ASIC has today released RG 234, Advertising financial products and advice services: Good practice guidance, to assist promoters in complying with their legal obligations when advertising financial products
and services. See the
media release - 14 February 2012, for further information and related material.
It applies to advertising on the Internet, via Twitter and the like. See section RG 234.115
and following.
What is interesting is that the Guidelines also apply to publishers (such as newspapers), Internet sites, and aggregators and comparison websites. See Section E and RG234.164 and following.
"While the primary responsibility for advertising material rests with the
organisation placing the advertisement, the publisher may also have some
responsibility for the content of an advertisement."
Online Privacy
A good comment: "The piracy of online privacy".
"Online privacy doesn’t exist. It was lost years ago. And not only was it taken, we’ve all already gotten used to it. Loss of privacy is a fundamental tradeoff at the very core of social networking. Our privacy has been taken in service of the social tools we so crave and suddenly cannot live without. If not for the piracy of privacy, Facebook wouldn’t exist. Nor would Twitter. Nor even would Gmail, Foursquare, Groupon, Zynga, etc. And yet people keep fretting about losing what’s already gone...."
"Online privacy doesn’t exist. It was lost years ago. And not only was it taken, we’ve all already gotten used to it. Loss of privacy is a fundamental tradeoff at the very core of social networking. Our privacy has been taken in service of the social tools we so crave and suddenly cannot live without. If not for the piracy of privacy, Facebook wouldn’t exist. Nor would Twitter. Nor even would Gmail, Foursquare, Groupon, Zynga, etc. And yet people keep fretting about losing what’s already gone...."
Law firm sues over bad online review about it
A Dallas law firm has filed a lawsuit seeking to learn the identity of a commenter calling himself “Ben” who posted a bad online review.
The Lenahan Law Firm claims defamation and seeks $50,000 in damages, Texas Lawyer reports. Partner Wes Black says the suit will allow the law firm to subpoena Google to learn the commenter’s identity.
Ben wrote in his comments on Google Review: "Bad experience with this firm. Don't trust the fake reviews here.” Ben also gave a bad review to an Oregon cleaning company and may have intended to post the negative review about a different law firm closer to home, the suit(PDF) says.
Black tells Texas Lawyer the Lenahan Law Firm gets most of its clients from searches, and the bad review won’t help. "The issue isn't trying to recover tons of money,” Black tells Texas Lawyer. “We just want the review down.”
See: ABA
New Google Privacy Policy
"We're getting rid of over 60 different
privacy policies across Google and replacing them with one that's a
lot shorter and easier to read. Our new policy covers multiple
products and features, reflecting our desire to create one beautifully
simple and intuitive experience across Google.
We believe this stuff matters, so please
take a few minutes to read our updated Privacy Policy and Terms of
Service
at http://www.google.com/policies. These
changes will take effect on March 1, 2012."
See story in Washington Post and CNN
Mr Kim Dotcom Arrested - No Need for SOPA?
With the recent arrest of Mr Kim Dotcom in NZ for online piracy, one wonders why new legislation such as the SOPA in the U.S. is needed.
See SMH and NZ Herald.
"The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which defends free speech and digital rights online, said in a statement that the arrests set "a terrifying precedent. If the United States can seize a Dutch citizen in New Zealand over a copyright claim, what is next?""
Is it true that the president of Activation visiting Mr Dotcom this month, before his arrest? Why has it not been reported that members of the Black Eyed Peas were in Mr Dotcom's home when he was arrested, and have attended some of the NZ court proceedings?
See SMH and NZ Herald.
"The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which defends free speech and digital rights online, said in a statement that the arrests set "a terrifying precedent. If the United States can seize a Dutch citizen in New Zealand over a copyright claim, what is next?""
Is it true that the president of Activation visiting Mr Dotcom this month, before his arrest? Why has it not been reported that members of the Black Eyed Peas were in Mr Dotcom's home when he was arrested, and have attended some of the NZ court proceedings?
