Law Commons^™

Creating Effective Broadband Network Regulation, Daniel L. Brenner

Daniel L. Brenner

ABSTRACT: The Internet is central to the business and pastimes of Americans. Calls for increased regulation are ongoing, inevitable, and often justified. But calls for “network neutrality” or “nondiscrimination” assume with little hesitation federal agency competence to give predictable and accurate meaning to these terms and create regulations to implement them. This article’s chief contribution to Internet policy debate is to focus attention on the likelihood of successful FCC Internet regulation -- a key assumption of some advocates. The article analyzes three characteristics that hobble the FCC, the likeliest federal agency to provide prescriptive rules. First, the record for the …

Fantasy Crime, Susan Brenner

Susan Brenner

The article "Fantasy Crime" analyzes activity in virtual worlds that would constitute a crime if it were committed in the real world. The article reviews the evolution of virtual worlds like Second Life and notes research which indicates that more and more of our lives will move into this realm. It analyzes the criminalization of virtual conduct that inflicts "harm" in the real world and virtual conduct that only inflicts "harm" in the virtual world. It explains that the first category qualifies as cybercrime and can be prosecuted under existing law. It then analyzes the necessity and propriety of criminalizing …

Electronic Commerce And Legal Protection For Consumers In Spain, Juan-Antonio Mondejar-Jimenez

Juan-Antonio Mondejar-Jimenez

Electronic commerce is becoming increasingly common at international level and is the object of analysis by various fields and scientific disciplines.

Guaranteeing the security of transactions is of fundamental importance if electronic commerce is to expand correctly. In this regard, legal protection for electronic commerce transactions is an area that is gaining in interest for scientific literature. The Spanish Information Society Services and Electronic commerce Act describes various aspects that need to be further developed in this field.

This document analyses the new contractual forms arising from the “Information Society” and the legal issues associated to the latter, as well …

Viewing Virtual Property Ownership Through The Lens Of Innovation, Ryan G. Vacca

Akron Law Faculty Publications

Over the past several years scholars have wrestled with how property rights in items created in virtual worlds should be conceptualized. Regardless of how the property is conceptualized and what property theory best fits, most agree the law ought to recognize virtual property as property and vest someone with those rights.

This article moves beyond the conceptualization debate and asks two new questions from a new perspective. First, how ought virtual property rights be allocated so innovation and creativity can be maximized? Second, how can the law be changed to remove barriers that unnecessarily impede a regime that maximizes creativity …

Regulating Search, Viva R. Moffat

Viva R. Moffat

With the digital revolution and the internet age have come not just material and resources unimaginable fifty years ago, but also an overwhelming onslaught of information. Search engines have become the crucial intermediary in this online world, ameliorating the “information overload” and serving as the gatekeepers of the Internet. Academic commentators have recognized the significance of the issues posed by search engines’ role as a crucial intermediary, but the conversation about the appropriate structures for regulating search is still in its early stages. Thus far, the debate is a bipolar one: market regulation versus agency regulation.

In this paper, I …

Jurisdiction As Competition Promotion: A Unified Theory Of The Fcc's Ancillary Jurisdiction, John F. Blevins

John F. Blevins

The FCC’s “ancillary jurisdiction” refers to the agency’s residual authority to regulate matters over which it lacks explicit statutory authority under the Communications Act of 1934. Because many of today’s most controversial and consequential policy debates involve new technologies not explicitly covered by that statute, the scope of the FCC’s ancillary jurisdiction has taken on a critical new importance in recent years. In particular, the future of federal Internet policy depends on resolving the questions surrounding ancillary jurisdiction. In this article, I provide a new theory of the FCC’s ancillary jurisdiction, arguing that it is best understood as an authority …

Electronic Contracting In China, Debra J. Reed

Debra J Reed

QUESTION PRESENTED

Whether an electronically signed business contract between a Chinese and foreign party is legally valid under the 2005 Electronic Signature Law of the People’s Republic of China and is enforceable in China’s courts?

