Hard Drive Prods., Inc. v. Does 1-55, No. 11 C 2798, Slip Op. (N.D. Ill. Oct. 21, 2011) (Darrah, J.).

Judge Darrah granted in part Does defendant’s Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss plaintiff Hard Drive Production’s (“HDP”) complaint accusing Does of infringing HDP’s copyrighted video via BitTorrent. While HDP had not received its copyrights registration, it was sufficient for HDP’s claim in the Seventh Circuit that HDP sought registration before filing suit.

The Court did, however, dismiss HDP’s civil conspiracy claim, without prejudice to replead, for failure to plead agreement between the Does to infringe. Finally, HDP’s claims that the Does infringed HDP’s copyright via BitTorrent were sufficient to satisfy the Fed. R. Civ. P. 20(c)(2) joinder standard. The Court noted that its joinder holding was consistent with other Northern District of Illinois decisions, although the Northern District of California held that the allegations did not meet the joinder requirements.