As this article by Sheri Qualters explains, "Netflix Inc. has agreed to put closed captions on 100 percent of its streaming content within two years to settle a lawsuit filed by the National Association of the Deaf last year" under the Americans With Disabilities Act. This settlement could encourage other on-line video providers to follow […]
Author Archives: Brian Wolfman
The purpose of the Airline Deregulation Act (ADA) of 1978 was to get federal and state governments out of the business of regulating the economic aspects of the commercial passenger airline industry. (The FAA still regulates the safety of air travel.) Mark Perry, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, has found that, despite a […]
Today's Washington Post has this article comparing President Obama's and former Governor Romney's positions and track record on a range of health care issues.
Last Friday, we told you about eBay's anti-class-action arbitration policy and the campaign urging consumers to opt out of eBay's arbitration clause, which seeks to bar consumers' access to the courts. The campaign has been getting a lot of notice from on-line consumer advocacy sites, such as eCOMMERCEBYTES, Tech Crunch, and The Consumerist. Join the […]
We posted last week about whether the Supreme Court will take on the issue of pay-for-delay settlements. Now, this interesting article by Alison Frankel explains what she views as the FTC's efforts to maximize its influence if and when the Supreme Court grants review.
As explained in this Huff-Po story . . . As criticism over sugary sodas intensifies, Coke, Pepsi and Dr Pepper are rolling out new vending machines that will put calorie counts right at your fingertips.The move comes ahead of a new [federal] regulation that would require restaurant chains and vending machines to post calorie information […]
Businesses these days will go to great lengths to force their customers into arbitration and deny them access to the civil justice system. Sometimes that extends to trying to enforce an arbitration agreement that the customer is not a party to; other times, that extends to trying to enforce an arbitration agreement that the company […]
by Theresa Amato [guest post] [cross-posted from faircontracts.org] The Fine Print, a Fine Read on How a Rigged Economy Harms Consumers Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter David Cay Johnston asks why the United States ranks forty-seventh out of 224 countries in infant mortality, forty-sixth in the share of our economy spent on public education, thirty-seventh in the […]
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear McBurney v. Young, which presents the following question: Under the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV and the dormant Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution, may a state preclude citizens of other states from enjoying the same right of access to public records that the state […]
Recently, we've discussed (here and here) eBay's terrible new forced arbitration clause that prohibits its customers from going to court and bans class actions. Class actions are often the only way to hold corporations accountable when they break the law and harm their customers. We told you that eBay is trying to give the world […]