BRIEF ANSWER

An electronically signed business contract between a Chinese and foreign party is legally valid under the 2005 Electronic Signature Law of the People’s Republic of China, PRC. Statutorily, Chinese law enables electronic contracting by giving the same legal force to electronic signatures and data messages, as to traditional ink signatures and paper documents. Lack of payment systems, high costs to businesses of adopting …

Consumers As Producers: The Personal Mainframe And The Law Of Computing, Peter P. Swire

Peter P Swire

This article explores the idea of “consumers-as-producers” as an organizing principle for understanding modern computing and cyberlaw. Leading legal commentators such as Yochai Benkler and Larry Lessig have emphasized the non-market nature of modern computing, stressing the shared actions of volunteers in blogs, wikis, and Open Source software. By recognizing the ways that ordinary individuals are also economic producers, this article describes major features of modern computing that have been minimized in these leading accounts.

Part I describes the history of home computing as an economic activity, where individuals’ home computers today are “personal mainframes,” with the processing power of …

Parental Rights In Myspace: Reconceptualizing The State’S Parens Patriae Role In The Digital Age, Sheerin N. Shahinpoor

Sheerin N. Shahinpoor

The law grants parents a great deal of leeway in their child-rearing decisions, including choices in the context of their children’s internet use. But there is a harm about which many parents and state and federal governments are unaware: reputational harm. Children and teenagers’ current internet use put them at risk of permanently harming their reputations, and there are no protective measures in place, whether educational or regulatory. They are posting personal information on the internet at an alarming rate mostly via social networking sites like MySpace.com and Facebook.com without an awareness of the present and long-term consequences, such as …

United States V. O’Keefe: Do The Federal Rules Of Civil Procedure Provide The Proper Framework For Managing “Data Dumping” In A Criminal Case?, David W. Degnan

David W Degnan

In 2008, two criminal cases addressed large amounts of unintelligible documents being dumped on the unprepared defendant: United States v. O’Keefe and United States v. Graham. O’Keefe teaches that when the Rules of Criminal Procedure are silent in a criminal case, the civil discovery rules provides a thoughtful and well reasoned answer for how to handle the production of large quantities of unintelligible documents stored electronically. Graham, on the other hand, did not apply the civil rules to a comparatively similar criminal data dumping case, but that case did re-emphasize the need and the duty to manage electronic discovery before …

"Smile, You're On Cellphone Camera!": Regulating Online Video Privacy In The Myspace Generation, Jacqueline D. Lipton

Jacqueline D Lipton

In the latest Batman movie, Bruce Wayne’s corporate right hand man, Lucius Fox, copes stoically with the death and destruction dogging his boss. Interestingly, the last straw for him is Bruce’s request that he use digital video surveillance created through the city’s cellphone network to spy on the people of Gotham City in order to locate the Joker. Does this tell us something about the increasing social importance of privacy, particularly in an age where digital video technology is ubiquitous and largely unregulated? While much digital privacy law and commentary has focused on text files containing personal data, little attention …

Intellectual Property And Information Technology Due Diligence In Merger And Acquisition Transactions, Martin B. Robins

Martin B. Robins

this article addresses both the theoretical and practical elements of M&A due diligence regarding IP and IT, with an emphasis on recent developments.

From Nuclear War To Net War: Analogizing Cyber Attacks In International Law, Scott James Shackelford

Scott Shackelford

On April 27, 2007, Estonia was attacked by a computer network causing widespread damage. It is currently unclear what legal rights a state has as a victim of a cyber attack. Even if Estonia could conclusively prove that it was Russia, for example, behind the March 2007 attack, could it respond with force or its own cyber attack? There is a paucity of literature dealing with these questions, as well as the ethical, humanitarian, and human rights implications of information warfare (“IW”) on national and international security. Treatments of IW outside the orthodox international humanitarian law (“IHL”) framework are nearly …

Pirates Among The Second Life Islands – Why You Should Monitor The Misuse Of Your Intellectual Property In Online Virtual Worlds, Ben Quarmby

Ben Quarmby

Virtual online worlds such as Second Life – a world in which users can live, work and purchase virtual goods, services and real estate – have enjoyed a well-documented explosion in popularity. Their success, however, has not come without some degree of turbulence. Relying on the example of Second Life, this article will address one of the primary sources of concern to arise in connection with these worlds: the dramatic escalation in trademark and copyright violations in virtual world and its impact on real-world individuals or business entities. Given that users have the ability to design and create virtual property …

Intellectual Property And Information Technology Due Diligence In Merger And Acquisition Transactions, Martin B. Robins

Martin B. Robins

No abstract provided.

Intellectual Property And Information Technology Due Diligence In Merger And Acquisition Transactions, Martin B. Robins

Martin B. Robins

This article is intended to address both the theoretical and practical elements of M&A due diligence associated with intellectual property and information technology issues.

