Egregious/Overreaching Ex Parte Orders for Rightsowners Keep Coming — Deckers and Richemont
[Post by Venkat Balasubramani, with comments from Eric] Deckers v. Liyanghua, 11-cv-07970 (N.D. Ill.; Dec. 15, 2011) (report and recommendation) Deckers proceeds against a slew of domain names in Illinois. The case was originally sealed, but in granting a preliminary…
Attempted Trademark Workaround to 47 USC 230 Immunity Fails Badly—Ascentive v. PissedConsumer [Catch-Up Post]
By Eric Goldman [This is one of the top dozen or so most important Internet law opinions of 2011, but unfortunately it came out just as I was going into my exam-grading exile and I had to put blogging it…
Trademark Owner Can’t Hold GoDaddy Liable for Domain Name Forwarding — Berhad v. GoDaddy
[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] Berhad v. GoDaddy, C 09-5939 PJH (N.D. Cal.; Jan. 3, 2012) Plaintiff, Petroliam Nasional Berhad (Petronas), a government owned entity, owns the Petronas Towers in Malaysia. It’s trying to enforce its trademark rights against two domain…
SOPA/PROTECT-IP/OPEN Linkwrap #2
By Eric Goldman It’s been a busy time for news related to SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act, not the Stop Online Privacy Act, although that could be an unintended result!), PROTECT-IP/PIPA, and the OPEN Act. In a bit, I’ll…
Keyword Advertiser Mostly Defeats Trademark Lawsuit–Scooter Store v. SpinLife
By Eric Goldman Scooter Store, Inc. v. SpinLife.com, LLC, 2011 WL 6415516 (S.D. Ohio Dec. 21, 2011). The Justia page. This is a spirited litigation between two retailers of wheelchairs, motorized scooters and related items. Maybe that retailing sector is…
Nov.-Dec. 2011 Quick Links, Part 2 (Extended IP Edition)
By Eric Goldman Copyright * Costco v. Omega (E.D. Cal. Nov. 9, 2011). On remand after the disappointing non-result from the Supreme Court in this case, the district court gives Costco a decisive win, holding that Omega engaged in copyright…
I’m Not a Fan of this Craptastic Trademark Lawsuit–Fancaster v. Comcast
By Eric Goldman Fancaster, Inc. v. Comcast Corp., 2011 WL 6426292 (D.N.J. Dec. 22, 2011). We’ve seen some pathetic trademark lawsuits this year (SUE MOAR KALE, anyone?), but I’ll nominate this long-running litigation money-sink (going over 3.5 years) as the…
Academic Literature Recap, Q4 2011
By Eric Goldman I’m mired in grading heck, slogging my way through 146 exams. As a result, blogging has taken a back seat. I have several key items to blog, including the UMG v. Shelter Capital and Ascentive v. Opinion…
More on Ex Parte Cutoffs of Foreign “Rogue” Domain Names
By Eric Goldman I got the following email regarding our prior three posts on ex parte cutoffs of foreign “rogue” websites in the Chanel, True Religion and Philip Morris cases (I’m republishing the email with permission): __________ All of the…
Does the House Judiciary Committee Debating SOPA Know What’s Going On In the Courts?–Philip Morris v. Jiang
[Post by Venkat Balasubramani, with comments from Eric] Philip Morris USA, Inc. v. Jiang, 11-cv-24049 (S.D. Fla.) (TRO entered on Nov. 16, 2011) (Prelim. Injunction Entered on Dec. 12, 2011) This is yet another case where a court orders broad…