit

As of April 28, 2006, the ESPC claimed to represent seven United States embroidery publishers and distributors. The legitimacy of the ESPC was disputed by critics, who suggested that the ESPC was associated with only one publisher, Great Notions Embroidery Designs. On June 28, 2006, the ESPC responded to two such critics, against whom the ESPC had previously filed copyright infringement lawsuits, by filing a new lawsuit. In the new lawsuit, the ESPC alleged defamation,

intentional infliction of emotional distress Intentional infliction of emotional distress (IIED; sometimes called the tort of outrage) is a common law tort that allows individuals to recover for severe emotional distress caused by another individual who intentionally or recklessly inflicted ...

conspiracy A conspiracy, also known as a plot, is a secret plan or agreement between persons (called conspirers or conspirators) for an unlawful or harmful purpose, such as murder or treason, especially with political motivation, while keeping their agre ...

, business disparagement, and

tortious interference Tortious interference, also known as intentional interference with contractual relations, in the common law of torts, occurs when one person intentionally damages someone else's contractual or business relationships with a third party, causing e ...

. The ESPC subsequently petitioned for a subpoena seeking the identities of every subscriber to the two critics' Internet mailing list. In September 2006, after the Electronic Frontier Foundation intervened on behalf of the anonymous targets of the subpoena, the subpoena was withdrawn. The referenced critics have, since February 2006, entered an out-of-court settlement with ESPC. Prior out-of-court settlements show that the alleged infringers handed over lists of buyers and individuals to whom the machine embroidery designs were sent.

References

{{embroidery Embroidery in the United States Arts and media trade groups