Friday - 11 April, 2008

Sponsored links 


Remember how, in a world first, the ACCC sued Google and the Trading Post over "sponsored links" which were alleged to be misleading or deceptive.

Well, the Australian IT reports that Telstra has settled with the ACCC, admitting that its Trading Post division had engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct ...


Posted at 02:13 PM     Read More   |

Tuesday - 05 February, 2008

Subpoenaing the telco/ISP to discover the P2P downloader 


The European Court of Justice has ruled that member states may, but do not have to, provide that copyright owners can subpoena the telephone company (or ISP) to identify who the (alleged) downloading infringers are ... 


Posted at 05:47 PM     Read More   |

Friday - 16 November, 2007

Gossip, rumor and privacy on the internet - the future of reputation 


Remember the woman who sent a raunchy email to her boyfriend the morning after, only to have the Cad email it (eventually) all round the world?

Then, there's Dog Poop Girl, who was so embarrassingly outed on the Internet that she found it necessary to drop out of her University ... 


Posted at 02:59 PM     Read More   |

Thursday - 20 September, 2007

2Clix backs down 


According to the Age, 2Clix has decided to withdraw from its attempt to sue the Whirlpool forum operator for injurious falsehood ...


Posted at 06:21 PM     Read More   |

Thursday - 13 September, 2007

Privacy, freedom of speech and the fundamental right to make money 


Another illustration of the intersection of privacy, free speech and other fundamental rights:

Whirlpool - the forum - is a fantastic online resource where you can check out broadband plans, get advice from people about technology they use and ISPs, who's good with customer service, who has or doesn't have good quality lines etc.

The thing is, members of the great unwashed public - that's right me and you and people from all over - write about their own experiences (although some seem to be driven by other impulses - to vent their rage or promote the sale of products they stock/make etc.)

Somebody called "2Clix" didn't like the comments somebody else posted about them on Whirlpool and has sued Whirlpool for injurious falsehood alleging sales losses in the order of $150,000 per month ... 


Posted at 03:09 PM     Read More   |

Tuesday - 07 August, 2007

More on enforceability of eBay contracts 


Following yesterday's post, Smythe v Thomas [2007] NSWSC 844 is now online ...


Posted at 02:01 PM     Read More   |

Monday - 06 August, 2007

eBay contracts are enforceable in Australia 


The Sydney Morning Herald reports that a NSW Supreme Court judge has upheld an eBay auction contract ...


Posted at 12:39 PM     Read More   |

Wednesday - 01 August, 2007

Canadian Supreme Court on internet contracts 


One weekend, Dell in Canada published prices for its Axim computers of C$89 and C$118 (instead of (C$379 and $549) on its website by mistake.  It fixed up the mistake on the Monday.  While it usually had 2 or 3 customers for Axims over a weekend, that weekend, it had 354 from Quebec.  Dell tried to block the class action on the basis of an arbitration clause incorporated into the contracts by a hyperlink to standard terms and conditions.

The lower courts refused to enforce the arbitration clause or uphold the validity of terms and conditions which were incorporated into the contract by means of a hyperlink.

According to Prof. Michael Geist, the Canadian Supreme Court reversed, upholding the enforceability of arbitration clauses and the validity of hyperlinking to the terms and conditions in ecommerce contracts ...


Posted at 11:14 AM     Read More   |

Monday - 23 July, 2007

More on sponsored links, Google and the ACCC 


You will recall that the ACCC has launched a "world first" legal action against the Trading Post and Google over allegedly misleading or deceptive sponsored links ... 


Posted at 03:23 PM     Read More   |

Friday - 13 July, 2007

ACCC sues Trading Post and Google over sponsored links 


In what it describes as a global first, the ACCC is suing the Trading Post and Google over sponsored links on their websites in 2005 which are alleged to contravene s 52 and 53(d) of the Trade Practices Act 1974 ...


Posted at 09:05 AM     Read More   |

Monday - 12 February, 2007

Liability for hyperlinking, location tool services and content aggregation services


The UK's Department of Trade and Industry, "mindful of its obligation for evidence based-regulations" has concluded that there shouldn't be any extensions to the current limitations on liability of providers of hyperlinks, location tool services and content aggregation services.

Posted at 07:41 PM     Read More   |

Wednesday - 08 November, 2006

Spammer goes down


In Australia's first prosecution under the new Act, Nicholson J has imposed fines of AUD$4.5 million on the corporate entity and AUD$1 million on its sole director for sending "unsolicitied electronic messages" and "use of harvested electronic addresses" in contravention of the Spam Act 2003 (Cth).

Posted at 10:44 AM     Read More   |

Friday - 03 November, 2006

Anti-spam measure


Everyone gets lots of spam. Many of us have (overwhelmed) filters to try and block some of it. People with their own domain names are increasingly reporting that their email addresses are being used to send spam without their permission. What do you do if your(or your client's) email address is being used this way?

Posted at 05:59 PM     Read More   |

Thursday - 18 May, 2006

Remember the little boy and the hole in the dike?


Joshua Gans (over at CoreEcon) - no he's not the little boy - draws our attention to a report about the highest priced words on Google ...

Posted at 05:36 PM     Read More   |

Monday - 24 April, 2006

More on sponsored links


Kim Weatherall rounds up the commentary on Telstra's latest controversy over sponsored links here and points out that Joshua Gans has discovered lots of people do it ...

Posted at 11:11 AM     Read More   |

Wednesday - 19 April, 2006

Sponsored links


Another opportunity to clarify the law about sponsored links (in search engine results) has gone begging ...

Posted at 04:06 PM     Read More   |

Wednesday - 12 April, 2006

Payments from Nigeria


Mr Ison was trying to fend off a bankruptcy petition brought against him by relying on some emails purporting to confirm that very substantial payments had been delayed but were about to be transferred to Mr Ison's bank account. The emails were from various individuals claiming to have official positions in Nigerian government agencies, but their addresses ended @yahoo.com.

Posted at 03:39 PM     Read More   |

Monday - 03 April, 2006

Cross-border communications and legal liability


The University of Melbourne's CMCL is holding a seminar on legal liability and dispute resolution for cross-border communications.

Posted at 12:57 PM     Read More   |

Tuesday - 28 March, 2006

Notice and take down


Mr Kopp writes a book on how to win (or at least play better) at the online game World of Warcraft.

He sells the book via Ebay, quite successfully.

The owners of the rights to World of Warcraft claim he has infringed their copyright and trade marks ...

Posted at 11:23 AM     Read More   |

Wednesday - 25 January, 2006

Tracing an email


via Dennis Kennedy, a link to a useful outline of tracing where an email has come from ...

Posted at 03:07 PM     Read More   |


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