Issue No. 068 · Story 02 · October 24, 2026

Apple Keeps Servant Jury Verdict

Apple and the other defendants prevailed on October 22 at the Ninth Circuit in Francesca Gregorini's copyright appeal over Servant. Gregorini alleged the show's first three episodes were substantially similar to her film The Truth About Emanuel. The panel affirmed the jury's verdict for the defendants.

§Gregorini argued the access instruction in her case against Apple, M. Night Shyamalan and others should have defined widely disseminated.
§The panel held the model instruction correctly stated the law and found no error in accepting the verdict without answering the jury's question.
§The panel made no separate determination on whether Servant copied the film, leaving the jury's verdict for the defendants in place.

THE TAKEAWAY

Access can be shown through a chain of events or wide dissemination. The appeal turned on whether jurors needed a definition of how widely a work must circulate.

Filing: ESCA Filings

Same issue

Eminem's Former Employee Strange Pleads Guilty to Copyright Charge

Eminem's former employee Joseph Strange pleaded guilty to criminal copyright infringement on October 22 in federal court in the Eastern District of Michigan. The Justice Department says he copied and sold unreleased music for about $50,000 without authorization. The court has not decided whether to accept the plea agreement, and no sentence has been imposed.

Reservoir Sues Anthropic Over Song Lyrics

Reservoir Media Management and two other music publishers sued Anthropic on October 21 in federal court in the Northern District of California. They allege Anthropic copied the lyrics of 853 compositions to train its AI model without a license or payment. Anthropic has not responded in court, and no court has decided the claims.

USPTO Refuses Anthropic's CLAUDE MYTHOS Registration for Now

The USPTO issued a nonfinal refusal of Anthropic's application to register CLAUDE MYTHOS for AI software services on October 20. The examiner found a likelihood of confusion with a MYTHOS registration for software services involving searchable databases and customizable surveys. Anthropic has three months to respond.

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