Meme Law Alert! Meme Use In Political Ad Isn't Fair Use--Griner v. King

The plaintiff in this case owns the copyright to the well-known “Success Kid” meme, a photo of a cute 11-month old boy named Sam. The defendants are former Rep. Steve King and his reelection campaign committee. Wikipedia calls King “far-right,”…

MA Supreme Court Blesses Uber's TOS Clickthrough Formation--Good v. Uber

This opinion addresses the aftermath of an Internet lawyer’s nightmare. In Kauders v. Uber Techs., 486 Mass. 557 (Mass. Sup. Ct. Jan. 4, 2021), the Massachusetts Supreme Court struck down Uber’s TOS because it wasn’t properly formed. Maybe I missed…

Instagram Defeats Lawsuit Claiming It Was a "Breeding Ground" for Sex Traffickers--Doe v. Backpage

This opinion came out in March but just showed up in my alerts. Doe claims she was sex-trafficked on Instagram. Section 230 preempts her lawsuit against Facebook: “Ninth Circuit precedent interpreting Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C….

TIL: "Texas Tamale" Is an Enforceable Trademark--Texas Tamale v. CPUSA2

This case hit my alerts because of its discussion about keyword advertising, but first, I have to digest how the court got there. [Reminder: per Wikipedia, a tamale “is a traditional Mesoamerican dish made of masa, a dough made from…

Misidentified Person Loses Defamation Claim Against Tabloid--Bloom v. A360

Elon Musk “secretly” fathered twins with his subordinate Shivon Zilis. When the news came to light, it triggered a “tabloid feeding frenzy.” US Weekly published two articles on the story and posted to Instagram. Unfortunately, the photo US Weekly used…

Ninth Circuit Does More Damage to Section 230--Calise v. Meta

This is a lawsuit over scammy ads from Chinese advertisers. The plaintiffs claim Facebook “affirmatively invites” scammy ads by “actively soliciting, encouraging, and assisting scammers it knows, or should know, are using its platform to defraud Facebook users with deceptive…

Facebook Makes Some Progress Against a Scraper--Meta v. Voyager (Guest Blog Post)

by guest blogger Kieran McCarthy Companies looking to stop web scraping have suffered a losing streak in the Northern District of California recently. In February, Meta lost on Partial Summary Judgment against Bright Data on its breach of contract claim….

YouTube Isn't Liable for User Uploads of Animal Abuse Videos--Lady Freethinker v. YouTube

YouTube’s TOS restricts the uploading of content depicting animal abuse, defined as “content that shows the malicious infliction of serious physical or psychological harm that causes an animal to suffer.” The TOS provides additional details about what YouTube considers impermissible…

Section 230 Applies to YouTube and Google Search Results--Montano v. Washington Department of Health

The court summarizes some of the plaintiff’s concerns: all [] [D]efendants acted with malice against [] [P]laintiff who is a member of a protected class “LGBTQ” as a self-identified gay individual, causing [] [P]laintiff to suffer monetary damages including loss…

Section 230 Applies to Publication of Court Documents--Medina v. Microsoft

In 2014, Medina sued Microsoft. Microsoft’s filings made some unredacted disclosures about Medina that were repeated in an unredacted court opinion, and those documents appeared on several websites that publish court documents. In 2020, Medina got the disclosures from the…