Mass Law Blog
Intellectual property and business litigation, Massachusetts and nationallyWritten by humans
Lee Gesmer’s Mass Law Blog began in 2005, and contains almost 600 posts. The site initially focused on Massachusetts law, but today it follows business and intellectual property law nation-wide. The site is hosted by Gesmer Updegrove LLP, a law firm based in Boston, Massachusetts. The firm represents startup and established companies in the areas of litigation, transactions (including financings, mergers and acquisitions), IP rights, taxation, employment law, standards consortia, business counseling and open source development projects and foundations. You can find a summary of the firm’s services here. To learn how Gesmer Updegrove can help you, contact: Lee Gesmer
Google Rolls the Dice, Files Cert Petition in Oracle Copyright Case
Google has filed a certiorari petition with the Supreme Court, asking it to review and reverse the Federal Circuit's May 9, 2014 decision holding that the declaring code of Oracle's Java API software is not copyrightable. I have written about this case on several occasions, most recently on May 10, 2014 (CAFC Reverses Judge Alsup – Java API Declaring Code Held Copyrightable). Google framed the "question presented" (framing the question in such a way as to catch the interest of the court is an...
Grooveshark’s Lesson: Better to Ask Permission Than Forgiveness
One thing that any online "music locker" company that relies on third-party content and hopes to benefit from the DMCA safe harbor should know is that employees should not upload copyrighted content to the service. Nothing will blow up a DMCA defense faster. It seems that Grooveshark (legally "Escape Media"), didn't get this message. As Joshua Greenberg, one of Grooveshark's co-founders wrote to employees in 2007: Download as many MP3′s as possible, and add them to the folders you’re sharing...
California “Yelp” Bill, Guarantees Right to Post (Non-Defamatory) Reviews
Imagine this. You go to a new dentist and, before she will take you as a patient she requires you to sign an agreement that you won't post negative reviews of her on the Internet. You go to book a wedding reception at a restaurant and before they will book your reception they ask you to sign a similar document. Even worse, you must agree that if you do post a negative review, you will owe the restaurant a $500 fine. The Internet has been full of stories of this sort, but now one state --...
Eleventh Circuit Requires a Hearing on Noncompete Where Evidence “Bitterly Disputed”
Now that the Massachusetts legislature has abandoned (at least until next session) a bill to make employer/employee noncompete agreements unenforceable (or more difficult to enforce) in Massachusetts, we're back to business as usual in Massachusetts, and how the courts handle these cases remains of interest. And, since the preliminary injunction stage of these cases is so critical, how the courts handle preliminary injunction motions in noncompete cases is of particular interest. Of course,...
Ninth Circuit Finds Barnes & Noble’s “Browsewrap” Unenforceable
Online companies have often found it challenging to create enforceble terms of service ("TOS"), and the courts aren't making it any easier. Perhaps the courts have concluded that, now that the Internet is an established commercial medium, they are not going to cut vendors any slack. The latest decision illustrating this is the Ninth Circuit's August 18, 2014 holding in Nguyen v. Barnes & Noble, holding that Barnes and Noble's browsewrap agreement was not enforeable. A website “browsewrap”...
Capitol Records Bares Knuckles in Redigi Suit, Goes After Founders
It's a sad reality that when the record companies want to get serious, they sue not only companies that they claim have infringed their copyrights, but the owners of those companies. Capitol Records pursuit of Michael Robertson, despite the bankruptcy of MP3tunes, is a classic example. MP3tunes declared bankruptcy and shuttered its service, but Capitol Records (part of UMG), pursued Robertson individually, and obtained a $41 million verdict against him personally. Capitol is using the same...
This site is hosted by Gesmer Updegrove LLP, a technology law firm based in Boston, Massachusetts. You can find a summary of our services here. To learn how GU can help you, contact:
Lee Gesmer