UK’s New Defamation Law May Accelerate the Death of Anonymous User-Generated Content Internationally (Forbes Cross-Post)
By Eric Goldman Historically, United Kingdom defamation law has been victim-favorable. In an effort to modernize its defamation law, the UK Parliament recently enacted the Defamation Act 2013 (royal assent was given on April 25). The act generally makes it harder for…
Perfect 10 Gets a Surprising Partial Sumary Judgment in 512 Case–Perfect 10 v. Yandex
By Eric Goldman Perfect 10, Inc. v. Yandex N.V., 2013 WL 1899851 (N.D.Cal. May 7, 2013) Few names strike as much fear–and derision–among Internet lawyers as Perfect 10. Perhaps the quintessential Internet Law plaintiff of the 2000s decade, Perfect 10…
Copyright Trolling Is Really Hard to Do Profitably–Righthaven v. Hoehn
By Eric Goldman Righthaven LLC v. Hoehn, 2013 WL 1908876 (9th Cir. May 9, 2013) It’s been a rough week for copyright trolls. First, Judge Wright destroyed the Prenda Law enterprise in a sanction-filled opinion. Second, today the Ninth Circuit…
Suing Like It’s 2009: Parts.com Sues Google and Yahoo for Keyword Advertising
By Eric Goldman Parts.com v. Google, 3:13-cv-01074-JLS-WMC (S.D. Cal. complaint filed May 6, 2013); and Parts.com v. Yahoo, 3:13-cv-01078-AJB-JMA (S.D. Cal. complaint filed May 6, 2013) _____ In the immediate wake of the Second Circuit’s Rescuecom ruling in 2009, about…
Assessing Winners and Losers in Google’s Worldwide Antitrust Battles (Forbes Cross-Post)
By Eric Goldman Recently, the European Commission announced details of a proposed antitrust settlement with Google (the full commitments). Google’s competitors now have the opportunity to publicly whine about the deal as part of the “market testing” procedural step. I doubt…
More Evidence That Congress Misaligned the DMCA Online Copyright Safe Harbors–UMG v. Grooveshark (Forbes Cross-Post)
By Eric Goldman UMG Recordings, Inc. v. Escape Media Group, Inc., 2013 WL 1729431 (N.Y. App. Div. April 23, 2013) Grooveshark runs a user-generated content (UGC) website that allows users to upload sound recordings and other users to stream those…
Differences Between Consumer Surveys for Trademark Cases and False Advertising Cases
By Eric Goldman In February, I spoke about the differences between consumer surveys in trademark cases compared with false advertising cases. My talk notes: Overall, the similarities between consumer survey in the two types of cases outweigh the differences. So…
You Shouldn’t Need a Copyright Lawyer to Pick a Dentist–Lee v. Makhnevich (Forbes Cross-Post)
By Eric Goldman In October 2010, Robert Lee needed a dentist, pronto. He didn’t realize he needed a copyright lawyer to help him pick a dentist. In search of urgent pain relief, Lee contacted Dr. Stacy Makhnevich (a preferred provider…
Talk Slides on Section 230, Anti-SLAPP Laws and Housing Anti-Discrimination
By Eric Goldman On Friday I presented at the California State Bar’s Fifth Annual Fair Housing and Public Accommodations Symposium. My topic was to discuss how Roommates.com, Section 230 and anti-SLAPP laws restrict the ability of housing anti-discrimination to sue…
Viacom Loses Again–Viacom v. YouTube
By Eric Goldman Viacom International Inc. v. YouTube Inc., 2013 WL 1689071 (S.D.N.Y April 18, 2013) Persistence is a virtue, but stubbornness is a sin. I’m pretty sure Viacom has sinned a lot in its six years of litigation against…