Hipaa And Its Privacy Regulations: Is There Too Much Privacy Regulation On Health Care Information?, Yuhong Wu

Yuhong Wu

In 1996, Congress passed HIPAA, and later on August 14, 2003 Department of Health and Human Services finalized HIPAA privacy regulations. HIPAA privacy regulation creates privacy right of personal healthcare information by giving individuals absolute control over their health information, setting boundaries on the use and disclosure of health information, and mandating covered entities to establish safeguards for healthcare information. In fact, HIPAA defines the privacy right in its finest granular form: the privacy right is enforced not only at individual level, but also for every chunk of personal healthcare information that is needed in any possible usage. This article …

Ceo Postings: Leveraging The Internet’S Communications Potential While Managing The Message To Maintain Corporate Governance Interests In Information Security, Reputation And Compliance, Margo E. K. Reder

Margo E. K. Reder

CEO POSTINGS –

LEVERAGING THE INTERNET’S COMMUNICATIONS POTENTIAL WHILE MANAGING THE MESSAGE TO MAINTAIN CORPORATE GOVERNANCE INTERESTS IN INFORMATION SECURITY, REPUTATION AND COMPLIANCE

By Margo E. K. Reder

For approximately eight years, Whole Foods Market, Inc. [Whole Foods] CEO John Mackey posted messages to Yahoo! Financial’s online message board for Whole Foods. Rather than using his real name, Mr. Mackey like many posters to chat rooms, created an online alter ego and posted his comments under a pseudonym. As “Rahodeb” Mr. Mackey promoted his Whole Foods chain, boasted about personal stock gains in Whole Foods stock, company plans and performance …

Manipulating Andhiding Terrorist Content On The Internet: Legal And Tradecraft Issues, Jack F. Williams

Jack F. Williams

The global war on terror (“GWOT”) is being fought on many levels. In addition to traditional terror and counterterror activity, both sides are engaged in a public relations and propaganda war, employing the media, willingly and unwillingly, to support their positions. Hovering over these war campaigns are information technologies, which include the Internet. This article provides an introduction to various online content concealing practices that have been employed by those seeking to conceal or limit access to information on the Internet, including terrorist organizations. Further, there is a discussion on tracking and monitoring of website visitors. After reviewing open source …

The Trademark Trap, Aneta Ferguson

Aneta Ferguson

The currently existing scheme of two filing systems for recordation of security interests in trademarks causes a lot of legal uncertainty and numerous problems for lenders and trademark owners. The uncertainty about the rules of perfection and priorities increases costs associated with financing transactions involving trademarks and contributes to the complexity of those transactions. The empirical study of the security interests in trademarks shows that fifteen percent of creditors failed to fulfill the requirements of the currently existing dual filing system and as a consequence are left in a position of unsecured creditors. Legislative reform is very urgently needed in …

The First Amendment Constitutional Implications Of Facebook And Myspace And Other Online Activity Of Students In Public High Schools, Brandon J. Hoover

Brandon J. Hoover

My paper, entitled The First Amendment Constitutional Implications of MySpace and Facebook, will explore what constitutional issues may arise through the use of social networking websites such as MySpace and Facebook. The paper will begin with an explanation of social networking websites; how such sites were developed, how many users each cite has, and how such sites work. The central focus of the paper will be on youth who use such sites. After laying the basic framework of what these sites are and what they do, the paper will next turn to the First Amendment issue of free speech. Some …

Space Pirates, Hitchhikers, Guides And The Public Interest: Transformational Trademark Law In Cyberspace, Thomas C. Folsom

Thomas C. Folsom

Modern trademark law has come of age. Like copyright and patent, it not only has a metaphysic of its own, but it also has the capacity to take goods and services out of the commons. The tendency of modern trademark law to dimi-nish, waste or spoil the commons is nowhere more apparent than in cyber-space. My prior analytic, descriptive and doctrinal articles asserted the leading cases either overprotect or under–protect marks in space, and both extremes are wrong. The cases reach the wrong results at the critical margin because they neither define cyberspace nor distinguish the mark–type conflicts typical-ly occurring …

Computers, Search Warrants, And The Private Papers Exemption, David E. Clark

David E Clark

Police increasingly seek search warrants for information stored on personal computers. Georgia law, OCGA 17-5-21(a)(5) prohibits the issuance of a search warrant for "private papers," which include any documents subject to a recognized privilege (attorney-client, doctor-patient). This statute, and other technological factors, raise the risk of a computer search warrant being ruled overbroad unless it is carefully drafted. A constitutionally sound format for a computer search warrant application is given, along with guidelines for drafting and executing a warrant for digital property believed to be evidence of a crime.

