by Paul Alan Levy A fun exercise by Jonathan Band estimates the value of Wikipedia at tens of billions of dollars, with this punchline: "Wikipedia demonstrates that highly valuable content can be created by non-professionals [without the incentives provided] by the copyright system."
As Allison explained, the Third Circuit's recent Carrera decision puts consumer class actions in jeopardy, and so the plaintiff has sought hearing en banc. Public Citizen has now moved, with the parties' consent, to file this amicus brief.
As the Blog of the Legal Times explains: Continuing its crackdown on companies that provide debt settlement services, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau today announced that a payment processing company will pay $1.376 million to settle allegations that it collected illegal up-front fees from consumers. The CFPB said Tacoma, Wash.-based Meracord LLC helped debt-relief service […]
by Paul Alan Levy A Tampa-area company called “Federal Verification Co.,” which operates under “dozens of names,” according to the author of this exposé on a local television station, has filed a defamation lawsuit against its online critics, and is using vague allegations about defamation on a number of sites as an excuse for a […]
by Deepak Gupta Back in June, I blogged about my firm's constitutional challenge to New York's credit-card surcharge law — a law that aims to protect credit card company profits by preventing merchants from communicating the true cost of credit to consumers. This morning, U.S District Judge Jed Rakoff issued a fantastic 35-page opinion agreeing […]
by Jeff Sovern Which happens first: a win by the NY Giants or Congress resolves the budget impasse? Put your responses in the comments (Disclosure: though I am in New York, I am not a Giants fan).
Great editorial in the Times today calling on the Obama Administration to stop obstructing the long-delayed rule to prevent backover injuries, i.e. injuries from cars backing into people the drivers can't see — injuries that disproportionately befall young children. Representing a coalition of safety advocates and parents, we here at Public Citizen filed suit last […]
When the Supreme Court upheld Obamacare's individual mandate last year in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, it was not a total victory for reform: because the Court held that the Act's Medicaid expansion imposed too coercive a spending condition on states, states were left with a choice whether or not to accept federal […]
By Paul Bland, On Twitter @PblandBland This is a case with very painful facts – according to the complaint, a Kaiser patient went in to see his doctor and was told he had a particular type of cancer that his doctor wasn’t familiar with, but would do “internet research” about, that he might die within […]
That's the question addressed by law professor Linda Simard in her article A View from Within the Fortune 500: An Empirical Study of Negative Value Class Actions and Deterrence. Here is the abstract: This paper takes a look inside the Fortune 500 to analyze the deterrent effect of negative value class actions. The study focuses […]