Court Can’t Compel Twitter to Shut Down Trump’s Account
This lawsuit involves the @realdonaldtrump Twitter account. Has any Twitter account ever generated more litigation? The plaintiffs allege that Twitter did not properly enforce its TOS against the account. The plaintiff sought two types of relief: (1) a declaration that…
Emojis Keep Teen Out of Jail–State v. DRC
Tomorrow is World Emoji Day (named because most calendar emojis depictions show July 17 on the calendar). To celebrate the power of emojis, I’m blogging a case where emojis helped a teen avoid jail. DRC and her mom were having…
Trump’s Twitter Tantrums Are Affecting How Judges Evaluate Online Discourse–US v. Cook
The state unsuccessfully prosecuted Cook for drug offenses. “Not content to quietly accept his victory, Cook made disparaging remarks on the internet about various players in his Calhoun County prosecution.” The government prosecuted him again, this time for the federal…
California’s Effort to Suppress the Publication of Age Information Violates the Constitution–IMDb v. Becerra
IMDb has a subscription service, where subscribers can remove their age from their personal profiles (this feature wasn’t at issue in this case), and a free service, where IMDb displays an actor’s age (compiled from unspecified sources) even if the…
“Shitty Media Men” List Operator Doesn’t Qualify for Section 230 (Yet)–Elliott v. Donegan
[Note: I will blog the Senate Judiciary Committee’s EARN IT bill in a blog post next week, after I stop crying.] This case involves a Google spreadsheet called “Shitty Media Men,” created by the defendant. The defendant’s goal was to…
Want to Learn More About Section 230? A Guide to My Work (UPDATED)
I’ve written a lot on Section 230 over the years. I thought it might be helpful to provide a narrated and highly selective bibliography: The Basics An Overview of the United States’ Section 230 Internet Immunity. This is the one-stop…
My Interview With Mathew Ingram Regarding Section 230
[Note: I did this interview with Mathew Ingram in late February–before the recent flood of new anti-Section 230 activity in DC that I still need to blog. I had always planned to share it here, but the issue got backburnered…
Section 230 Protects Twitter from the “Devin Nunes’ Cow” Lawsuit–Nunes v. Twitter
In this well-publicized case, Rep. Devin Nunes sued Liz Mair (@LizMair) and the accounts @devincow (“Devin Nunes’ Cow”), and @DevinNunesMom for various tweets. That lawsuit is dubious. Even less wisely, Nunes also sued Twitter for these third-party tweets. The judge…
Reviewing the Americans With Disabilities Act’s Application to Websites–Martinez v. SDCCU
Following the Ninth Circuit’s Robles v. Domino’s opinion, we’ve entered a period of relative clarity about when websites constitute “places of public accommodation” for purposes of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA). A recent court opinion, over a financial institution’s…
President Trump Loves Section 230 for Himself, Just Not for Anyone Else (Guest Blog Post)
by guest blogger Jess Miers [Eric’s introduction: this is the second of a two-part series from Jess Miers, a 3L at SCU and my RA, providing historical context on Trump’s anti-social media statements, including the anti-Section 230 Executive Order from last…