Consumer Protection Law Commons^™

Mad Men And Dead Men: Justification For Regulation Of Computer-Generated Images Of Deceased Celebrity Endorsers, Kerry Barrett

Cleveland State Law Review

Pursuant to the Federal Trade Commission Act, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is charged with consumer protection through the prohibition of unfair and deceptive trade practices. An unfair and deceptive trade practice is gaining in prominence and has not yet been subjected to FTC regulation. Computer-generated imagery (CGIs) of deceased celebrity endorsers are misleading to consumers and constitute a false advertisement. This Note evaluates how digitally resurrected endorsers pervert the consumer decision-making process through analysis of issue-relevant thinking, the match-up hypothesis, event-study analysis, social adaptation theory, and transfer theory. This Note also accounts for the macroeconomic effect of regulation of ...

Vertical Merger Enforcement Actions: 1994–2016, Steven C. Salop, Daniel P. Culley

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This is a revised listing of vertical merger enforcement actions by the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission since 1994. This revised listing includes 52 vertical matters beginning in 1994 through the end of 2016. It includes challenges and certain proposed transactions that are known to have been abandoned in the face of Agency concerns. This listing can be treated as an Appendix to Steven C. Salop and Daniel P. Culley, Revising the Vertical Merger Guidelines: Policy Issues and an Interim Guide for Practitioners, 4 Journal of Antitrust Enforcement 1 (2016).

The Uneasy Case For Patent Federalism, Roger Allan Ford

Legal Scholarship

Nationwide uniformity is often considered an essential feature of the patent system, necessary to fulfill that system’s disclosure and incentive purposes. In the last few years, however, more than half the states have enacted laws that seek to disrupt this uniformity by making it harder for patent holders to enforce their patents. There is an easy case to be made against giving states greater authority over the patent system: doing so would threaten to disrupt the system’s balance between innovation incentives and a robust public domain and would permit rent seeking by states that disproportionately produce or consume ...

Volume 4 Issue 2 (Complete Spring 2017), David J.. Cook, Zachary Bolitho, Evan Wright, George Steven Swan, Cynthia Brown

Lincoln Memorial University Law Review

A complete version of LMU Law Review Volume Issue 2 for Spring 2017.

Won’T Get Fooled Again: Why Vw’S Emissions Deception Is Illegal In Europe And How To Improve The Eu’S Auto Regulatory System, Kevin Tarsa

Boston College International and Comparative Law Review

Replete with greed, hubris, and deceit, the Volkswagen emissions scandal is not your typical case of corporate wrongdoing. With a price tag of $20 million in the United States, it is already one of the most expensive corporate scandals in history and has caused significant damage to the environment, public health, and the global economy. Dieselgate has had a majorly disproportionate impact on Europe, where nearly nine million of the eleven million affected cars are located. The financial cost of the scandal, however, has been confined almost entirely to the United States, due to a European Union (EU) regulation that ...

“Safe Harbor” On The Rocks: Ttb Label Approval For Beer, Wine, And Spirits, And The Uncertain Status Of The “Safe Harbor” Defense, Michael Mercurio

Notre Dame Journal of International & Comparative Law

This Note examines the U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB)’s label review process and the judicial split regarding the “safe harbor” doctrine in the context of alcoholic beverage labels. This Note observes that the judicial split is a result of the tension between two conflicting priorities stemming from the TTB’s purpose and identity: on one hand, courts apply Chevron deference to the TTB as a federal agency enforcing federal law, but on the other hand, courts aim to uphold the central purpose of the Federal Alcohol Administration (FAA) Act—protecting consumers from misinformation. Ultimately ...

Who Will Protect The Consumers Of Trademarked Goods?, James Astrachan

University of Baltimore Law Review

Federal and state law recognizes multiple forms of intellectual property, including patents,1 copyrights,2 trademarks,3 and trade secrets.4 Alleged violations of patents and copyrights are required by statute to be litigated in the federal courts.5 Trademark rights can arise under the Federal Lanham Act6 or state law.7 Trademark infringement can be litigated in state or federal courts.8 Trade secrets arising under state statutes are litigated in state courts unless diversity jurisdiction exists and is pled.9

Infringement of intellectual property in the case of patents arises when a patented invention is used, manufactured or ...

