Problems with Congress’ Latest Anti-Porn Law
Congress’ latest anti-porn attack is codified in 18 U.S.C. 2257. a law which requires anyone producing or distributing pornography to engage in some costly and logistically-difficulty verifications and record-keeping. Kurt Opsahl at EFF explains how this law affects more than…
EFF’s Legal Guide for Bloggers
The EFF has released the wonderful resource “Legal Guide for Bloggers.” It successfully strikes a delicate balance between being comprehensive, accurate and accessible to lay readers. If you’re wondering about the law of blogging, this guide will most likely answer…
Groups Sue to Strike Down Utah’s Anti-Internet Porn Law
King’s English, Inc. v. Shurtleff (D. Utah complaint filed June 9, 2005). As expected, the ACLU is leading a charge against Utah for their latest anti-porn initiative (HB 260). The AP story. Declan’s News.com story. I have already predicted that…
Web Gambling Advertising Suit Against Search Engines Allowed to Proceed
By John Ottaviani Business Wire is reporting that Judge Richard Kramer of the San Francisco County Superior Court has denied a motion to dismiss certain of the allegations in a class action lawsuit filed last summer against Google, Yahoo! and…
Supreme Court on Interstate Shipment of Wine–Granholm v. Heald
Granholm v. Heald, 544 U.S. __ (May 16, 2005). The US Supreme Court, in a 5-4 vote, has declared that states cannot discriminate between out-of-state wineries and in-state wineries in allowing direct-to-consumer sales. Such discrimination violates the dormant commerce clause….
ACLU Considering Challenge to Utah Anti-Internet Porn Law
The ACLU of Utah is considering a constitutional challenge against Utah’s most-recent anti-Internet porn law. Despite Rep. Dougall’s defensiveness, this law is almost certainly unconstitutional, and I’m confident that it will be struck down when scrutinized by the courts. We…
Utah Governor Signs HB 260
Not a surprise, but today the Utah governor signed HB 260, the ridiculous Internet service provider-as-filterer law. See my earlier critique (I think there are other objectionable aspects of the bill; I tried to control myself). Anyone want to make…
Another Dumb Utah Law
The Utah Legislature is at it again. (See my critique of their efforts to regulate spyware/provide some extra bucks for a few local companies at the expense of free competition). The Utah legislature has passed another sloppy and ill-conceived law…