Law Commons^™

Understanding The Consumer Review Fairness Act Of 2016, Eric Goldman

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Consumer reviews are vitally important to our modern economy. Markets become stronger and more efficient when consumers share their marketplace experiences and guide other consumers toward the best vendors and away from poor ones. Businesses recognize the importance of consumer reviews, and many businesses take numerous steps to manage how consumer reviews affect their public image. Unfortunately, in a misguided effort to control consumer reviews, some businesses have deployed contract provisions that ban or inhibit their consumers from reviewing them. I call those provisions “antireview clauses.”

Anti-review clauses distort the marketplace benefits society gets from consumer reviews by suppressing peer …

How Elonis Failed To Clarify The Analysis Of "True Threats" In Social Media Cases And The Subsequent Need For Congressional Response, Jessica L. Opila

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Social media and other internet communications have altered the way people communicate with one another, including the way people threaten one another. In 2015, the United States Supreme Court decided Elonis v. United States, which imposed a heightened mental state requirement for federal prosecutions of threats issued in interstate commerce. Although the statute, 18 U.S.C. § 875(c), has no mental state requirement, the Supreme Court held that, consistent with the principles of criminal law, only those with guilty minds should be convicted and thus some showing of subjective intent is required. The opinion did not name the requisite mental …

Property Rights In Augmented Reality, Declan T. Conroy

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Increasingly, cities, towns, and even rural communities are being slowly reshaped by a dynamic yet initially imperceptible phenomenon: the elaboration of augmented reality. Through applications that place virtual features over specific, real-world locations, layers of augmented reality are proliferating, adding new elements to an increasingly wide range of places. However, while many welcome the sudden appearance of arenas for battling digital creatures in their neighborhood or the chance to write virtual messages on their neighbor’s wall, the areas being augmented oftentimes are privately owned, thereby implicating property rights. Many intrusions, of course, are de minimis: an isolated, invisible Pikachu unexpectedly …

Paypal Is New Money: Extending Secondary Copyright Liability Safe Harbors To Online Payment Processors, Erika Douglas

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) has shaped the Internet as we know it. This legislation shields online service providers from secondary copyright infringement liability in exchange for takedown of infringing content of their users. Yet online payment processors, the backbone of $300 billion in U.S. e-commerce, are completely outside of the DMCA’s protection. This Article uses PayPal, the most popular online payment company in the U.S., to illustrate the growing risk of secondary liability for payment processors. First it looks at jurisprudence that expands secondary copyright liability online, and explains how it might be applied to PayPal. Then it …

The Oversimplification Of Deregulation: A Case Study On Clinical Decision Support Software, Deeva V. Shah

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Until the December 2016 passage of the Cures Act, the FDA had regulatory power over clinical decision support (CDS) software; however, the Act removed a large group of CDS software from the FDA’s statutory authority. Congressional intent was to increase innovation by removing regulatory blockades—such as device testing and certification—from the FDA’s purview. This note argues that the enactment of this specific provision of the Act will instead stymie innovation and overlook the unfortunate safety consequences inherent in its deregulation. CDS software is a burgeoning field ripe for innovation; however, rapid innovation can often lead to a slew of mistakes—mistakes …

Steering Consumers Toward Driverless Vehicles: A Federal Rebate Program As A Catalyst For Early Technology Adoption, Marie Williams

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

In the not-too-distant future, your car could drive itself; technology companies and automobile manufacturers alike are currently developing driverless vehicle technology. While there are many touted benefits to driverless vehicles, perhaps the most important societal benefit is a reduction in automobile accidents. Currently, car crashes are one of the leading causes of death in the United States, and the majority of accidents are caused by human error. Unlike humans, driverless vehicles will not get distracted, significantly decreasing the number of car crash fatalities that happen each year.

In order for driverless vehicles to save lives, driverless vehicles must be on …

A Comment On Privacy And Accountability In Black-Box Medicine, Carl E. Schneider

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Human institutions and activities cannot avoid failures. Anxiety about them often provokes governments to try to prevent those failures. When that anxiety is vivid and urgent, government may do so without carefully asking whether regulation’s costs justify their benefits. Privacy and Accountability in Black Box Medicine admirably labors to bring discipline and rationality to thinking about an important development — the rise of “black-box medicine” — before it causes injuries regulation should have prevented and before it is impaired by improvident regulation. That is, Privacy and Accountability weighs the costs against the benefits of various forms of regulation across the …

New Threats To Vehicle Safety: How Cybersecurity Policy Will Shape The Future Of Autonomous Vehicles, Caleb Kennedy

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

This note assesses the threat that hacking and related cybersecurity issues will pose to autonomous vehicles. Given the sweeping safety benefits autonomous vehicles will potentially bring to society, protecting against hacking and cyber-threats must be one of the top priorities for industry and public safety officials if autonomous vehicles are to gain widespread acceptance in the market. It proposes a framework for how these concerns should be addressed and how we can mitigate the risks. It addresses both proactive and reactive measures that can be taken by manufacturers, how to incentivize these measures, and the role cyber-insurance can play in …

Jailbreak!: What Happens When Autonomous Vehicle Owners Hack Into Their Own Cars, Michael Sinanian

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Autonomous and connected vehicles (ACVs) are a transformational force for humanity. It is highly likely that some owners of ACVs will circumvent their vehicle software to expose unauthorized functionality, known as “jailbreaking”. This would trigger copyright liability, the extent of which would be dependent upon the copyright system’s various rulemaking processes and common law interpretations. This note explores the world of software “jailbreaking”, with its roots in smartphone unlocking, and extrapolates that to ACVs. Some compelling (and at times dangerous) scenarios are contemplated, and recommendations are made for consumers, technologists, manufacturers, and policy makers.

A Survey Of Legal Issues Arising From The Deployment Of Autonomous And Connected Vehicles, Daniel A. Crane, Kyle D. Logue, Bryce C. Pilz

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

With concerns rising over the number and variety of state regulations, companies are increasingly looking to the federal government for guidance. Representatives from Google, GM, Lyft, and Delphi testified before Congress on March 15, urging Congress to pass a federal law concerning autonomous vehicles. While the passage of any federal legislation is unclear at this time, other parts of the federal government have been extremely active in recent months. In January 2016, the Obama administration proposed a 10-year, $4 billion investment in autonomous vehicle technology. In that same announcement, the Department of Transportation (“DOT”) committed to developing model state policy …