The "Maariv" Hebrew daily is asking the Jerusalem District Court to deny the "Israel Hayom" Hebrew daily, owned by Sheldon Adelson, access to the former's digital pictures archive, and to restrict the latter to use of the nrg archive only.
"Maariv" submitted this request in a case that the two sides have been pursuing for over a year. "Israel Hayom," which purchased the nrg archive, is seeking to continue its use of "Maariv's" entire digital archive, claiming that it purchased access to "all of 'Maariv's' digital assets," including the digital archives, even though these were used in "Maariv's" printed edition.
The "Jerusalem Post" Group, which acquired the printed "Maariv" newspaper, asserts that the sale agreement for the liquidated newspaper allows "Israel Hayom" to use only the digital archive of the website it acquired. According to the "Jerusalem Post," "Maariv's" complete archive contains four million pictures, of which nrg has used only 200,000 - those found in the nrg archive. The dispute about the archive was not solved during the sale of "Maariv's" assets when it was liquidated. After the trustee failed to achieve agreement between the parties, he referred them to the court. As of now, the archive is still in the hands of the trustee.
"The fact that 'Israel Hayom' acquired the archive used for the nrg website since the website was founded, and not the 'Maariv' archive, is clearly shown by the wording of the separate agreement signed with it, in which it is written that item sold also includes an archive," a document submitted to the court states. "Maariv" is also demanding that the nrg pictures not be used in the printed editions of "Israel Hayom" and "Makor Rishon."
According to "Maariv" management, "Israel Hayom" claimed that there was only one digital archive. Actually, however, it is asserted that there are two separate digital archives: one for "Maariv" and one for nrg. "According to the work procedures in the companies before they collapsed, every picture reaching the editors designed for use on the nrg website was immediately saved in the nrg archive, so that all the pictures that appeared on the website or designated for it are kept in the nrg archives," the summary to the court said.
"Maariv" is also demanding that nrg send a push message to all the users of its cellular application declaring that the website is no longer connected to "Maariv," and add a banner with this declaration on the application for three months. The claim is that the website continues to use the "nrg Maariv" combination on various pages on the website and in the website's operating code.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 5, 2014
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