Mar
15
“Sunshine Week is a national initiative to open a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information. Participants include print, broadcast and online news media, civic groups, libraries, nonprofits, schools and others interested in the public’s right to know.” See more information at www.sunshineweek.org
Feb
23
The Minnesota Chamber of Commerce has filed suit to in the wake of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. At stake is to what extent the State of Minnesota can continue to regulate corporate expenditures on campaign advertising. Here is the article which includes a link to the complaint.
Feb
19
A post on Duets Blog got me thinking about parodies and trademarks. What is interesting about this area of law is that parodies of brands are commonplace, but on they are given only narrow exemptions within the law.
Take for example the number of gripe websites. This guy rips on Wal-Mart with his “Wal-ocaust” and “Wal-Qaeda” website. PETA has a website that uses the domain name murderking.com . In fact there is a website that just links to other gripe sites. Gripe sites are typically legal, because the trademarks are used to refer to the company and to comment on that company.
But parodies are often done without any serious criticism in mind. Walk through any mall and there are dozens of spin-offs of well known logos and brands that are misspelled for comic effect. Some are pretty clever too. A quick Google image search for “parody t-shirts” comes up with an “evil” version of the Levi’s logo, an AD/HD version of the band AC/DC’s logo, “Boring” and NASCAR, a Smurf and Simpsons version of the Soprano’s, a variety of versions of the Obama “Hope” logo and more. These parodies are commercial by nature and don’t always seem to be truly offering criticism of the trademark owner, which can cause trouble.
Even where lawsuits have successfully stopped parodies, they seem to persist. For example, a maker of a tee shirt reading “Enjoy Cocaine,” a parody of the iconic Coca-Cola design was successfully sued and ordered to stop making the tee shirts. See Coca-Cola Co. v. Gemini Rising, Inc., 346 F. Supp. 1183 (E.D.N.Y. 1972). Well over thirty years later, the same design can be found all over the internet.
Its hard to believe that many of these sales are likely to change the public’s perception of the trademark owner or that sales of tee shirts are damaging to their bottom line. Parodies occupy a large part of pop culture, but unfortunately sometimes operate in a gray area of the law.
Dec
17
Texas based Lookout Services has accused a Minnesota Public Radio reporter with violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. The reporter was doing a story about how Lookout had exposed the private data of a number of Minnesota consumers. Apparently doing your job as a reporter carries with it the risk of being a “hacker.”
The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act has both civil and criminal provisions and prohibits the “unauthorized access” of a computer. The phrase “unauthorized access” is pretty vague and has allowed prosecutions to go forward for such things as creating a phony Facebook account as Lori Drew had done to harass her daughter’s classmate. But unlike the Drew case, there is the new twist of a reporter doing the unauthorized accessing. So, which should be more important: a company’s right to be secure in its data, or a journalist’s right to discover and report? If the reports are true, perhaps a company should be expected to take reasonable security precautions before having CFAA remedies available.
See more at the MinnPost article.
Nov
25
Starting on December 1, 2009 the Federal Trade Commission’s new guidelines for testimonials by bloggers, Tweeters, Facebook-ers and others will take effect. These guidelines are set to help determine whether or not paid testimonials or endorsements are covered by the FTC Act. Bloggers who are paid by a company in exchange for a positive review of its products are making endorsements and may have to disclose any financial ties to that company.
Link to the FTC Press Release.
PC World’s Guide to the new guidelines
