Utah Amends Spyware Control Act
Last week, the Utah governor signed HB 104, the amendment to Utah’s Spyware Control Act. The amendment is, in fact, a nearly complete rewrite of the prior law. I blogged on the proposed law last month, and since then further…
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…
Batzel v. Smith Dismissal
Politech reports that Batzel v. Smith has been dismissed for procedural reasons. See multi-page TIFF here (I had problems viewing this with my browser–if anyone has a cleaner version, please advise). UPDATE: Evan Brown of InternetCases.com converted the TIFF to…
New 47 USC 230 case–Roskowski v. Corvallis Police Officers’ Association
Roskowski v. Corvallis Police Officers’ Association, 2005 WL 555398 (D. Ore. Mar. 9, 2005). Messy disputes between the former Corvallis Chief of Police and the police officer’s association. The Association set up a website to disseminate its gripes with the…
Copy of Marvel v. NCSoft Ruling
CE Petit has posted a copy of the court’s March 9 opinion in Marvel Enterprises v. NCSoft Corporation (CV 04-9253-RGK). The opinion is rather unremarkable—mostly it deals with motions to dismiss, so the standard for upholding the pleadings is pretty…
Ruling in Marvel v. NCSoft
NCSoft has won some favorable rulings in its lawsuit with Marvel. Marvel sued NCSoft because users could use NCSoft’s software in its City of Heroes MMORPG to generate characters that looked like Marvel characters. From the news/press reports, it appears…
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…
More Amicus Briefs in MGM v. Grokster
Yesterday was the deadline for respondents’ briefs in MGM v. Grokster. So far, EFF’s website shows 18 amicus briefs filed in the case on respondents’ side, making for a total of 46 amicus briefs. I joined the brief drafted by…
Copyright Case on Photos and Descriptions
SMC Promotions, Inc. v. SMC Promotions, 2005 WL 292492 (C.D. Cal. Feb. 7, 2005). Plaintiff is a product distributor that relies on affiliate marketing. Plaintiff grants a copyright license to affiliates to use catalog photos and descriptions on the affiliates’…
Pornmeister Liable for Affiliate’s Spam
A settlement involving Sobonito Investments, a Cyprus pornmeister that used an affiliate marketing scheme to generate traffic. The affiliates engaged in bad email practices, and the advertiser was put on the hook. This situation is clearly covered by CAN-SPAM but…