[4][5] Although its strategy was successful at first, it was undone in 2011 when several judges held that, since Righthaven didn't actually own the copyrights, it had no standing to sue for infringement.
[11][12] Typically, Righthaven has demanded $75,000 and surrender of the domain name from each alleged infringer, but accepted out of court settlements of several thousand dollars per defendant.
[14] Kurt Opsahl, an EFF attorney, said, "Despite what Righthaven claims, it's hard to interpret these lawsuits as anything else besides a way to bully Internet users into paying unnecessary settlements.
[3] In December 2010, Righthaven began to sue website operators over republished graphics and photographs, and also expanded its scope to material originally published by the Denver Post and other newspapers.
[19] On August 15, 2011, after losing a case handled by Marc Randazza Righthaven was ordered to pay $34,045.50 in attorney's fees and court costs in its unsuccessful lawsuit against Wayne Hoehn.
Federal judge Philip Pro found that Righthaven had no standing to sue, and in any case Hoehn's posting was protected by fair use.
[20][25][26] On November 1, 2011, Pro authorized the US Marshals Service to use reasonable force to seize $63,000 in cash and assets from Righthaven in order to pay Hoehn's legal fees.
[27] When it was discovered that the company bank account held less than $1,000, the court issued an order for Righthaven to turn over its intellectual property to a court-appointed receiver to be sold at auction.
[31] On January 6, 2012, the righthaven.com domain name sold for $3,300 to a Switzerland-based hosting service with the stated goal of protecting clients against "frivolous or overly aggressive take-down tactics".
As stated by the receiver, "...Righthaven’s rights acquired from Stephens Media were sold back to their original source in a commercially reasonable manner, as no other market existed for them.