Teenager Busted for Creating Fake “News” Story
By Eric Goldman It seems like every day there are new stories about teenagers doing stupid things online, but this story still struck me as interesting and unusual. The incident involves a website, Cheezus.com, that asks the user to submit…
Edina Realty v. TheMLSOnline Settles
By Eric Goldman The Edina Realty v. TheMLSOnline case, which held (among other things) that purchasing a trademarked keyword was a trademark use in commerce, has reportedly settled, according to the Associated Press. That leaves in place the conflict between…
Cynical Consumers and Brand Antipathy
By Eric Goldman Interesting article in the NYT about negative consumer attitudes towards brands. The article says that “cynical consumers [desire] not simply to avoid companies and brands they dislike but also to punish them.” Thus, consumers may use their…
KinderStart v. Google Motions to Dismiss and Strike
By Eric Goldman KinderStart.com LLC v. Google, Inc., No. C 06-2057 RS (N.D. Cal. motions to dismiss and strike filed May 2, 2006) You may recall the pending lawsuit by KinderStart against Google for Google’s downgrade of KinderStart’s PageRank. My…
Quick Links May 2006
By Eric Goldman My blogging queue has gotten too thick. Here’s some items that caught my attention that I’ve been meaning to blog and simply haven’t gotten to. * I previously blogged about Chris Wilson, the website operator who allowed…
Ebates Sued for Trespass to Chattels–Sotelo v. Ebates
By Eric Goldman Sotelo v. Ebates Shopping.com, No. 06C-2531 (N.D. Ill. complaint filed May 5, 2006) The Collins Law Firm has filed a third class action lawsuit over adware, this time targeting Ebate’s Moe Money Maker client software. The complaint…
Yahoo “Syndication Fraud” Lawsuits–Crafts by Veronica v. Yahoo and Draucker Development v. Yahoo
By Eric Goldman Crafts by Veronica v. Yahoo, Inc., No. 2:06-cv-01985-JCL-MF (D. N.J. complaint filed May 1, 2006) Draucker Development v. Yahoo, Inc., No. CV06-2737 (C.D. Cal. complaint filed May 4, 2006) Two companion lawsuits against Yahoo for what the…
Piracy Loss Estimates as a Managed Number
By Eric Goldman I’ve long had doubts about the estimates of copyright owners’ losses due to piracy. Typically these studies use suspect methodologies, are based on privately-reported data that cannot be independently verified, and overcount losses by ignoring the demand…
Google Sued for Child Porn–Toback v. Google
By Eric Goldman Toback v. Google, Inc., No. 06-007246 (NY Sup. Ct. complaint filed May 4, 2006) Yet another legislator has seized the public microphone to grandstand about Internet threats. This time the lucky legislator is Jeffrey Toback, a member…
North Carolina Blogging Conference Recap
By Eric Goldman Sorry to post yet another conference recap on blog law, but it’s been a busy conference season, and everyone wants to talk about blogs! I previously blogged on my presentation at the University of North Carolina’s conference…