Perfect 10, Inc. v. Google, Inc.

In this appeal, we once again consider a request by Perfect 10, Inc. for a preliminary injunction against Google, Inc. See Perfect 10, Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc. (Perfect 10 II), 508 F.3d 1146 (9th Cir.2007). Because Perfect 10 has not demonstrated that it would likely suffer irreparable harm in the absence of a preliminary injunction, we affirm the district court’s denial of that relief.

I

This appeal is the latest installment in a legal saga of several years’ duration. That history is recounted elsewhere, see Perfect 10 II, 508 F.3d 1146 , so we focus here on only those facts material to the questions before us now. Perfect 10 creates (and copyrights) photographic images of nude models for commercial distribution. For several years, it featured them in a now- defunct magazine, “PERFECT 10”; more recently, it began offering them for viewing on a password-protected, paid-subscription website, “perfectlO.com.” Perfect 10’s subscription website generates revenue from subscribers who pay a monthly fee to view the copyrighted images in a “members’ area,” which members access through a unique username/password combination. Perfect 10 v. Google, Inc. (Perfect 10 I), 416…