Faceless Net Giants
A story in the Sydney Morning Herald: "Faceless Net Giants Writing Own Rule Books." If you upset Google (or Google Ireland -- the company that Google hides behind), they can just make you disappear.
"Australians use them more than any other websites and to many they have become essential services, oiling the wheels of life and commerce at the click of a mouse.
"Australians use them more than any other websites and to many they have become essential services, oiling the wheels of life and commerce at the click of a mouse.
But when Google or Facebook no longer wants you, it can be all but impossible to find out why, as internet entrepreneur Mark Bowyer and others have found to their cost.
Advertisement: Story continues below
Earlier this year Google banned ads from his travel website, Rusty Compass, because it said the site "poses a risk of generating invalid activity".
Apple Apps
On Christmas morning, millions of people will unwrap new iPads, iPhones and iPod Touches — and immediately start downloading games and other applications for them. It is the biggest day of the year for app sales, which can mean big money for developers.
Flurry, a mobile analytics firm, estimated that in the period from Dec. 23 to Dec. 26 last year, 240 million applications were downloaded to Apple mobile devices, or about 20 percent of the total downloads for the month.
Source: NYTimes
Flurry, a mobile analytics firm, estimated that in the period from Dec. 23 to Dec. 26 last year, 240 million applications were downloaded to Apple mobile devices, or about 20 percent of the total downloads for the month.
Source: NYTimes
Brand xxx marks dot danger
The arrival of a generic top-level domain specifically for the porn industry has worrying implications and likely costs for many well known labels.
There is more trouble for brand owners brewing in cyberspace, with fundamental changes to the domain name system being implemented. In March 2011, following successful lobbying from the adult entertainment industry, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) agreed to allow the creation of a new generic top-level domain (gTLD) specifically for the adult entertainment industry. A gTLD is represented by the letters that come after the dot in a domain name, such as .com or .net.
The new adult entertainment top-level domain is .xxx and will come online next year.
This has implications for every business because brand names could be used in domain names for adult websites. For example, someone could register the new domain name sportsgirl.xxx or boostjuice.xxx for a porn website.
Metatag Use is Not Use as a Trade Mark
"I do not accept that the use of any of CTI’s Registered Trade Marks in Green Energy’s metatags would constitute a trade mark infringement for the purposes of s 120(1). Metatags are invisible to the ordinary internet user, although their use will direct the user to (amongst other websites) Green Energy’s website. Once at the Green Energy website, then, in the ordinary course, the internet user will be made aware that the website is concerned with Green Energy’s services. It cannot, therefore, be said that the use in a metatag of CTI’s Registered Trade Marks is a use that indicates the origin of Green Energy’s services. Thus, metatag use is not use as a trade mark"
Complete Technology Integrations Pty Ltd v Green Energy Management Solutions Pty Ltd [2011] FCA 1319 (18 November 2011)
Complete Technology Integrations Pty Ltd v Green Energy Management Solutions Pty Ltd [2011] FCA 1319 (18 November 2011)
Samsung Overturns Apple Injunction in Australia
Samsung was successfully in having an interlocutory injunction overturned today in the Full Court of the Federal Court of Australia. See decision: Samsung Electronics v. Apple Inc. [2011] FCAFC 156 (30 November 2011).
The case concerned two Australian patents owned by Apple. Apple asserted that the Samsung Galaxy 10.1 Tablet infringed claims of those two patents. An injunction was granted by the trial judge to prevent Samsung launching the Galaxy 10.1 in Australia until trial. Today, Samsung was successful in having that injunction removed.
As soon as the appeal court decision was announced today, Apple asked for the decision to be suspended so that it could appeal to the High Court of Australia. Apple asked this without even reading the Court's decision. The judge today suspended the decision until 4pm Friday, in effect keeping the injunction in place until Friday. Apple now has until 4pm Friday to convince the High Court of Australia to keep the injunction in place -- a hard task.
