TWEET and the Bird Logo Apparently Enter the Public Domain, But X Maintains Its Grip on the TWITTER Mark (For Now)--X v. Project Bluebird

This case involves Project Bluebird, a social media service previously named “twitter.new” and renamed to tweet.app immediately after this ruling (for reasons this post makes obvious). Project Bluebird’s service is designed to reimagine the Twitter service that Musk imploded when…

SAD Scheme Plaintiff Must Pay $40k to Defendant--Guangzhou Tinpod v. Schedule A Defendants

The plaintiff is Guangzhou Tinpod Electronic Technology Co. The plaintiff initially sued under the XYZ pseudonym and hasn’t updated the case caption, even though its identity is no longer sealed. I presume the plaintiff and many of the 44 defendants…

Courts Still Can't Let Go of the Possibility that Individual Prices are Copyrightable--Rapaport v. Nivoda

In my previous blog post on this case, I wrote: This lawsuit raises one of the venerable but surprisingly vexing copyright law questions: when is a price copyrightable? That might sound like a stupid question because “facts” aren’t copyrightable and…

New York Judge Shuts Down a SAD Scheme TRO Request--CJB Global v. Schedule A Defendants

This SAD Scheme case ended up before Judge Buchwald, who shreds it. Judge Buchwald recaps the scheme’s fundamental corruptness: if all of plaintiff’s requested ex parte relief were to be granted, plaintiff would at the outset be entitled to broad…

Collaborators Using the 'Instagram Collabs' Feature May Forego a Section 230 Defense--Winer v. Mohammed

[I have so many Section 230 cases backlogged in my blogging queue, but this one is jumping the queue because of its comparative novelty.] This is a defamation case between a professor and a student in the Emory School of…

Lawyer's Fee Agreement Gagging Client Reviews Is Illegal--LS Carlson Law v. Sedgwick

Katie Sedgwick is a former client of LS Carlson Law. It sounds like she didn’t love working with them. She negatively reviewed the firm on Yelp. I had difficulty finding the original review. In response, the firm sued her for…

A 512(f) Case Survived a Motion to Dismiss. Guess What Happened Next--Channel 781 v. WCAC

The court describes the case: Plaintiff Channel 781 News (“Channel 781”) is a YouTube-based news outlet focusing on local affairs in Waltham, Massachusetts. Channel 781 posted clips from Waltham municipal government meetings that it believed to be newsworthy. Channel 781…

Grok's TOS Formation Failed--Skaggs v. X.ai

This case naturally raises some questions that Musk might choose to pose to Grok, like: “Grok, is it bad when TOS formation fails?” “Grok, what are best practices for TOS formation and does our current TOS formation process satisfy those?”…

Every SAD Scheme Opinion Is Weird In Its Own Way--Cai v. Chaozhoushi Yitong Dianzi Shangwu Youxiangongsi

This case generally follows the SAD Scheme template, but with several twists: it’s in the Western District of Texas, not the more typical N.D. Ill. it’s a copyright claim rather than the more typical trademark claim it’s against a single…

LinkedIn's Insight Tag Creates Legal Entanglements--Doe v. LinkedIn

This opinion is an offshoot of the multitudinous Meta Pixel cases. LinkedIn offered its own tracking technology called the Insight Tag. Prior blog post. In this case, two healthcare entities, Covered California and Nevada Health Link, installed the Insight Tag,…