Ninth Circuit Reminds Businesses: “Clickwrap or It’s Crap”
The Ninth Circuit struck down two more TOS formations this week. In both cases, the panels applied exacting standards when reviewing the screens. You’ve been warned about this risk (many times). Morrison v. Yippee Entertainment, Inc., No. 25-7161 (9th Cir….
It’s Hard to Win a Schedule A Case Without Filing the “Schedule A”–Speedy Simulator v. Schedule A Defendants
Hanlon’s razor says, “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by [incompetence].” (Consistent with a standard substitution, I’ve replaced “stupidity” with “incompetence”). This adage is constantly on my mind when I read SAD Scheme opinions. On the one…
Spam-Filtered Email Service Unwinds a $13M Default Judgment–Imagination Products v. Omont
Imagination Products has a supplemental trademark registration in the color orange (Pantone Orange 021c) for hand-operated plumbing snakes. It claims that several defendants, including Omont, sell drain clog cleaning tools that violate its trade dress in the orange shade. This…
Judge Barker (E.D. Tex.) Disassembles Two SAD Scheme Cases
Judge J. Campbell Barker (E.D. Tex.) issued two rulings involving SAD Scheme patent cases last week. The cases are: Shangyou Jiayi Lighting Product Co., Ltd. v. Schedule A Defendants, 2026 WL 2948520 (E.D. Tex. Sept. 30, 2026) and Haiying Liu …
Court Wipes Out SAD Scheme Default Judgment Due to Improper Email Service–Deckers v. Litfun
Deckers owns the UGG brand. It is a repeat SAD Scheme plaintiff. In this case, it sued 30 defendants for infringement, got permission to serve the lawsuit by email, and got default judgments against 18 defendants. One of those defendants,…
Uber Guests Aren’t Bound By Uber’s TOS–Walker v. Uber
A section from my Internet Law casebook’s chapter on online contracts is titled: “Uber’s TOS Formation Madness. An entire chapter could be dedicated solely to Uber’s TOS dramas!” Here’s another dramatic entry in the annals of Uber’s TOS history. The…
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…
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?”…