Defamation, False Information & 47 USC 230 Talk Slides
By Eric Goldman Earlier this week, I spoke at a PLI event, “Social Media 2011: Addressing Corporate Risks,” on the topic of “Defamation, False Information and 47 USC 230” (this link takes you to the talk slides). I tried to…
Court Dismisses Class Action Against Spokeo for Lack of Standing — Robins v. Spokeo
[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] Robins v. Spokeo, 10-cv-05306 (C.D. Cal. Jan. 27, 2011) Spokeo is a website that bills itself as an aggregator of hard-to-find information about people. Robins filed a complaint against Spokeo for violation of the Fair Credit…
CA Anti-SLAPP Cases Involving Consumer Reviews as Matters of Public Concern
By Eric Goldman (with research assistance from the HTLI Graduate Fellow Michael Scapin) As I’ve indicated previously, I support efforts to enact a federal anti-SLAPP law. While I think it’s a good idea for a number of reasons, I especially…
Yellow Pages Companies Challenge Seattle Opt-out Ordinance on First Amendment Grounds
[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] Dex Media West, Inc., et al. v. City of Seattle, et al., Case No. 10-cv-01857 (W.D. Wash. complaint filed Nov. 15, 2010) In what many will probably characterize as a dinosaur’s last gasp litigation strike, two…
Class Action Brought by “Lonely and Vulnerable” Men Against Online Cupid Site Moves Forward — Badella v. Deniro Mktg.
[Post by Venkat Balasubramani with some comments by Eric] Badella v. Deniro Marketing LLC, 10-03908 CRB (N.D. Cal.; Jan 24, 2011) This is a good one. A group of plaintiffs brought a putative class action against an online dating website…
Top 5 Cyberlaw Developments of 2010, Plus a 2010 Year-in-Review
By Eric Goldman Earlier this Fall, I posted my top 8 trends in Internet law, and that’s a good place to start if you want to see how I think things are developing. Because of that post, this year I’m…
Nursing School Can’t Expel Students for Posting Photo to Facebook–Byrnes v. Johnson County CC
By Eric Goldman Byrnes v. Johnson County Community College, 2011 WL 166715 (D. Kan. Jan. 19, 2011). The complaint. You’ve probably already heard about this case. Four nursing students posted photos of a patient’s placenta to Facebook, and the school…
My 2005 Prediction of Wikipedia’s Failure By 2010 Was Wrong
By Eric Goldman “Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future.” — attributed to Niels Bohr I’ve written a few notorious posts in my 6 years of blogging, but none more so than my December 2005 prediction that Wikipedia would…
Lawyer-Spam Plaintiff Loses in the Sixth Circuit Over Allegedly Misleading DISH Network Emails — Ferron v. Echostar
[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] Ferron v. Echostar Satellite LLC, 09-4407 (6th Cir.; Dec. 28, 2010) Ferron brought claims against Dish Network and its retail and marketing partners alleging that he had been deceived by the terms of email offers sent…
Ripoff Report Ordered to Stop Publishing User-Submitted Report–Giordano v. Romeo
By Eric Goldman Giordano v. Romeo, No. 09-68539-CA-25 (Fla. Cir. Ct. Dec. 28 2010). The complaint. Today’s case is a baffling and clearly erroneous ruling. What’s even more bizarre is that the judge initially got the right result and *then*…