Comments on: The Ninth Circuit’s Broad (and Wrong) Standards for Conversion–Taylor v. Google (Guest Blog Post) https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2024/03/the-ninth-circuits-broad-and-wrong-standards-for-conversion-taylor-v-google-guest-blog-post.htm Fri, 15 Mar 2024 01:23:00 +0000 hourly 1 By: Bob https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2024/03/the-ninth-circuits-broad-and-wrong-standards-for-conversion-taylor-v-google-guest-blog-post.htm#comment-4182 Fri, 15 Mar 2024 01:23:00 +0000 https://blog.ericgoldman.org/?p=26194#comment-4182 This whole thing seems bizarre. One of the century-old cases cited for the utility comparison concerns license to use a limited resource being effectively transferred from one party to another by the defendant, where the allegedly senior licensee had never agreed to such a transfer. It bears some similarity to Kremen, but not to this case. Google isn’t transferring the plaintiff’s rights to any other party, and the illegitimate use argument is based on a fantasy that user data has no relevance to google’s services.

The other case concerns a lawsuit against a power utility for beach of contract. The court agreed to treat “power” as personal property that had been purchased, then never delivered. While I can see potential relevance in the expansive definition of personal property, the plaintiff only claimed damages arising from the breach of contract.

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