Internet Access Provider Gets Another Devastating Result in a Secondary Copyright Infringement Case—Sony v. Cox
In a recent post, I lamented how courts are exposing IAPs to secondary copyright liability for their subscribers’ activities. This is the result of a breakdown in the détente associated with the failed Copyright Alert System, and its demise has…
Eric Goldman’s Comments to the California DOJ Draft Regulations for the Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) (Part 3 of 3)
[Introduction: initially, I aspired to write a blog post summarizing and analyzing the DOJ’s proposed CCPA regulations. After seeing the draft, I quickly abandoned that idea. The regulations are 10,000 words of dense, layered, heavily cross-referenced administrative-speak. There is ambiguity…
Some Lessons Learned from the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), 18 Months In (Part 2 of 3)
[Introduction: this is part 2 of a 3-part series on the California Consumer Privacy Act, spurred by my comments on the DOJ’s draft regulations (which I’ll post tomorrow). Part 1 of the series addressed how we got here. Today’s part…
Resetting the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)…with 2 Weeks To Go! (Part 1 of 3)
[Introduction: I recently submitted comments on the California DOJ’s draft CCPA regulations. As part of preparing my comments, I took some time to reflect on the CCPA more generally, 18 months since passage and weeks away from launch. That led…
Breach of Contract/Promissory Estoppel Claims Bypass Section 230 But Fail Anyways—Yue v. Miao
(Sometimes Westlaw indexes magistrate reports only after the district court judge acts on them, which I what I think happened here). Miao ran a Chinese language social media site called “bian-wang.com.” Yue operated a rival service. Miao allegedly secretly poached…
Twelfth Lawsuit Against Social Media Providers for “Materially Supporting Terrorists” Fails–Retana v. Twitter
The court’s opening paragraph pretty much says it all: This case is the latest in a string of lawsuits that Plaintiffs’ lawyers have brought in an attempt to hold social media platforms responsible for tragic shootings and attacks across this…
Copyright, State Sovereignty, and Pirates: Some Thoughts on Oral Argument in Allen v. Cooper (Guest Blog Post)
by guest blogger Glynn Lunney, Texas A&M Law School When our country was founded, one of the central issues was how much of their sovereignty the states would cede to the new federal government and how much they would retain…
CreateSpace Isn’t Liable for Publishing Allegedly Infringing Uploaded Book–King v. Amazon
King wrote a book, From Brooklyn to the Grave. King asked his ex-girlfriend, Thomas, to help edit and publish the book. Thomas published the book via Amazon’s CreateSpace. King claims that Thomas expropriated the manuscript and thus Amazon never had…
Notifying Twitter of TOS Violations Isn’t Tortious Interference–Illoominate v. CAIR
Wikipedia describes Laura Loomer as a “conspiracy theorist.” Twitter banned her in 2018. I previously blogged on Loomer’s unsuccessful antitrust case against Twitter and other social media platforms. In this lawsuit, she seeks to hold CAIR responsible for her Twitter…
Review Services Aren’t Liable for Removing Business Profiles (and Associated Reviews)–PCS v. HomeAdvisor
This case is an interesting, but equally unmeritorious, variation of the many lawsuits seeking to impose “must-carry” obligations on UGC sites. The defendants are consumer review sites Angie’s List and HomeAdvisor. The lead plaintiff is a home contractor. It had…