Ripoff Report Sues Blogger, Loses on Jurisdictional Grounds–Xcentric Ventures v. Bird
By Eric Goldman Xcentric Ventures, LLC v. Bird, 2010 WL 447759 (D. Ariz. Feb. 3, 2010). See the initial complaint. I usually find personal jurisdiction rulings mind-numbingly uninteresting, so I try my best to avoid them. However, some personal jurisdiction…
Catching Up With Wikipedia
By Eric Goldman I recently posted the final published version of my article Wikipedia’s Labor Squeeze and its Consequences. In the course of updating the draft, I reviewed the news coverage of Wikipedia from the second half of 2009, and…
Third Circuit Schizophrenia Over Student Discipline for Fake MySpace Profiles
By Eric Goldman J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District, 2010 WL 376186 (3rd Cir. Feb. 4, 2010) Layshock v. Hermitage School District, 2010 WL 376184 (3rd Cir. Feb. 4, 2010) Now that I’m a middle-aged man, I don’t find fake…
FTC Privacy Roundtable Recap
By Eric Goldman [Introductory note: I have repeatedly criticized the FTC on this blog, and this post may implicitly criticize them as well. At the same time, I want to share a couple of compliments for the FTC. First, the…
Google Street View Lawsuit Revived, But Only on Trespass Grounds–Boring v. Google
By Eric Goldman Boring v. Google Inc., 2010 WL 318281 (3rd Cir. Jan. 28, 2010). You may recall the book project A Day in the Life of America [Amazon affiliates link], which published what 200 photojournalists saw on May 2,…
January 2010 Quick Links
By Eric Goldman Copyright * An English translation of Google’s December loss in France on a Google Book Search lawsuit. * Ed Felten reports on a survey of files available via BitTorrent. Acknowledging some methodological limits, he estimates ~99% were…
Terri Chen Replaces Rose Hagan as Google’s Chief Trademark Counsel
By Eric Goldman I previously mentioned that Rose Hagan, Google’s longtime chief trademark counsel, was retiring. (Her last day was Wednesday). Rose’s next ventures include art and jewelry. Terri Yun-Lin Chen, a current trademark counsel at Google, has taken over…
Utah May Repeal Its Spyware Control Act–SB 26
By Eric Goldman It’s that time of year again. The Utah legislature is back in session and cooking up new schemes to regulate the Internet. So far I only see one Internet-specific bill in queue, SB 26. Surprisingly, it does…
Facebook User Agreement Upheld in Copyright Infringement Lawsuit Over Third Party App–Miller v. Facebook
By Eric Goldman Miller v. Facebook, Inc., 1:2009cv02810 (N.D. Ga. Jan. 15, 2010). Miller’s complaint filed in October 2009. Miller makes the Adobe Flash videogame “Boomshine.” He alleges that defendant Yeo published a Facebook app, ChainRxn, that violates Miller’s “look…
Google and China: Some General Thoughts
By Eric Goldman I have deferred blogging on the Google/China imbroglio for a few reasons. First, heavyweights such as Jonathan Zittrain have tracked International online censorship and online security issues more closely than I have. Second, after Google’s provocative blog…