LEGAL INSIGHTS AND NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN INTERNET LAW & ONLINE BUSINESS

Sadly, Aaron Swartz recently took his own life. An oppressive federal lawsuit, over a victim-less crime, is thought to be the true impetus for his death. If Swartz had lost the suit, it would’ve meant a multi-decade prison sentence for the computer genius.
To ensure nobody else in Aaron’s position feels forced to make the same ultimate sacrifice, Rep. Zoe Lofgren wants to change the law. The congresswoman from California introduced Aaron’s Law, an amendment to the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
Aaron’s Story: Genius with a Yen for Information
Ever used an RSS feed? You can thank Aaron Swartz for that. As [...]

Will 2013 be the year that the Supreme Court of the United States accepts an illegal music downloading case? If K.A.D. Camara has anything to say about it, then “yes,” it will be. For about five years, K.A.D. Camara has represented Jammie Thomas-Rasset, a music “pirate” sued by the Recording Industry Association of America for illegally obtaining – via the Internet – 24 songs. After years of litigation, Camara filed a writ of certiorari, with hopes that the highest court in the land will debate and decide on whether or not the financial awards handed down in illegal downloading lawsuits are [...]

I was reading the other day on Techdirt, about a war that’s a-brewing in the open source community. In one corner we have the Wikimedia Foundation; in the other, Internet Brands – the company that owns and operates Wikitravel.com. A saga involving volunteer editors, a for-profit wiki site and bombastic court filings, the Wikitravel v. Wikimedia Foundation lawsuit, believe it or not, is so intriguing it could serve as the topic for a made for TV movie.
The Wikitravel.com Tale
Back in 2003, two developers started wikitravel.com using the open-source wiki code. In 2005, Internet Brands – an umbrella company with a [...]

At the beginning of the month, online affiliate marketplace, Clickbank, changed its promotional guidelines. Over the past several months, the FTC has aggressively pursued online companies suspected of violating various Internet standards established by the commission. Acai berry weight loss and PayDay loan websites were the hardest hit and several online operators were court ordered to pay out millions of dollars in fines.
So, to avoid any legal battle with the FTC and other regulatory agencies, ClickBank executives decided to make affiliate marketing guidelines a bit more FTC-friendly.
Deceptive Marketing And The Internet
While deceptive marketing has long been a civil crime in [...]

Music industry executives are on a warpath. Their targets: any individual who downloads and streams tunes illegally.
To ensure label-friendly laws are passed, industry suits have filled campaign coffers, employed hundreds of lobbyists and actively developed advanced anti-copying technology. But if Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA) is correct in his analysis, some of the new piracy-deterrent measures may actually be illegal.
The Audio Home Recording Act
In 1992, the U.S. Government passed the Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA). A ground-breaking copyright law, AHRA stipulated a government-imposed royalty on devices and media. Under the Act, recording companies are federally entitled to royalties on blank media, [...]