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LSU Law School Sues Student Over Website
hij writes: "The NY Times has an article that gives details about how the LSU Law School is suing one of its own students for a web site he maintains. The web site contains information about the Law School and also includes articles that are critical of the Law School."
From the article
The site's home page bears a disclaimer saying it is not affiliated with the law school.
Mr. Dorhauer has studied the law of domain names and said he was confident he would prevail. Legal experts who have inspected his Web site said he had a good case.
Ms. Esman said the school had made a mistake in asserting that Mr. Dorhauer aims to make money from the site. "They do seem to be focusing their complaint incorrectly on commercial uses," she said. "He's not offering any services whatsoever
Well it looks like the school should have talked more to the young man before suing him outright - after all he wasn't making pennies and he did have a disclaimer that his site has nothing to do with the law school
As always, use this handy page to view the NYT article without registering (yourself) :
NYT random login generator
The makers of US cartoon family The Simpsons are facing legal action after Rio de Janeiro's tourist board complained about an episode that made fun of the city.
It showed the main character Homer being robbed by street children and kidnapped by an unlicensed taxi, and monkeys overrunning an orphanage in the Brazilian city.
The tourist board said it could take a joke - but that the episode went too far and undermined an £18m (£12.5m) advertising campaign to attract visitors to the city.
Copy and Pasted from the "Their Sueing Me" Page:
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They Did It.
The Law School filed its lawsuit against me, their student, conveniently making sure I received notice thereof less than 48 hours before exams started. I barely had time to scan in the lawsuit and post it, but I did, and you can find a link to it below.
Many thanks to my wife, Jennifer, for putting up with me. Also, thanks to all my friends and acquaintances at the Law Center who have offered their support to me in this battle. Thanks also to all hundreds of visitors to this site who have written me in the last few weeks. It's great to have so many people--including many former LSU Law School grads--offer their assistance to me in this battle.
Now it's official: Louisiana State University HAS sued me....
My name is Douglas Dorhauer, and I am a student at the LSU Law Center. This site is my personal creation, built by me for my own use. In the event you find its contents of use, then consider it my gift to you.
Because of the similarity between this site's name and that of a local law school (of which I am a student), this site has recently been under attack. Specifically, in a letter dated November 30, 2001, Marc S. Whitfield of Taylor, Porter, Brooks & Phillips, L.L.P., legal counsel to Louisiana State University asked me to give up the domain name "lsulaw.com."
After researching the points in Mr. Whitfield's letter, I responded with a point-by-point rebuttal of each issue he raised. That response went unacknowledged for nearly two months before I requested Mr. Whitfield update me on his client's position concerning this matter.
Immediately, Mr. Whitfield responded with a threat of a lawsuit. I replied with a request to attempt an amicable resolution.
Mr. Whitfield's response to my request to amicably resolve the matter came in the form of a lawsuit naming me as defendant. Currently, I have just finished final exams. After regaining consciousness early next week, I will respond to the lawsuit, file cross-claims, etc. As always, I will post all correspondence here.
The premise of my argument is simple: all the laws Mr. Whitfield cites in his initial letter require a showing of "commerciality." I earnestly contend that this site is emphatically noncommercial, and, therefore, not susceptible of the trademark violations alleged by Mr. Whitfield.
www.slightlycrewed.com - Because aren't we all?
This Cease and Desist Letter was sent to him 30 November 2001. He responded within a few days, and seven weeks later he was threatened with a lawsuit on 11 February 2002. He responded to that on 04 March 2002, and they finally served him on 20 April 2002.
The new york times article indicates he recieved the cease and desist letter and the trademark infringement suit "last month, two days before his second-year final exams." Poppycock. He's had six months to work this out.
"[T]he single essential element on which all discoveries will be dependent is human freedom." -- Barry Goldwater
For extra credit, explain how Congress could have passed the rule you allege it passed without running into serious First Amendment problems (TM law, after all, comes from the Commerce Clause, and not from the Copyright clause).
I have a blog.