This lawsuit involves competitors in the “star registry” niche . The incumbent is the International Star Registry of Illinois. The challenger is RGIFTS. The incumbent doesn’t like the competition and is clinging to its very descriptive trademarks to try to shut down the challenger. The court discusses the Google Knowledge Panel, which bore “the name of RGIFTS that describes its services as backed by the ‘International Star Registry.” The court credits RGIFTS’ claims that it had no involvement in creating Google’s Knowledge Panel. For more on how intermediaries construct consumer associations t ..read more

Prof. Rebecca Tushnet and I are pleased to announce the seventh edition of our casebook, Advertising & Marketing Law: Cases & Materials. It is available for purchase in the following formats: * DRM-free PDF file. Price: $12 * Kindle. Price: $9.99 * Print-on-demand paperback from Amazon. Price: $30 + shipping and tax. Paperback buyers can get a free PDF file by emailing me a copy of their receipt showing which edition they bought. If you are a professor, or are hoping to teach the course, and would like a free evaluation copy, please email me (egoldman@gmail.com). A sampl ..read more

This is an assault case. Soon after the assault, the defendant made a public Instagram post showing a bloody fist and the caption “Got slim blood all on me … #NoSuckaShit.” A law enforcement officer saw the post and screenshotted it, then called the defendant. The post came down shortly after that call. The defendant was convicted of assault and evidence-tampering. I’m only blogging the latter. The statute defines the crime: A person commits the offense of tampering with physical evidence if, knowing or having reason to believe an official proceeding has begun or knowing that an official proc ..read more

Recapping a couple of doomed-from-inception lawsuits. Benedict v. Google LLC, 2024 WL 3427161 (D. Ariz. July 16, 2024) Lance Benedict is a musician. Someone attacked him on the heavy metal website “All That Shreds” (apparently gone now), posting allegedly doctored images and defamatory  statements. Those items got indexed in Google and appeared in Benedict’s vanity searches. Benedict complained to Google with predictable (non)results. He claims the false info ruined his career and marriage and led to other deleterious consequences. Trademark. “A defendant does not “use” a plaintiff’s mark ..read more

A jury convicted Farley of sexual abuse of a minor. On appeal, the court addresses this online conversation between Farley and the victim: Farley: “10:30 good boy 11 bad boy” Victim: “Me bad boy” Farley: “11 tomorrow night bud” Victim: “No” plus “three emojis, which the victim testified were ‘a pointer at — like closing their finger meaning small [I assume ] and an eggplant emoji []'” [The court then includes more of the conversation in a footnote, but treats this part as irrelevant:] Farley: “Please bud, u know why” Victim: “N9” [meant to be “no”] Victim: “Plz 11” [the opinion says this messa ..read more

[Reminder: I don’t blog all of the SAD Scheme cases I see, and the ones I blog are more exemplars of the general principles than standout or unique cases.] Kate Louise Powell is a Scotland-based artist. (I wonder how she became a participant in the SAD Scheme? I saw 10 different SAD Scheme cases in her name). As part of a SAD Scheme case, she claims an Amazon seller infringed on her work. Here is the comparison: This looks like a derivative work to me. It’s clearly based on the original and clearly adds new expression. Would fair use apply? This post focuses on the case economics. Take a look ..read more

In the mid-2010s, plaintiffs filed about 20 lawsuits filed around the country seeking to hold social media services liable for allegedly facilitating terrorist attacks. Two of those cases, Gonzalez v. Google and Taamneh v. Twitter, produced Supreme Court rulings last year. In Taamneh, the court held that Twitter could not be liable for aiding-and-abetting because, among other reasons, Twitter did not do anything that specifically facilitated the terrorist attack at issue. In light of that conclusion, the court declined to rule on the parallel Gonzalez v. Google case, saying that it’s likely no ..read more

Lloyd brought  a pro se lawsuit against Facebook raising a myriad of concerns. My prior blog post. The Ninth Circuit easily dismisses most of it in a breezy memorandum opinion, but the contract claim gets revived for a little longer. Some of the points covered: “the ADA claim fails because Facebook is not a place of public accommodation.” The Rehabilitation Act “does not apply to defendants who are private entities that do not receive federal funds.” With respect to the Unruh Act, the plaintiffs “alleges no facts to support that the Meta defendants engaged in intentional discrimination ..read more

Wallshoppe makes wallpaper with copyrighted designs, such as the “Pacifico Palm Design” depicted to the right. It has a copyright registration in the design. Wallshoppe found Redbubble merchants selling the design. However, for unspecified reasons, Wallshoppe didn’t submit proper DMCA takedown notices. On October 19, 2021, Wallshoppe submitted a DMCA notice for a seller that identified one listing by URL and said the same seller had 28+ other infringing listings but didn’t identify those URLs. On October 20, Wallshoppe submitted another DMCA notice that identified 2 URLs and said the seller ha ..read more

Kari MacRae is a grandmother to four grandkids and a Republican candidate for Massachusetts state senate. During the relevant time period, she was a public school teacher. She maintained a TikTok account at the alias “NanaMacof4.” (Nana is a synonym for grandma). TikTok eventually terminated her account for violating its community standards. In 2021, she “liked, shared, posted, or reposted” 6 memes to her TikTok. My apologies for the memes’ crudeness, but the details about those 6 memes matter: • A photo of Dr. Rachel Levine, the United States Assistant Secretary for Health and a transgender ..read more