Speech, Spam, And Central Hudson: Redefining The Terms Of Commercial Speech, Justin Torres

Justin Torres

Congressional attempts to curtail the growth of email spam consistent with the First Amendment highlight the uncertainty and confusion surrounding the Supreme Court’s commercial speech doctrine. This confusion stems from two central yet ambiguous terms central: “commercial speech” and “substantial state interest.” Throughout its commercial speech cases, the Court has broadened and narrowed the definition of commercial speech in various contexts, subjecting some speech to commercial speech regulations while exempting other speech. And it has steadily broadened the definition of “substantial state interest” to take in a number of dignitary and moral harms, to the point that the requirement is …

Omniveillance, Privacy In Public, And The Right To Your Digital Identity: A Tort For Recording And Disseminating An Individual’S Image Over The Internet, Josh Blackman

Josh Blackman

Internet giant Google recently began photographing American streets with a new technology they entitled Google Street View. These high-resolution cameras capture people, both outside, and inside of their homes, engaged in private matters. Although the present iteration of this technology only displays previously recorded images, current privacy laws do not prevent Google, or other technology companies, or wealthy individuals, from implementing a system that broadcasts live video feeds of street corner throughout America. Such pervasive human monitoring is the essence of the phenomenon this Article has termed omniveillance. This threat is all the more realistic in light of projected trends …

Shanghaied? How The Commercial Value Of Electronic Waste Has Deterred Efforts To Regulate Its Movement From The United States To China: The Resulting Impact On The Chinese Economy And Environment, Cameron B.F. Black

Cameron Black

If you are interested in how discarded electronics get from the United States to China, and why (the answer may surprise you), please read this paper. Abstract included.

Chilling Effects: The Communications Decency Act And The Online Marketplace Of Ideas, Anthony M. Ciolli

Anthony M Ciolli

The popularization of the Internet has ensured that, for the first time in human history, speech is in a position where it can become truly free. In 1996 Congress, hoping to preserve and promote a vibrant and competitive free marketplace of ideas on the Internet, passed Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a controversial statute that grants the owners of private online forums and other Internet intermediaries unprecedented immunity from liability for defamation and related torts committed by third party users. Since then, a fierce debate has raged over how to strike the proper balance between the seemingly competing …

A Fragile Foundation -- The Role Of "Intermodal" And "Facilities-Based" Competition In Communications Policy, John F. Blevins

John F. Blevins

The communications industry is currently experiencing extensive and rapid deregulation. The policies justifying this deregulation have been constructed upon the concepts of “intermodal” and “facilities-based” competition. At both the federal and state level, regulators and courts have increasingly embraced deregulatory policies that promote – and assume the existence of – these forms of competition. In short, these concepts have become the theoretical foundation of modern communications policy. In the rush to either embrace or reject these forms of competition, policymakers and scholars have not paused to ask whether these two concepts are descriptively meaningful. In this article, I argue that …

Ability-To-Pay And The Taxation Of Virtual Income, Adam S. Chodorow

Adam S Chodorow

Whether to tax virtual income raises a vexing question. Most people’s intuition suggests that virtual income should be exempt from tax, but the real-world economic value inherent in such income suggests otherwise. Those who have considered the question to date have attempted to justify non-taxation using either an intent-based or imputed-income approach. In this Article, I argue that neither of these approaches nor the proposals they produce are fully satisfactory. Using the ability-to-pay principle, I offer a new approach to this question, which better conforms to existing tax policy and doctrine and produces a more administrable proposal than those made …

Celebrity In Cyberspace: A Personality Rights Paradigm For Personal Domain Name Disputes, Jacqueline Lipton

Jacqueline D Lipton

When the Oscar™-winning actress Julia Roberts fought for control of the domain name, what was her aim? Did she want to reap economic benefits from the name? Probably not, as she has not used the name since it was transferred to her. Or did she want to prevent others from using it on either an unjust enrichment or a privacy basis? Was she, in fact, protecting a trademark interest in her name? Personal domain name disputes, particularly those in the space, implicate unique aspects of an individual’s persona in cyberspace. Nevertheless, most of the legal rules developed for these disputes …