A Motion To Compel Changes To Federal Arbitration Law: How To Remedy The Abuses Consumers Face When Arbitrating Disputes, Jeremy Mcmanus

Boston College Journal of Law & Social Justice

Arbitration, as a form of alternative dispute resolution, is a favored method of settling legal disputes because it resolves disputes faster and more cost effectively than in-court litigation. Corporations often exploit the private nature of arbitration by including complex provisions in consumer contracts that require certain disputes to be resolved through arbitration. Consumers subject to these arbitration provisions often do not realize the existence of the provisions, and do not understand that because of undue corporate influence over arbitrators, arbitration tends to favor the corporations against which they arbitrate. Unfortunately, because the U.S. Supreme Court has declared that the ...

The Role Of Antitrust Principles In Patent Monopolies: The Third Circuit Applies Antitrust Scrutiny To No-Ag Patent Settlements In Smithkline, Meghan Fay

Boston College Law Review

On June 26, 2015, in King Drug Co. of Florence v. Smithkline Beecham Corp., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit held that no-authorized generic agreements (“no-AG agreements”), in which a pioneer pharmaceutical manufacturer agrees not to introduce a generic drug, are subject to antitrust scrutiny under the Sherman Act. This Comment argues that the Third Circuit correctly extended the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis to non-cash settlement agreements. In Actavis, the Court held that a “reverse-payment settlement,” which compensates a generic manufacturer to delay market entry, creates monopolistic consequences and ...

Weaponizing Citizen Suits: Second Circuit Revises The Burden Of Proof For Proving Sham Citizen Petitions In Apotex V. Acorda Therapeutics, Franklin Liu

Boston College Law Review

In 2016, in Apotex Inc. v. Acorda Therapeutics, Inc., the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held that a generic drug company could not rely solely on the timing of the Food and Drug Administration’s (“FDA’s”) disposition of a citizen suit and approval of a generic application to state a claim under the Sherman Act based on sham litigation. By contrast, in 2009, in In re DDAVP Direct Purchaser Antitrust Litigation, the Second Circuit held that precisely such evidence was sufficient to state a Sherman Act claim. This Comment argues that the Second Circuit’s ...

Third Circuit Confirms The Class Arbitration "Clear And Unmistakable" Standard In Chesapeake Appalachia, Llc V. Scout Petroleum, Llc, Dealing A Blow To Consumers And Employees, Caitlin Toto

Boston College Law Review

Whether class action is available in an arbitration proceeding is a highly controversial topic with implications for all parties bound by such clauses. Due to the high stakes of class action arbitrability, it is essential that a neutral decisionmaker determine this question. Whether this decisionmaker is the court or the arbitrator, however, is contested and unresolved by the U.S. Supreme Court. Although undetermined by our highest court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has addressed this question. In Chesapeake Appalachia, LLC v. Scout Petroleum, LLC, the Third Circuit affirmed that the availability of class arbitration ...

Businesses Are People Too? Anomalies In Widening The Ambits Of "Consumer" Under Consumer Credit Law, Francina Cantatore, Brenda Marshall

Francina Cantatore

The Government’s Green Paper on National Credit reform canvasses the possibility of affording small businesses the same degree of protection as consumers under consumer credit legislation. Such a step will enable manufacturing businesses with fewer than 100 employees, and other businesses with fewer than 20 employees, to be treated as “consumers” with all the concomitant privileges that this classification implies, including the ability to rely on hardship provisions when unable to pay their debts. Small businesses already benefit from hardship provisions under compulsory external dispute resolution (EDR) scheme Rules imposed on consumer credit providers, with some anomalous results. The ...

Businesses Are People Too? Anomalies In Widening The Ambits Of "Consumer" Under Consumer Credit Law, Francina Cantatore, Brenda Marshall

Francina Cantatore

The Government’s Green Paper on National Credit reform canvasses the possibility of affording small businesses the same degree of protection as consumers under consumer credit legislation. Such a step will enable manufacturing businesses with fewer than 100 employees, and other businesses with fewer than 20 employees, to be treated as “consumers” with all the concomitant privileges that this classification implies, including the ability to rely on hardship provisions when unable to pay their debts. Small businesses already benefit from hardship provisions under compulsory external dispute resolution (EDR) scheme Rules imposed on consumer credit providers, with some anomalous results. The ...