The case concerned two Australian patents owned by Apple. Apple asserted that the Samsung Galaxy 10.1 Tablet infringed claims of those two patents. An injunction was granted by the trial judge to prevent Samsung launching the Galaxy 10.1 in Australia until trial. Today, Samsung was successful in having that injunction removed.
As soon as the appeal court decision was announced today, Apple asked for the decision to be suspended so that it could appeal to the High Court of Australia. Apple asked this without even reading the Court's decision. The judge today suspended the decision until 4pm Friday, in effect keeping the injunction in place until Friday. Apple now has until 4pm Friday to convince the High Court of Australia to keep the injunction in place -- a hard task.
Law Schools That Teach Little About Legal Practice
From the NY Times:
Law Schools That Teach Little About Legal Practice By DAVID SEGAL
Law schools have long emphasized the theoretical over the useful, leaving law firms fairly resigned to training their hires how to actually practice law.
Speedo Shuts Down Blogger and Gets Domain Name
A NSW man has been ordered to shut down several pornographic websites featuring Speedo swimwear and using the company's trademark. Speedo Holdings took Central Coast blogger Dave Evans to court claiming he had used the trademark under aliases and without the company's consent. The company claimed the websites and the use of the company's trademark as part of his domain names could damage the "valuable reputation and goodwill associated with the name and trade mark Speedo". In the Federal Court of Australia on Thursday, Justice Geoffrey Flick ordered Evans to stop operating and registering any domain name containing the name Speedo. He was also restrained from operating websites featuring any sign of the Speedo trademark. Evans, who didn't appear in court, was ordered to transfer the domain names to Speedo within 21 days.
Amazon Running Sweatshop
Amazon's online store has great prices and service, and is efficient for consumers. But someone has to pick and pack the goods ordered online. Amazon has a number of distribution centres to do this. And according to U.S. newspaper reports, Amazon is running these distribution centres as sweatshops. This is the downside of cheap prices and Internet stores.
See for example: Inside Amazon's Warehouse.
Just Google "Amazon Sweatshop Pennsylvania" and you will find numerous articles about this situation.
Free books from Amazon
"Free books, including New York Times bestsellers, for the Kindle. If you’re an Amazon Prime member.
Free shipping, free movies, free books, for $80 a year. What, exactly, is Amazon up to?
There has to be some master plan, because Amazon is spending itself silly to pull this off. Because the offer is limited to owners of Kindles — it doesn’t work if you use the Kindle service on an iPad, for instance — it is intended to sell more Kindles."
Google Changes Search Algorithm to Make Results More Timely
"Acknowledging that some searches were giving people stale results,
The new algorithm is a recognition that Google, whose dominance depends on providing the most useful results, is being increasingly challenged by services like
It is also a reflection of how people use the Web as a real-time news feed — that if, for example, you search for a baseball score, you probably want to find the score of a game being played at the moment, not last week, which is what Google often gave you."
Full story in NY Times.
Hyperlinking to articles not publication for defamation
An interesting case concerning defamation on the Internet: see the Supreme Court of Canada decision, Crookes v Newton, 2011 SCC 47.
The defendant operated a website offering commentary on various issues. An comment included hyperlinks to two other pages, both of which contained articles that the defendant conceded were defamatory.
One hyperlink was "shallow," in that it referred to a web page on which the defamatory article was one of several articles posted there.
Another was "deep," in that clicking on the link led a viewer directly to the article.
For different reasons, all judges decided that this hyperlinking was not a "publication" for Canadian defamation law.
Inteflora case - bidding on trademarks as Google keywords
The Court of Justice of the European Union ("CJEU") has delivered its ruling in the long-running Interflora v Marks & Spencer Adwords case. The CJEU decided that trade mark owners can prohibit the purchase of their trade marks as keywords on web search engines, but cannot do so if the advertisements triggered do not allow users to ascertain the origin of the goods or services referred to in such advertisements.
