How Many Times Must the Courts Say “No” to This Guy?–Fyk v. Facebook

In 2018, Jason Fyk sued Facebook for removing and blocking his content. My previous summary of this litigation campaign:

His lawsuit against Facebook was dashed by Section 230 in the district court. The Ninth Circuit quickly agreed and then denied his en banc request. The Supreme Court denied cert. Thereafter, he tried to vacate the district court decision, which triggered a new cycle of rejection by the district court, the 9th Circuit, and the Supreme Court.

Having exhausted his arguments in court twice, he launched a third expedition against Section 230. He sued the government to declare Section 230 unconstitutional. The judge’s response might be characterized as: WTF = What The Fyk?

I assume the 230 constitutionality challenge is on appeal in DC. Meanwhile, his Sisyphean attempt to reopen the California case fails again in the Ninth Circuit.

Fyk argued that the law regarding anticompetitive animus had changed during his 6-year-long litigation quest, citing the Enigma v. Malwarebytes and Lemmon v. Snap decisions. However, the Ninth Circuit previously rejected the implications of Malwarebytes for Fyk’s case in its last ruling, and “Lemmon says nothing about whether Section 230(c)(1) shields social-media providers for content-moderation decisions made with anticompetitive animus.” Without any change in the relevant law, the court easily dismisses the case again. Remarkably, the court doesn’t impose any sanctions for what some courts might have felt was vexatious relitigation of resolved matters.

Will this be the last time a court says “no” to Fyk’s attempt to relitigate the case that courts have repeatedly terminated? As the Magic-8-Ball might say, “very doubtful.”

Case Citation: Fyk v. Facebook, Inc., 2024 WL 5074905 (9th Cir. Dec. 11, 2024). The CourtListener page.