Ripoff Report Gets a Pricey Lesson on Section 230–Selker v. Xcentric
I’ve blogged many Ripoff Report cases over the years, but it’s been a while since my last one (looks like 2018?). In this case, the plaintiff alleges that someone posted a false attack review; he paid Ripoff Report $2,500 to…
Form “Non-Disparagement” Clause Violated Consumer Review Fairness Act–State v. Ideal Horizon Benefits
In 2016, Congress enacted the Consumer Review Fairness Act (CRFA), which bans businesses from trying to contractually restrict their customers’ reviews. It represents a rare federal intervention into contract law, and it does so for good reasons–to reduce the ability…
Why I Think California’s Age-Appropriate Design Code (AADC) Is Unconstitutional
I’ve repeatedly expressed my opposition to the California Age-Appropriate Design Code (AADC), and now I’ve put my opposition into more formal terms for a judge. With the pro bono assistance of Jenner & Block, I filed an amicus brief in…
Debrief on the Taamneh v. Twitter Oral Arguments
My observations about the Supreme Court’s 2.5 hour long (and very tedious) oral arguments in the Taamneh v. Twitter case: The justices struggled to define the statute’s actus reus (did Twitter take a culpable action?) and mens rea (did Twitter…
Quick Debrief on the Gonzalez v. Google Oral Arguments
I’m going to crank this blog post out before I get swamped with press requests. My takeaways: I did not hear 5 votes in favor of the plaintiffs’ position. Indeed, the justices didn’t really engage with the plaintiffs’ core arguments…
Preparing for the Supreme Court’s Gonzalez v. Google Oral Arguments
Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the Gonzalez v. Google case. I am NOT looking forward to this at all. First, I expect the arguments will go poorly for free speech and the Internet’s status quo. It’ll…
Musk’s Changes at Twitter Moot Lawsuit Over Naomi Wolf’s Deplatforming–Trump v. Twitter
Wikipedia says: “During the COVID-19 pandemic, [Naomi] Wolf has frequently promoted COVID-19 misinformation, misinformation related to vaccination and 5G conspiracy theories.” Twitter banned her account as part of its COVID misinformation crackdown. Wolf then joined Trump’s “deplatforming” lawsuit against Twitter,…
New York’s Mandatory Editorial Transparency Law Preliminarily Enjoined–Volokh v. James
Last year, as part of the first wave of censorial mandatory editorial transparency laws, New York enacted N.Y. Gen. Bus. Law ยง 394-ccc. The “has two main requirements: (1) a mechanism for social media users to file complaints about instances…
A Preliminary Analysis of Trump’s Copyright Lawsuit Over Interview Recordings (Trump v. Simon & Schuster) (Guest Blog Post)
By Guest Blogger Tyler Ochoa [Eric’s note: Prof. Ochoa calls this a “preliminary” analysis, but that doesn’t mean it’s short!] Two weeks ago, former President Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against journalist Bob Woodward and his publisher, Simon & Schuster…
Snapchat Defeats Lawsuit Over User-to-User Harassment–Ziencik v. Snap
[I’m backlogged on several 230 cases. I’ll get to them eventually] This case involves two Snapchat users who repeatedly received threatening messages from other Snapchat users despite the victims’ efforts to block the perpetrators. A victim flagged messages for Snapchat,…