See Bloomberg and Search Engine Watch
Australian Google AdWords Decision - Google Wins
After an 17 month wait, Justice John Nicholas of the Federal Court of Australia decided today that the ACCC did not make out their claims against Google in the case involving sponsored links and Adwords.
The key findings were that:
The court's reasons for decision are published at http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/FCA/2011/1086.html
The key findings were that:
- ordinary and reasonable members of the relevant class of consumers are likely to understand that sponsored links are advertisements; and
- Google merely communicated the representations made by advertisers, without adopting or endorsing any of those representations
The court's reasons for decision are published at http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/FCA/2011/1086.html
Patent Case - non-patentable subject matter
Cybersource v Retail Decisions was decided on 16 August 2011. It decided that a certain Internet process was not patentable subject matter.
CyberSource is the owner by assignment of a patent, which recites a “method and system for detecting fraud in a credit card transaction between [a] consumer and a merchant over the Internet.” Claim 3 of the patent recites a process for verifying the validity of credit card transactions over the Internet.
"We are not persuaded by the appellant’s argument that the claimed method is tied to a particular machine because it “would not be necessary or possible without the Internet.” Appellant’s Br. 42. Regardless of whether “the Internet” can be viewed as a machine, it is clear that the Internet cannot perform the fraud detection steps of the claimed method. Moreover, while claim 3 describes a method of analyzing data regarding Internet credit card transactions, nothing in claim 3 requires an infringer to use the Internet to obtain that data (as opposed to obtain- ing the data from a pre-compiled database). The Internet is merely described as the source of the data. We have held that mere “[data-gathering] step[s] cannot make an otherwise nonstatutory claim statutory.”
CyberSource is the owner by assignment of a patent, which recites a “method and system for detecting fraud in a credit card transaction between [a] consumer and a merchant over the Internet.” Claim 3 of the patent recites a process for verifying the validity of credit card transactions over the Internet.
"We are not persuaded by the appellant’s argument that the claimed method is tied to a particular machine because it “would not be necessary or possible without the Internet.” Appellant’s Br. 42. Regardless of whether “the Internet” can be viewed as a machine, it is clear that the Internet cannot perform the fraud detection steps of the claimed method. Moreover, while claim 3 describes a method of analyzing data regarding Internet credit card transactions, nothing in claim 3 requires an infringer to use the Internet to obtain that data (as opposed to obtain- ing the data from a pre-compiled database). The Internet is merely described as the source of the data. We have held that mere “[data-gathering] step[s] cannot make an otherwise nonstatutory claim statutory.”
My Blog is Paying My Bills
Further to the class last night, have a look at:
My Blog is Paying My Bills in the NY Times.
Don't forget to click on the Google Ads here ---->
Last Class!
Next Monday is the last class for this semester.
The reading for this class is the following:
Google - Oracle patent lawsuit and here
Free Speech on Twitter
From the NYTimes:
SAN FRANCISCO — What began as seamy gossip about an affair between a famous British soccer player and a reality TV star has quickly become another test over how far the rights to privacy and free speech extend online, where social media operate in countries with vastly different laws.
The soccer player has been granted a so-called super-injunction, a stringent and controversial British legal measure that prevents media outlets from identifying him, reporting on the story or even from revealing the existence of the court order itself.
But tens of thousands of Internet users have flouted the injunction by revealing his name on Twitter, Facebook and online soccer forums, sites that blur the definition of the press and are virtually impossible to police.
Last week, amid growing outrage in Britain over the use of super-injunctions, the athlete obtained a court order in British High Court demanding that Twitter reveal the identities of the anonymous users who had posted the messages. A Twitter spokesman, Matt Graves, said the company could not comment on the court order or how it planned to respond.
