Mere weeks after the sentencing of the three operators of an MP3 download website (who escaped jail time), the Australia Record Industry Association (ARIA) has launched another action - this time against directors and employees of Com-Cen, an Australian ISP.  Read more »

An Austrian trade union has called for restrictions upon the duration for which department stores may play Christmas carols as background music.  Read more »

‘Apple has shown an increasingly litigious face in recent months, targeting news site Think Secret a week before the start of Macworld San Francisco last month, and going after two additional sites in December 2004 for their reporting on prerelease builds of the upcoming Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger).  Read more »

According to The Australian and the Globe and Mail, life is imitating Monty Python in this amusing recreation of the famous parrot sketch — only this avian dispute has ended up in court:  Read more »

Most suspected it would happen eventually, but probably not in this form. In what the plaintiffs’ lawyers are calling both conceptual art project and ‘the mother of all lawsuits’, an action has been filed to determine whether American and Thai authorities and a French hotelier acted negligently in preparing for and dealing with last year’s tsunami disaster.  Read more »

The father of a brain-damaged Florida woman said a judge’s ruling Friday ordering his daughter’s feeding tube to be removed March 18 is ‘a temporary relief.’

The parents’ attorney, David Gibbs, said he will appeal to the US Supreme Court contending that [his daughter], who has been severely brain-damaged since she suffered heart failure in 1990, is being denied her religious liberty rights. Gibbs said he and his legal team will work to prevent the feeding tube from being removed on March 18.  Read more »

Predictable result, interesting ratio.

Originally by Wendy at Wendy's Blog: Legal Tags, 12:24 PM

Read more

FCC's elimination of functional equivalency test in determining proper compensation between exchange carriers, in response to carrier's letter inquiry, merely clarified pronouncements of earlier order and thus did not constitute legislative rule-making in violation of Administrative Procedures Act.

Originally by Law.com - Tech Law Practice Center, 12:28 PM

Read more

Internet marketing company did not "use," and thus did not infringe, contact lens distributor's trademarks by including distributor's Web site address, which was almost identical to trademarked name, in unpublished list of terms used to trigger "pop-up ads"; nor did company infringe distributor's marks by causing competitors' separate, branded pop-up ads to appear on computer user's screen along with distributor's Web site window.

Originally by Law.com - Tech Law Practice Center, 12:28 PM  Read more »

District court's summary judgment finding of "willful" copyright infringement was inappropriate absent evidence conclusively demonstrating actual, rather than constructive, knowledge of software copyright violation.

Originally by Law.com - Tech Law Practice Center, 12:28 PM

Read more

A group of advertisers last week filed a class action suit against Google, accusing the search engine of overcharging advertisers who use its paid search advertising services, according to Reuters.

Originally by The Register - Internet and Law: eCommerce, 4:38 PM  Read more »

Kudos to John Cole, who evaluated the evidence and withdrew his endorsement of the LA Times story. One of his commenters protests: "I’ve certainly heard [the Winnebago case] presented as true." Well, no doubt. That's...

Originally by Ted Frank at Overlawyered, 9:44 PM

Read more

Companies who watched profits disappear due to allegedly fraudulent clicks on their ads aren't just taking aim at the clickers. They're going after the search engines as well. Commentary by Adam L Penenberg.

Originally by Wired News: Top Stories, 9:46 PM

Read more

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Lexar Media Inc said on Monday Memorex has agreed to settle a patent infringement case related to CompactFlash cards sold by Memorex prior to November 2004, sending Lexar shares up 1.7 per cent.

Lexar claimed in its 2001 lawsuit that certain Memorex cards infringed a number of its flash memory patents.  Read more »

South Korea's antitrust watchdog said it would probably rule next month on allegations that software giant Microsoft engaged in unfair trade practices.

Originally by WSJ.com: What's News Technology, 12:08 PM

Read more

'According to AppleInsider, on Thursday a San Mateo County judge granted final approval of a settlement in the iPod class action suit that affects as many as 1.3 million iPod owners who may have been victim to poor or defective batteries. Under the settlement, owners of either a first- or second-generation model are entitled to $25 cash or $50 credit at the Apple store. Owners of third-generation iPod models are entitled to a free replacement battery if the battery fails. The deadline for submitting a claim is September 30, 2005.  Read more »

'"The [Tennessee] Supreme Court has ruled that store owners can be sued for causing injuries in a drunken driving accident if they sold gas to an intoxicated driver." Employees at an Exxon station on Rutledge Pike in Knoxville allowed Brian Lee Tarver to buy $3 worth of gas and even helped him pump it when he seemed unable to work the controls. Victims of his subsequent drunk-driving crash sued the station.

Originally by Walter Olson at Overlawyered, 9:02 PM  Read more »

The case of a young Iranian man seeking compensation for the time he spent in two of Australia's immigration detention centres has started in the Supreme Court in Sydney.

Originally by ABC News: Politics, 11:06 PM

Read more

'St Louis, MO -- In a decision with dangerous implications for competition, consumer choice, reverse engineering, and innovation, the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals today ruled against three software programmers who created a free, open-source program to allow gamers to play games they purchased with others on the platform of their choice.  Read more »