by Paul Alan Levy In the wake of recent coverage of an attempt by the online trinket company Kleargear.com to ruin the credit of a customer whose wife complained about Kleargear’s failure to send an order of Christmas gifts, in violation of a non-disparagement clause inserted into later versions of the online sales contract, […]
Author Archives: Paul Levy
by Paul Alan Levy Whatever happens as a result of Judge Leon's decision this week and whatever comes of today's recommendations from the intelligence review panel, we cannot forget who it was who helped our country get to the stage of having this debate, not to speak of the personal price he has had to […]
The blogosphere has been humming with concern about a subpoena from the Attorney General of New York seeking to identify AirBnB users who are likely renting out their apartments in violation of local law. It appears, however, that the AG isn't the only one concerned — note this letter from a co-op board warning its […]
by Paul Alan Levy Scott Cleland’s weekly anti-Google rant raises the question whether Google’s recording of conversations through Google Glass, and Google’s use of those recordings as a source of data for its commercial operations, might run afoul of federal wire-tapping laws that require consent for the interception of communications, but it seems to me […]
by Paul Alan Levy KB Home has built new homes in several major markets throughout the United States, but its construction projects have left a trail of unhappy homeowners complaining about shoddy construction in several of those locations, such as here, here, here, and here. The problem is broadly portrayed by a number of links […]
by Paul Alan Levy In response to aggressive reporting on the blog Digital Music News about the contract terms that Apple has imposed on independent labels that lack the economic clout to negotiate their own specific deals regarding iTunes Radio, Apple sent a DMCA takedown notice to Scribd, where the blog had posted the contract […]
by Paul Alan Levy One of the sweetest things that Public Citizen does each year is recognize a long-time public interest staffer whose work is vital to that staffer's organization, but whose work is sufficiently behind-the-scenes that he or she receives no public recognition. The award is named for Phyllis McCarthy, who started working for […]
by Paul Alan Levy The major ruling of the day: Circuit Judge Denny Chin, sitting as a trial judge because he retained the case after being promoted to the Second Circuit, has granted summary judgment rejecting the Authors Guild’s copyright claims against Google’s program of scanning books into digital form and both offering the digital […]
by Paul Alan Levy In this motion a prosecutor asked a trial judge to order a particular defense lawyer to stop referring to her during jury trials as “the Government” on the ground that jurors would likely take this as a derogatory reference “and is meant to make the State’s attorneys seem oppressive and to […]
by Paul Alan Levy Over the years I have blogged several times about corporate abuses of trademark law to use litigation, or the threat of litigation to block criticism. Because they have so many other tools to deploy against citizens, government agencies usually do not stoop to this level – the City of Memphis aside […]