Eric Goldman, director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University, said, “It’s really going to the core of Twitter’s service and trying to balance the speech of its users and the fact that countries have different laws and norms about speech.”
Online contracting, creation of websites
e-commerce
What impact does the Electronic Transactions Act have on e-commerce / online contracting?
In this area you should also look at:
the Queensland legislation
UNCITRAL Model
UN Convention
Standard forms of agreement
Website terms of use - look at a few examples including Great South East; Microsoft. What are the common clauses? Anything strange? What impact does Unfair Contracts legislation have on these contracts?
Click wrap v Shrink wrap - what are the differences?
Case summaries
Setting up a website
What should you be aware of (having regarding to previous lectures)?
What impact does the Electronic Transactions Act have on e-commerce / online contracting?
In this area you should also look at:
the Queensland legislation
UNCITRAL Model
UN Convention
Standard forms of agreement
Website terms of use - look at a few examples including Great South East; Microsoft. What are the common clauses? Anything strange? What impact does Unfair Contracts legislation have on these contracts?
Click wrap v Shrink wrap - what are the differences?
Case summaries
Setting up a website
What should you be aware of (having regarding to previous lectures)?
Rogue Websites
On May 12, 2011, U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT), and Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-IA) sponsored S. 968, the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act (PROTECT IP Act), a bill to deter, prevent and root out websites that profit from trafficking in stolen content.
See also FightOnlineTheft
Week 10 - Copyright
Legislation
International treaties - Berne Convention
The law in Australia - Copyright Act, and amendments related to the internet - Computer Programs Act 1999, Digital Agenda Act 2000, US Free Trade 2004
Australian Cases - piracy and copyright
Kazaa
MP3s4free
Stevens v Sony
Newspaper headlines
iiNet
US Cases
Napster
Grokster
Limewire
YouTube
UK
Newzbin
Policy Issues
Balancing interests of copyright owner and users - Electronic Frontiers Australia
Licensing through Creative Commons
International treaties - Berne Convention
The law in Australia - Copyright Act, and amendments related to the internet - Computer Programs Act 1999, Digital Agenda Act 2000, US Free Trade 2004
Australian Cases - piracy and copyright
Kazaa
MP3s4free
Stevens v Sony
Newspaper headlines
iiNet
US Cases
Napster
Grokster
Limewire
YouTube
UK
Newzbin
Policy Issues
Balancing interests of copyright owner and users - Electronic Frontiers Australia
Licensing through Creative Commons
End of Voluntary Internet Filtering Program in Australia
See The Australian
THE Gillard government will scrap its voluntary internet filtering grants program to save $9.6 million over three years.
A combination of reasons led to the decision, including moves by Telstra, Optus and Primus to voluntarily block child abuse websites.
"Consultation with industry has identified limited interest in the grants due to the increasing range of filtering technologies readily available to online users, including browser and search engine filters," the government says in the 2011-12 budget papers.
"Savings from this measure will be redirected to support other government priorities."
Labor intends to introduce mandatory ISP internet filtering -- a policy championed by Communications Minister Stephen Conroy -- once a government review is completed.
Treasurer Wayne Swan's fourth budget today is aimed at delivering $22 billion in savings to meet the government's surplus target in 2012-13.
Google News - Copyright Violation in Belgium
The Belgian Court of Appeal has ruled that Google has infringed the copyright of Belgian newspapers, by placing links and portions of articles on Google News. Read more here
Competition Law Issues
Michael Laufert, working with the ABA Communication and Digital Technologies Industries Committee, has put together a website devoted to antitrust and collaboration issues facing tech industries. Common topics are patent pooling, standard setting and the like. His site, "Collaboration and Competition in Technology," is available at the link below or through CDTI's page on the Section's website:
http://apps.americanbar.org/dch/comadd.cfm?com=AT328100&pg=1
Data theft
Sony - Details of more than 100m users stolen; Sony faces US congressional hearing; Claims file "Anonymous" left on server.
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