Catching Up on Recent FOSTA Developments (None of Them Good)
The number #1 question I get whenever I discuss FOSTA with folks who aren’t familiar with it: did Congress know what it was doing? Well, the answer is complicated. Many things have gone wrong with FOSTA, and those outcomes were…
The First Amendment Protects Twitter’s Fact-Checking and Account Suspension Decisions–O’Handley v. Padilla
The plaintiff is Rogan O’Handley, a California lawyer with elite credentials (UChicago Law, practice experience as a corporate finance and entertainment attorney) who nevertheless jumped onto the anti-“elites” Trump train 🙄 and embraced Trump’s Big Lie that the 2020 election…
Section 230 Preempts Claims Against Omegle–M.H. v. Omegle
Omegle enables real-time video and text chats with users assigned at random. The case involves an 11 year old girl who was a first-time Omegle user. The complaint alleges that a malefactor John Doe manipulated her into disrobing so he…
Background Reports Protected by Section 230–Dennis v. MyLife
Plaintiffs sued MyLife for selling background reports about them and furnishing “public reputation scores.” MyLife aggregates its data from third-party sources, but the plaintiffs “seek to hold Defendant liable for packaging and re-publishing this information on its website without their…
Catching Up on the 11th Circuit Appeal in NetChoice v. Moody Over Florida’s Social Media Censorship Law
As you recall, earlier this year Florida passed SB 7072, a brazenly censorial #MAGA bill. The district court enjoined the law, and Florida appealed to the 11th Circuit. In my last post, I recapped Florida’s appeal brief and the supporting…
Airbnb Uses Section 230 to Defeat a Personal Injury Claim–Smith v. Airbnb
I was a little surprised by this ruling. The Ninth Circuit’s HomeAway ruling seemingly eliminated Section 230 for any transactions that Airbnb booked, at least in the Ninth Circuit. Yet, this court finds that Section 230 fully protects Airbnb…amazingly without…
A 512(f) Plaintiff Wins at Trial! 👀–Alper Automotive v. Day to Day Imports
Background A refresher: in 1998, Congress created a notice-and-takedown scheme for user-submitted items that allegedly infringe copyright. Copyright owners send takedown notices, and service providers either remove the items or lose the safe harbor. Congress recognized how much power it…
Armslist Loses Two Section 230 Rulings, But Still Defeats Both Lawsuits
Armslist has become a critical player for Section 230 jurisprudence in Wisconsin. It’s not going well for Armslist or Section 230. Due to the Seventh Circuit’s troubled Section 230 jurisprudence, two federal district judges in Wisconsin ruled that Armslist didn’t…
Yearbook Defendants Lose Two More Section 230 Rulings
2021 has seen the emergence of a litigation genre against “yearbook” database vendors that publish old yearbooks online. I’ve blogged three yearbook cases so far this year (Callahan v. Ancestry, Knapke v. Classmates, and Sessa v. Ancestry), and today I’ll…
The U.S. Department of Justice Defends Section 230’s Constitutionality
The DOJ stirred up some chatter when it announced that it was defending Section 230’s constitutionality in Trump’s lawsuits against the social media services. I wasn’t sure why so many people were buzzing about the move. The DOJ had previously…