Vernor v. Autodesk–Does the Right to Possession Distinguish Between Sales and Licenses?
By Venkat Balasubramani [A big thanks to Professor Goldman for the guest blogging opportunity. I jokingly mentioned that asking me whether I was interested in guest blogging was the law blog industry equivalent of Oprah calling one of her viewers…
Lori Drew Criminal Case Ends With a Whimper
By Eric Goldman United States v. Drew, 2009 WL 2872855 (C.D. Cal. Aug. 28, 2009) Almost 2 months ago, the judge presiding over the Lori Drew trial orally announced that he intended to rule in favor of Drew, but it…
2009 Cyberspace Law Syllabus and Some Comments
By Eric Goldman I have posted my syllabus for this semester’s Cyberspace Law course. This blog post describes the changes from my 2008 course reader. For more on my pedagogical approaches to the course, see my Teaching Cyberlaw article. Trademark…
Wikipedia and Rules Proliferation
By Eric Goldman I have previously mentioned how rule sets tend to expand over time. We’ve seen this with legislation; for example, consider how the Copyright Act has grown over time. Personally, I’ve seen code expansion over and over again…
Google Goes on Offensive in AdWords Trademark Lawsuit–Google v. John Beck Amazing Profits
By Eric Goldman Google, Inc v. John Beck Amazing Profits, LLC, C09 03459 (N.D. Cal. complaint filed July 27, 2009). [Warning: 1.4MB file] The Justia page. A couple of interesting developments in John Beck Amazing Profits v. Google, the putative…
Republishing Third Party Ratings in Marketing Material Might Be Copyright/Trademark Infringement–Health Grades v. Robert Wood Johnson Univ. Hospital
By Eric Goldman Health Grades, Inc. v. Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, Inc., 06-CV-02351-JLK (D. Colo. June 19, 2009) A Colorado judge has reached the remarkable conclusion that a hospital publicizing its star ratings and other recognition from a third…
Facebook Sued for Click Fraud–RootZoo v. Facebook
By Eric Goldman RootZoo, Inc. v. Facebook, Inc., 5:09-cv-03043-HRL (N.D Cal. complaint filed July 7, 2009) Facebook appears to have run into some trouble with click fraud recently. Last month, TechCrunch had a series of articles about Facebook click fraud….
June 2009 Quick Links, Part 2
By Eric Goldman State Regulation of the Internet * iAWFUL, the Internet Advocates Watchlist for Ugly Laws * Texas HB 2003. Part of the anti-cyber-harassment mania. Very broad statute with lots of room for prosecutorial mischief. * BNA (BNA subscription…
ABA Antitrust Section Consumer Protection Conference Recap
By Eric Goldman Last month I attended the ABA Antitrust Section’s Consumer Protection Conference. This post recaps some highlights from the event. A few overarching themes: * in light of the country’s economic malaise, the FTC is focusing its enforcement…
June 2009 Quick Links, Part 1
By Eric Goldman Just a reminder that I post some items to Twitter that don’t make it into these monthly recaps. If you want even more, you can track a superset of my online activities at Friendfeed. Search Engines *…