legal

Seeking 'veritas' in Facebook's latest legal battle

3:14 p.m. PT: This post has been updated with the results of the hearing involving Facebook and 02138 Magazine.

There's a cliched old joke among the Ivy League set: how many Harvard students does it take to screw in a lightbulb? The answer: only one. He holds that bulb and the world revolves around him.

It's a somewhat fitting jab in the latest back-and-forth spat involving social-networking site Facebook's powerful legal team, as the skirmish has brought out the ugly sides of both the Palo Alto, Calif.-based dot-com and the Harvard alumni magazine attempting … Read more

Apple settles patent suit with Burst.com

Apple has agreed to a $10 million settlement with Burst.com over patents related to delivering video over the Internet.

Burst sued Apple in April of last year claiming that the iPod, iTunes, and QuickTime products all used technology patented by Burst without a license. Burst's software enables something they call "Faster-Than-Real-Time" video, which sounds like it would be hard to watch, but it really represents the technology that allows you to download a 30-minute TV show in less than 30 minutes.

Microsoft paid Burst $60 million in 2005 for a license to the same patents. With … Read more

Apple shareholder lawsuit over backdating dismissed

New Apple General Counsel Daniel Cooperman won his first battle on behalf of his new company yesterday, successfully convincing a judge to dismiss a shareholder lawsuit over Apple's stock-options backdating mess.

The New York City Employees Retirement System had sued Apple claiming that the company's practice of backdating stock options diluted the value of the stock. Apple has admitted that it improperly backdated stock options on several occasions, including two awards to CEO Steve Jobs, and last December it took a $84 million charge to account for the options.

But the suit had to show that Apple shareholders … Read more

Revoking open source

Those of us who have actually read through many of the Open Source licenses and have spent a fair bit of time mulling and discussing their consequences take a lot of things for granted.

One of those things is that once a program, or anything else, is released under an Open Source license you can't just take it back. Maybe this seems obvious to you, or maybe not, but it isn't to everyone. Perhaps especially as we depart the realm of software where most developers involved with Open Source have given at least passing thought to the implications … Read more

Law professor argues that Facebook's Social Ads may be illegal

Facebook executives have recently been quoted as saying they want to take over the world, but something might already be getting in their way: the law.

The New York Times' Saul Hansell has linked to a blog post from William McGeveran, a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, in which McGeveran asserts that an obscure, 100-year-old New York privacy law may put a damper on Facebook's new "Social Ads" program, which inserts "endorsements" from your friends on the social-networking site.

Plenty of pundits have already argued that this program could be really annoying, … Read more

States file formal request to extend Microsoft oversight

Rather than letting Microsoft's antitrust oversight end in November, the current oversight should be maintained through 2012, prosecutors for six states and the District of Columbia said in a court filing this week.

The group of states said at a hearing last month that they would make the request. The filing, made Tuesday, argues that Microsoft took years to make fully available the communications protocols required under the 2002 accord, and that there are still few PC makers offering rival browsers to Internet Explorer with new PCs.

Microsoft brushed off the concerns.

"This is not new," company … Read more

Facebook, N.Y. attorney general reach accord

NEW YORK--Facebook appears to be making peace with New York's aggressive attorney general, Andrew M. Cuomo.

At a press conference on Tuesday afternoon at Cuomo's office in downtown Manhattan, the attorney general along with Facebook vice president and chief privacy officer Chris Kelly unveiled a joint plan to address concerns about sexual predators on the fast-growing social-networking site.

"This did start out as an investigation," Kelly explained to the room full of reporters and photographers, "but it has turned into a great cooperative effort that we hope the whole industry will follow."

Cuomo had … Read more

New Jersey attorney general subpoenas Facebook over sex offender data

Anne Milgram, the attorney general for the state of New Jersey, issued a subpoena on Monday against popular social-networking site Facebook, requesting that the company turn over information as to whether registered sex offenders have profiles on the site. The return date for the subpoena is October 12.

Milgram's office has additionally sent letters to 11 other social networking sites, asking that they release similar data. It's unclear as to which social-networking sites those are; representatives for the attorney general's office were not immediately available for comment.

"This is a matter of public safety, and more … Read more

Facebook's legal issues escalate as N.Y. attorney general strengthens warnings

The office of New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has stepped up its warnings against social-networking site Facebook, with a representative from the office saying the company may face a consumer fraud charge for misrepresenting how safe the site is for minors. The problem, according to an Associated Press story, is that Facebook claims its closed-site model makes the service safer for minors than other social networks, and that privacy and harassment concerns receive prompt responses.

The attorney general's office says those asserations simply aren't true. "We expect an immediate correction eliminating the dangers exposed by our … Read more

Legal Suicide for Web 2.0 start-ups: A beginner's guide

I got an email from Fred von Lohmann of the Electronic Frontier Foundation yesterday. It began, "Half the companies you blog about have copyright or privacy legal issues simmering just under the surface. Since most of them are thinly capitalized, when they get into trouble, they're likely to call EFF for legal advice. Several already have."

I called von Lohmann right away, since I've had a nagging feeling for months that too many of the interesting products I've been seeing were legally shaky. So I talked with him to come up with this list: 9 Fun Ways Web 2.0 Startups Can Commit Legal Suicide.

For more information than can fit in a blog post, you might want to check out the EFF's upcoming Compliance Bootcamp on Oct. 10 in Mountain View. I told von Lohmann I'd link to the event in exchange for this preview.

1. Ignoring the rules of Safe Harbor Many media sharing sites, like SimplifyMedia, exist in a narrow legal framework carved out of the DMCA. But you can't take advantage of the Safe Harbor provisions of the DMCA if you don't register as a "copyright agent." All that's required is filling out a form and paying an $80 fee. You can't get protection without registering. As von Lohmann said, "The difference between you and Napster might be this form."

2. Ignoring the Terms of Service chain This applies to sites that collect or aggregate data--like Mint, which collects its users' financial information. The sites where the data are coming from may have terms of service that prohibit their users from sharing them with third parties. Sites that collect this information may be seen as encouraging breech of contract, which is a legal exposure.

3. Falling for a sob story If you're collecting personal information from or about people, there will be other people who want it. They may call up your company and give someone there a convincing story to get it. If your team falls for this "pretexting," or social engineering, users can sue you for exposing their information.