On March 15, 2011, the FTC reported that it entered into the first settlement agreement under the new FTC Guidelines prohibiting fake reviews. Essentially, the Guidelines provide that when someone posts a positive review of a service or product and that person is either connected to the seller receives some sort of compensation for the [...]
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
$250,000 fine for fake reviews
Posted in Uncategorized on April 19, 2011 | 7 Comments »
Health Care Law Unconstitutional – For Now
Posted in Uncategorized on February 22, 2011 | 3 Comments »
The District Court in Florida recently declared the new Health Care Law unconstitutional. Of course, this decision will still need to be appealed to the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court, but the Judge carefully outlined the reasons for his declaration in the written opinion. Although I would have listed a few more reasons, [...]
more to come
Posted in Uncategorized on February 14, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Arkansas Mom a/k/a Facebook Hacker – Guilty!
Posted in Uncategorized on May 28, 2010 | 6 Comments »
Another case I recently commented on has been decided. The Arkansas Mom who made comments on her son’s Facebook page as though he had made them and then changed his password so he could no longer access his account was convicted of misdemeanor harassment on May 27, 2010. The Judge ordered the Mom to pay [...]
No double jeopardy here
Posted in Supreme Court, Uncategorized, tagged double jeopardy, Renco v. Lett on May 6, 2010 | 1 Comment »
In the Supreme Court case of Renco V. Lett, No. 09-338 (decided May 3, 2010) the Court held that no double jeopardy occurred when the defendant was retried on a murder charge after his first trial resulted in a hung jury. Despite the short amount of time the jury spent deliberating (4 hours), seven questions [...]
Using someone else’s Facebook Account – Legal? Ethical?
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Facebook, harassment, privacy on April 10, 2010 | 13 Comments »
I am very interested in following the Arkansas case of a 16-year-old boy who filed a complaint with the police resulting in a misdemeanor charge of harassment against his mother for making changes on his Facebook account and then changing his password so he could no longer access it. A similar issue has come up [...]
Should Corporations Have the Right to Own Parts of Our Bodies?
Posted in Uncategorized on April 6, 2010 | 7 Comments »
You’ve probably seen the barrage of commercials for the BRCA (pronounced “brack”) test for women. It tests for the BRCA gene which indicates that a woman is 3 to 7 times more likely than the rest of the population to develop breast cancer. Last week a New York federal court invalidated the patent held by Myriad Genetics [...]
King Kirby Kids v. Minacious Marvel and Dauntless Disney
Posted in Law, Uncategorized, tagged copyright, disney, kirby, marvel on March 26, 2010 | 13 Comments »
Disney acquired Marvel Entertainment last year for quite a chunk of change. One of the most important assets of Marvel is its superhero collection, many of which were developed by Jack Kirby who has since passed away. The heirs of Kirby sent out a notice of copyright termination under Section 304(c) of the Copyright Act [...]
“You have the right to use your rights”
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Florida v. Powell, Miranda, Supreme Court on March 12, 2010 | 9 Comments »
Does telling a suspect that “You have the right to talk to a lawyer before answering any of our questions” and “You have the right to use any of these rights at any time you want during this interview” mean the same thing as “You have the right to an attorney during questioning?” In the [...]
Is a cross a religious symbol or a war memorial?
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged 1934, Buono, Establishment clause, religion, Salazar, Supreme Court on January 29, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
In Salazar v. Buono, 08-472 (Supreme Court 2008 – not yet decided) the lower court held that the presence of a Christian cross located on land owned by the federal government was an unconstitutional endorsement of religion. The original cross had been erected in 1934 by the Veterans of Foreign Wars in remembrance of those [...]
