The European Union’s Digital Services Act: In Force from This Saturday, February 17, 2024, Including for U.S. Intermediaries (Guest Blog Post)
by guest blogger Prof. Marketa Trimble [Eric’s introductory note: I briefly addressed the DSA in this blog post, along with the attached meme. Otherwise, I generally try to avoid the DSA because it is so long, complicated, and mind-bending. To…
Boat Rental Marketplace Defeats Lawsuit Over Offline Boating Accident–In re Chaves
A rare case analyzing Section 230’s intersection with admiralty law. 🚢 The case involves GetMyBoat, an online marketplace for boat rentals. Listings are free, but GetMyBoat takes a cut of any booked transactions. A young woman, Lindsey Faith Partridge, used…
Fourth Circuit Issues a Bummer Fair Use Ruling–Philpot v. IJR
Larry Philpot is a repeat copyright plaintiff. We’ve blogged some of his cases before (1, 2), including the lower court ruling in this case. In 2016, the defendant IJR published an article/listicle titled “15 Signs Your Daddy Was a Conservative.”…
Retweeting as Copyright Infringement–Prepared Food Photos v. Chicken Joe’s
The issue is, what is (the copyright implication of retweeting a photo of) chicken? (head nod to Judge Friendly). * * * The plaintiff allegedly licenses a photo database to grocery stores for $12k/yr. The case involves one of those…
YouTube Still Isn’t a State Actor–Albertson v. Google
This year, the Supreme Court is expected to issue an opinion on jawboning and its implications for when Internet services may become state actors because of such government pressure. Until then, plaintiffs will keep losing lawsuits that claim Internet services…
Online Marketplace Defeats Lawsuit Over Murder–Roland v. Letgo
I previously summarized this case: This is a tragic case involving the marketplace app Letgo. Using an alias, Brown listed a stolen car for sale on the app. The Rolands agreed to meet Brown in person to buy the car….
Think You Understand Online Trespass to Chattels Law? Think Again–In re Meta Healthcare Pixels
This is one of the many pending “Pixel” cases. If you don’t recall, a “pixel” is a 1×1-pixel image file that is imperceptible to web visitors. A website adds code to its web page that summons the pixel from a…