Yahoo Not Civilly Liable for User-Disseminated Child Porn–Doe v. Bates
By Eric Goldman Doe v. Bates, No. 5:05CV91 (E.D. Tex. Jan. 18, 2006) Introduction The facts of this case are virtually identical to the Doe v. AOL case from the late 1990s. In this case, Yahoo provided email and web…
Anti-Spyware Coalition Workshop Recap
By Eric Goldman I attended the Anti-Spyware Coalition Public Workshop last week in Washington DC. This was a well-attended event (my guess is that 300+ people attended), with a good mix of anti-spyware vendors, anti-spyware activists, adware vendors, policy wonks/politicos…
10th Circuit Recognizes Initial Interest Confusion Doctrine–Australian Gold v. Hatfield
By Eric Goldman Australian Gold, Inc. v. Hatfield, 2005 WL 3739862 (10th Cir. Feb. 7, 2006) Following on a regressive initial interest confusion/metatags case from January, last week the 10th Circuit found initial interest confusion based on metatag usage and…
Craigslist Sued for Fair Housing Act Violation–Chicago Lawyers Committee v. Craigslist
By Eric Goldman Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Inc. v. Craigslist, Inc., Case No. 06C-0657 (N.D. Ill. complaint filed Feb. 3, 2006) Craigslist, the free online classified site, has been sued by a group of lawyers for…
Operation Site Down Fallout–19 RISCISO Participants Indicted for Warez Trading
By Eric Goldman I previously blogged on Operation Site Down, one of the largest warez busts ever. In “Operation Jolly Roger,” a component of the larger Operation Site Down, a cooperating witness gave the FBI access to the RISCISO warez…
Metatags as Per Se Trademark Infringement–Tdata v. Aircraft Technical Publishers
By Eric Goldman Good grief. Lawsuits over metatag usage are so 1999. Yet, we continue to get a steady stream of cases that treat inclusion of a competitor’s trademark in a metatag as a per se trademark infringement. I’ve explained…
Congress, Search Engines and China
By Eric Goldman OPEN LETTER TO THE MEMBERS OF THE CONGRESSIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS CAUCUS Dear Caucus members, Like you, I do not like the fact that search engines are helping China effectuate its repressive policies. However, I am confused why…
Orphan Works Report Released
By Eric Goldman The Copyright Office released its report on orphan works. It concludes: “* The orphan works problem is real. * The orphan works problem is elusive to quantify and describe comprehensively. * Some orphan works situations may be…
Allegedly Wrong VeRO Notice of Claimed Infringement Not Actionable–Dudnikov v. MGA Entertainment
By Eric Goldman Dudnikov v. MGA Entertainment, 2005 WL 3693829 (D. Colo. Aug. 17, 2005) [see the earlier Magistrate report] This one just showed up on my radar screen–not sure why it took so long to appear on Westlaw. However,…
Wasted Time as a Damage–Paglinawan v. Frey
By Eric Goldman Paglinawan v. Frey, No. 2:06-cv-00099-RSM (W.D. Wash. complaint filed Jan. 19, 2006). James Frey publishes the book “A Million Little Pieces.” It’s marketed as a non-fiction book, but some of it is actually fiction. Readers are upset…