Tag Archives: defamation

it’s not defamatory to conflate 2 legally distinct entities when unity is what they wanted consumers to perceive

Posted on October 4, 2018 by rtushnet

RainSoft v. MacFarland, No. 15-432 WES, 2018 WL 4696737 (D.R.I. Sept. 30, 2018) MacFarland runs lazymanandmoney.com, where he blogs about companies who provide consumer products and services. He and his wife “sat through an in-home demonstration of RainSoft’s water-treatment products.” … Continue reading →

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Defamation, but not false advertising, claim survives against niche publisher that added wrong info about allegations of wrongdoing

Posted on October 4, 2018 by rtushnet

MiMedx Group, Inc. v. DBW Partners LLC, No. 17-1925 (JDB), 2018 WL 4681005 (D.D.C. Sept. 28, 2018) MiMedx, a seller of medical products, sued DBW, which offers business and regulatory analysis to paid subscribers, for libel, slander, defamation, false light … Continue reading →

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exercise company affiliation and ad revenue don’t make diet review into commercial speech

Posted on May 8, 2018 by rtushnet

GOLO, Inc. v. HighYa, LLC, 2018 WL 2086733, No. 17-2714 (E.D. Pa. May 4, 2018) The court here declines to apply the Lanham Act to “companies that generate income through websites that review the products of others, without selling any … Continue reading →

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Content Moderation at Scale, DC Version

Posted on May 7, 2018 by rtushnet

Foundations: The Legal and Public Policy Framework for Content Eric Goldman gave a spirited overview of 230 and related rules, including his outrage at the canard that federal criminal law hadn’t applied to websites until recently—he pointed out that online … Continue reading →

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Sock puppet reviews aren’t literally false absent additional non-identity literal falsity, court rules

Posted on March 19, 2018 by rtushnet

Nunes v. Rushton, No. 2:14-cv-00627, — F.Supp.3d —-, 2018 WL 1271446 (D. Utah Mar. 9. 2018) Every time I think I’ve seen it all, I’m reminded that humans are not only stranger than we imagine, they are stranger than we … Continue reading →

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Suing critics using copyright doesn’t work

Posted on August 25, 2017 by rtushnet

Hosseinzadeh v. Klein, No. 16-cv-03081 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 23, 2017) Hosseinzadeh posts original video content on YouTube, playing a character known as “Bold Guy.” Ethan and Hila Klein criticized “Bold Guy vs. Parkour Girl,” in which the Bold Guy flirts with … Continue reading →

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taking customer list as conversion; false claims of official investigation as false advertising

Posted on August 18, 2017 by rtushnet

Yeti Enters. Inc. v. Tang, 2017 WL 3478484, No. 13-cv-01203 (D. Or. Aug. 14, 2017) This is a tangled story that illustrates how false advertising claims can arise from failed business agreements.  Plaintiff NPK sued Nicholas Jackson and Jessica Lilga … Continue reading →

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Yelp avoids liability for allegedly biased filter yet again

Posted on November 10, 2016 by rtushnet

Albert v. Yelp, Inc., 2016 WL 3910830, No. G051607, 44 Media L. Rep. 2357 (Cal. Ct. App. July 15, 2016) Albert, who operates a small law office, sued Yelp for various claims, and Yelp brought an anti-SLAPP motion.  Although she … Continue reading →

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Don’t sell a business and then keep running it

Posted on October 17, 2016 by rtushnet

Electrology Laboratory, Inc. v. Kunze, 169 F.Supp.3d 1119 (D. Colo. 2016) Larry Paul Kunze a/k/a Lorenzo Kunzel sold his family business, plaintiff ELI (d/b/a Rocky Mountain Laser College/RMLC), “but couldn’t give it up. So, as the evidence revealed, even while … Continue reading →

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Volunteer moderator plausibly alleged to be agent of ISP for 230 purposes

Posted on July 13, 2016 by rtushnet

Enigma Software Gp. USA LLC v. Bleeping Computer LLC, 16 CV 57 (S.D.N.Y. Jul. 8, 2016) Eric Goldman probably won’t like this decision holding that a volunteer moderator may be treated as the ISP’s agent when the ISP gives enough … Continue reading →

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