Litigation

A New Jersey online ad agency claims in a suit filed in federal court in Newark that it was defrauded by artificially generated Web traffic on a company's website, an issue e-commerce attorneys said is "extremely prevalent," but rarely litigated.

Has acceptance of technology-assisted review (TAR) finally turned a corner and earned broad acceptance in the legal community? Some recent comments by the influential and technology-savvy Magistrate Judge Andrew Peck would seem to indicate that TAR has moved beyond the controversial stage and entered into the mainstream of e-discovery practice.

The Ninth Circuit has held that fair use is an exception to copyright law and not a defense, in the first federal appeals court ruling on this issue. The decision is the latest in the ongoing battle between plaintiff Stephanie Lenz and defendant Universal Music Corp. and affiliated companies (Universal). Starting in a rural kitchen in Pennsylvania, the case is now a landmark decision in copyright law that protects many home videographers.

Rapper 50 Cent is suing his former lawyers for $75 million, accusing them of malpractice and not adequately representing him in business matters, including an intellectual property case involving his line of headphones.

It seems that the definition of employer under state law is becoming more restrictive but the definition under federal statutes has become more flexible. The reason is a federal political agenda to empower the National Labor Relations Act to encourage collective bargaining of employees of franchises.

Electronic discovery is a complex business that requires continuous professional learning from litigation team members and ongoing innovation from technology solution providers. To help stimulate discussion and drive innovation, The Legal Innovation 2020 Working Group was formed at the beginning of 2015 in order to help legal-industry leaders identify the keys to success over the next five years.

On Oct. 16, in Authors Guild v. Google, the Second Circuit affirmed a U.S. District judge's holding that Google's mass digitization of more than 20 million books from major university libraries in order to enable users of the Google Books website constitutes fair use.

GoDaddy.com has been the prevailing defendant in two major lawsuits under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA). In both cases, plaintiffs sought to hold a defendant liable for contributory or secondary infringement rather than "direct" cybersquatting under the ACPA. The principal reason for plaintiffs' lack of success lies in a fundamental misunderstanding of the ACPA.