In an ongoing dispute commenced in 2016, the Eleventh Circuit for the second time in the lifetime of the litigation considered trade secret misappropriation and related copyright claims in a scraping case between direct...more
"I expect to see an increased focus on GenAI-specific inquiries in the due diligence process and corresponding representations and warranties in purchase and merger agreements. Governing legal terms and conditions vary...more
12/8/2023
/ Acquisitions ,
Artificial Intelligence ,
Automation Systems ,
Bots ,
Copyright ,
Cybersecurity ,
Emerging Technology Companies ,
Infringement ,
Innovative Technology ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Machine Learning ,
Mergers ,
Patents ,
Telecommunications ,
Trade Secrets ,
Trademarks
In a recent post, we recounted the myriad of issues raised by recently-filed data scraping suits involving job listings, company reviews and employment data. Soon after, another interesting scraping suit was filed, this time...more
11/17/2023
/ Air Canada ,
Artificial Intelligence ,
Breach of Contract ,
Cease and Desist Orders ,
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) ,
Copyright ,
Injunctive Relief ,
Lanham Act ,
Online Travel Vendors ,
SCOTUS ,
Travel ,
Van Buren v United States ,
Web Scraping
In recent years there has been a great demand for information about job listings, company reviews and employment data. Recruiters, consultants, analysts and employment-related service providers, amongst others, are...more
10/20/2023
/ Artificial Intelligence ,
Breach of Contract ,
Cease and Desist Orders ,
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) ,
Consultants ,
Copyright ,
Damages ,
DMCA ,
Injunctive Relief ,
Job Ads ,
LinkedIn ,
Online Reviews ,
Unfair Competition ,
Web Scraping
ChatGPT has quickly become the talk of business, media and the Internet – reportedly, there were over 100 million monthly active users of the application just in January alone.
While there are many stories of the...more
On July 30, 2021, a New York district court declined to dismiss copyright infringement claims with respect to an online article that included an “embedded” video (i.e., shown via a link to a video hosted on another site). ...more
In a narrowly drawn, yet significant decision, the Supreme Court reversed the Federal Circuit and ruled that Google LLC’s (“Google”) copying of some of the Sun Java Application Programming Interface (API) declaring code was a...more
4/9/2021
/ Application Programming Interface (APIs) ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Fair Use ,
Google ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
IP License ,
Java ,
Oracle v Google ,
Software Developers ,
Transformative Use
Recently, the Ninth Circuit reinstated a $460,000 jury verdict against print-on-demand site Zazzle, Inc. (“Zazzle”) for willful copyright infringement, putting a final stamp (perhaps) on a long-running dispute that explored...more
In early July, Ticketmaster reached a favorable settlement in its action against a ticket broker that was alleged to have used automated bots to purchase tickets in bulk, thus ending a dispute that produced notable court...more
Content owners and their attorneys have been enthusiastically anticipating the use of blockchain as a mechanism for royalty accounting, recording the chain of title of intellectual property interests, and protecting, tracking...more
5/16/2018
/ Bitcoin ,
Blockchain ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Digital Currency ,
Digital Media ,
Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) ,
DMCA ,
Encryption ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Popular ,
Royalties ,
Technology
In this long-running dispute that has been previously dubbed “The World Series of IP cases” by the presiding judge, Oracle America Inc. (“Oracle”) accuses Google Inc. (“Google”) of unauthorized use of some of its Java-related...more
3/30/2018
/ Android ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Fair Use ,
Google ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
IP License ,
Java ,
Oracle ,
Oracle v Google ,
Software Developers ,
Technology Sector
A New York district court recently held that a host of online news publishers and media websites that embedded certain tweets (containing unauthorized uploads of plaintiff’s copyrighted photo) on their websites violated the...more
Earlier this month, the Ninth Circuit issued a noteworthy ruling in a dispute between an enterprise software licensor and a third-party support provider. The case is particularly important as it addresses the common practice...more
1/25/2018
/ Breach of Contract ,
Browsewrap Agreement ,
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Social Media ,
Terms of Use ,
Unauthorized Access ,
Web Scraping ,
Websites
The controversial consumer gripe site, RipoffReport.com, is at it again. The First Circuit recently affirmed a lower court’s ruling that RipoffReport.com was entitled to immunity under Section 230 of the Communications...more
10/25/2017
/ Attorney's Fees ,
Browsewrap Agreement ,
Communications Decency Act ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Defamation ,
Novell ,
Section 230 ,
Terms of Use ,
The Copyright Act ,
Third-Party Service Provider ,
User-Generated Content ,
Websites
Screen scraping is a problem that has vexed website owners since the early days of e-commerce – how to make valuable content available to users and customers, but prevent competitors from accessing such content for commercial...more
4/24/2017
/ Arbitration Agreements ,
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
DMCA ,
Fair Use ,
Motion to Compel ,
Motion to Dismiss ,
Preliminary Injunctions ,
Terms of Use ,
Transformative Use ,
Web Scraping
Service Providers Must Re-register Online to Maintain Safe Harbor Protection -
A service provider seeking to take advantage of certain of the safe harbors under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is required...more
12/7/2016
/ Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Copyright Office ,
DMCA ,
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) ,
Music Industry ,
Popular ,
Registration Requirement ,
Safe Harbors ,
Takedown Notices ,
Websites
In a dispute that touches on the intersection of copyright, contract law and cloud technology, the Second Circuit affirmed the dismissal of copyright claims against Barnes & Noble (“B&N”) related to ebook samples stored on a...more
11/11/2016
/ Authors ,
Barnes and Noble ,
Cloud Storage ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Copyright Litigation ,
Digital Downloads ,
Digital Media ,
e-Books ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Popular ,
Summary Judgment
Last month, a New York district court refused to dismiss most of the copyright infringement claims asserted against a website operator based on an allegation that the website linked to an infringing copy of plaintiff’s...more
10/7/2016
/ Computer-Related Inventions ,
Copyright ,
Copyright Infringement ,
Copyright Litigation ,
E-Commerce ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Internet ,
Online Platforms ,
Software Patents ,
Technology ,
Technology Sector ,
Vendors ,
Websites
On June 29th, the Supreme Court denied certiorari in Google’s appeal of the Federal Circuit’s 2014 ruling that that the declaring code and the structure, sequence, and organization of 37 Java API packages are entitled to...more
The DMCA was enacted in 1998 to preserve “strong incentives for service providers and copyright owners to cooperate to detect and deal with copyright infringements that take place in a digital networked environment.” As part...more
The big fight may be over, but the implications of Mayweather vs. Pacquiao with respect to real-time, one-to-many streaming of video through apps like Meerkat and Periscope are still rippling through the media industry. In...more
5/5/2015
/ Copyright ,
DMCA ,
Internet Streaming ,
Live Streaming ,
Mobile Apps ,
Popular ,
Privacy Concerns ,
Smartphones ,
Social Media ,
Social Networks ,
Sports ,
Takedown Notices
We previously wrote about a Virginia federal magistrate judge’s report recommending dismissal of a declaratory judgment action brought by several radio stations asking the court to rule that webcasts limited in scope via...more
In a novel lawsuit that tests the bounds of service provider liability, two music publishers brought suit against an ISP for contributory copyright infringement for allegedly facilitating infringement by failing to terminate...more
New technology continues to generate business models that test the limits of intellectual property laws enacted before such technologies were ever contemplated. The latest example is the use of “geofencing” in an attempt to...more
It’s a problem that has vexed website owners since the days of the dot-com boom – how to make certain user-generated content available to users or subscribers, but also prevent competitors and other unauthorized parties from...more