For a number of reasons discussed below, employers truly interested in turning back the clock on the 1991 amendments to Title VII would be well served to cease using mandatory arbitration agreements and instead have their employees execute waivers of their right to jury trials. It is juries that employers generally fear, not the courts themselves. Prior to the 1991 amendments, employers felt no imperative to exempt themselves from the civil justice system available in the courts. Thus, employers do not now need to flee the court system altogether in order to avoid jury trials, and there is certainly no reason for them to require their employees to agree to the wholesale replacement of court litigation with mandatory arbitration.

On Feb. 6, 2007, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in a 2-1 decision, affirmed the district court's certification of a nationwide class of approximately 1.5 million current and former female employees who were employed at one or more of Wal-Mart's 3400 stores across the county. The court's ruling is significant due to the 'historic' nature of the plaintiffs' motion, which sought approval of 'the largest certified class in history,' and because many of the court's findings, if they stand, undoubtedly will form part of the judicial debate in other jurisdictions as to the appropriate standards in analyzing the availability of class certification in large employment discrimination cases.

The Georgia Supreme Court issued a sharply divided ruling on March 26 that some say exposes employers to workers' compensation claims for just about anything their employees might do while traveling. <i>Ray Bell Construction Co. v. King</i>, S06G0891.

Title VII and similar state statutes penalize employees who harass others based on their status in a protected class. But there are currently no federal or state laws outlawing simple 'bullying.' However, the absence of these statutes does not permit employers to ignore with impunity the 'equal opportunity jerk' in their offices simply because the conduct, while obnoxious, is directed at everyone. In <i>EEOC v. National Education Association ' Alaska ('NEA-Alaska')</i>, 422 F. 2d 840 (9th Cir. 2005), the Ninth Circuit extended Title VII's reach to prohibit a supervisor's unquestionably abusive, but non-gender-related conduct, because the behavior impacted female employees more harshly than their male counterparts. Even before this case, there existed a grassroots movement to outlaw workplace bullying.

Features

Recent cases in e-commerce law and in the e-commerce industry.

It should strike no one as a surprise that the fluidity of using trademarks on the Internet expands the incidence of trademark-infringement claims and lawsuits. And along those lines, novel Internet trademark claims spring from the innovative but unlawful use of trademarks in e-commerce. Logically, then, it follows that Internet domain names, hyperlinks, meta tags and framing marks enlarge the number of trademark-infringement opportunities.

Not only do most of us not have a secretary tidying up our e-mail inbox each evening, but we also have many alternative inboxes for our business correspondence. Going through 'the file' has become an exercise not only in finding the appropriate messages and attachments, but in simply identifying all places and accounts where 'the file' might exist. Indeed, multiple accounts often are created by employees to bypass the hassles of security measures and record-retention policies diligently created by IT departments who often diligently enforce these polices and whose employees read and apply the information in publications like this one. Yet the rabbit-like multiplication of e-mail accounts has grave implications, not only for business, but, as we have seen in recent news, for anyone who uses e-mail ' including even our government leaders.

Mobile marketing offers the best in advertising ' a direct, personal, measurable and dynamic means of engaging, informing, and entertaining consumers. But this mobile advertising frontier is hardly the Wild West. Plenty of federal and state laws regulate this direct-marketing vehicle. More than that, various industry groups ' most notably the Mobile Marketing Association ('MMA') ' have developed best practices designed to maximize advertising impact while minimizing potential legal entanglements.