Misconstruing Whistleblower Immunity Under The Defend Trade Secrets Act, Peter S. Menell

Nevada Law Journal Forum

In crafting the Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016 (DTSA), Congress went beyond the federalization of state trade secret protection to tackle a broader social justice problem: the misuse of nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) to discourage reporting of illegal activity in a variety of areas. The past few decades have witnessed devastating government contracting abuses, regulatory violations, and deceptive financial schemes that have hurt the public and cost taxpayers and investors billions of dollars. Congress recognized that immunizing whistleblowers from the cost and risk of trade secret liability for providing information to the Government could spur law enforcement. But could this ...

Regulating Fantasy Sports: A Practical Guide To State Gambling Laws, And A Proposed Framework For Future State Legislation, Marc Edelman

Indiana Law Journal

In recent months, the legal status of fantasy sports has undergone intense scrutiny, with the attorneys general of many states contending that certain formats of daily fantasy sports violate state gambling laws. In an effort to save the burgeoning daily fantasy sports industry, legislators in these states have proposed bills to affirmatively legalize and regulate daily fantasy sports. However, these bills often fail to adequately address the underlying consumer protection concerns pertaining to the industry.

This Article analyzes how U.S. states currently regulate the fantasy sports marketplace and proposes a framework for future state laws to effectively regulate both ...

Rethinking Criminal Contempt In The Bankruptcy Courts, John A. E. Pottow, Jason S. Levin

Law & Economics Working Papers

A surprising number of courts believe that bankruptcy judges lack authority to impose criminal contempt sanctions. We attempt to rectify this misunderstanding with a march through the historical treatment of contempt-like powers in bankruptcy, the painful statutory history of the 1978 Bankruptcy Code (including the exciting history of likely repealed 28 U.S.C. § 1481), and the various apposite rules of procedure. (Fans of the All Writs Act will delight in its inclusion.) But the principal service we offer to the bankruptcy community is dismantling the ubiquitous and persistent belief that there is some form of constitutional infirmity with "mere ...

A Generic A Day Keeps The Lawyer Away, Cara Brumfield

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

It Depends: Recasting Internet Clickwrap, Browsewrap, "I Agree," And Click-Through Privacy Clauses As Waivers Of Adhesion, Charles E. Maclean

Cleveland State Law Review

Digital giants, enabled by America’s courts, Congress, and the Federal Trade Commission, devise click-through, clickwrap, browsewrap, "I Agree" waivers, and other legal fictions that purport to evidence user "consent" to consumer privacy erosions. It is no longer enough to justify privacy invasions as technologically inevitable or as essential to the American economy. As forced consent is no consent at all, privacy policies must advance with the technology. This article discusses adhesion waivers, the potential for FTC corrective action, and a comparison to privacy policies of the European Union.

Social Data Discovery And Proportional Privacy, Agnieszka Mcpeak

Cleveland State Law Review

Social media platforms aggregate large amounts of personal information as "social data" that can be easily downloaded as a complete archive. Litigants in civil cases increasingly seek out broad access to social data during the discovery process, often with few limits on the scope of such discovery. But unfettered access to social data implicates unique privacy concerns—concerns that should help define the proper scope of discovery.

The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, as amended in 2015, already contain the tools for crafting meaningful limits on intrusive social data discovery. In particular, the proportionality test under Rule 26 weighs the ...

The Behavioral Paradox Of Boilerplate, Tess Wilkinson-Ryan

Faculty Scholarship

Although assent is the doctrinal and theoretical hallmark of contract, its relevance for form contracts has been drastically undermined by the overwhelming evidence that no one reads standard terms. Until now, most political and academic discussions of this phenomenon have acknowledged the truth of universally unread contracts, but have assumed that even unread terms are at best potentially helpful, and at worst harmless. This Article makes the empirical case that unread terms are not a neutral part of American commerce; instead, the mere fact of fine print inhibits reasonable challenges to unfair deals. The experimental study reported here tests the ...