Ever since Airbnb disregarded the cancellation and refund policies of hosts, hosts have been clamoring for a class action against Airbnb. The Airbnb Terms of Service contain a class action waiver. However, those waivers are subject to legal attack.  And a class action could be filed against Airbnb under a variety of theories despite the mandatory arbitration clause.  The class-action lawy...

People sometimes ask us what an Internet attorney really is. Let's face it, you have trademark attorneys, criminal attorneys, civil attorneys, litigation attorneys snd on and on. What makes an Internet lawyer different? An Internet lawyer is an attorney that understands how the Internet works. This is critical because there are special laws which apply to Internet activities, the way certain webs...

We have seen a significant uptick in the amount of copyright infringement litigation at our law firm.   The reason for this is simple. There is an explosion of authorshipIn the areas of photographs and videos on the internet.   Because of this increase in the amount of content,And the ease In which it isTo postPhotographs and videos,The amount of copyright protected works cont...

Recently, a federal district court in Utah declined to dismiss claims of false advertising, deceptive trade practices, as well as including a claim of defamation against Eccentric Ventures, a company that operates Ripoff reports.  Relying on 10th Circuit precedent in the case of FTC v AccuSearch, Inc., 570 F3d 1187 (10th Cir. 2009).  The Court denied Ripoff Reports motion to dismiss based...

With the boom of the internet and the use of social media and websites to boost popularity, domain names for celebrities and politicians are some of the more popular domains trying to be acquired.  However, hijacked or acquired domains that are intended to be sold for an inflated price or to be used to post negative and slanderous messages about the famous individual on that website is consider...

The recent trademark dispute between the University of Texas (UT) and Virginia Commonwealth University involving the trademark for ‘havoc’ highlights the issue of trademark disputes across state lines.  By way of background, when Virginia Commonwealth University’s (or VCU) head basketball coach left to accept the same position at the University of Texas, the University of Texas, via its B...

The new generic top level domains (gTLDs) are opening up countless opportunities for new domains and websites.  However, these domains may come at a higher price.  As the new gTLDs become available, registrars are paying thousands to millions of dollars for the highly desired domain name extensions and may need to charge a more costly registration price for these top level domains.  ...

Since the onset of the new gTLDs being offered, it is being reported that the Trademark Clearinghouse (TMCH) program may be causing a negative effect on the registrations of domains.  A report released by ICANN on February 2, 2015 has reported that of the new 297 TLDs initiated in the Claims period, that there were 25,221,479 Claim Notices generated for the 4.2 million domains registered, which...