Here's my link for what it's worth. Now, do I get a certificate suitable for framing? Actually, I think that, while I don't understand all of the implications of this update, it is another example of how cool the Userland community is. I'm just glad to be a part of it.
7:59:26 PM
From Newsweek: Miami lawyer Reed Somberg filed a class-action suit against Penthouse Magazine owner Bob Guccione on the grounds that he committed fraud when he promised his 1.2 million readers that the June issue contained nude photos of tennis player Anna Kournikova. The photos were of someone who merely looked like her, and Guccione insists that he acted with good intentions. The 47-year-old Somberg disagrees, saying he spent $8.99 on a lie and he wants his money back.
Everything is a class action these days, but I'm sure the plaintiff's bar will insist that class actions provide important remedies for wrongs that would otherwise go unredressed. This case is obviously a testament to that argument.
5:33:30 PM
I have updated my Radio root, and links...
And now, since I've been a good boy, can I have some more porridge please? If you haven't updated yet Master Dave would like to see you in his office immediately.
4:35:37 PM
William Safire - "J. Edgar Mueller"
From N.Y. Times: "Just because the F.B.I. brass hats are presently computer illiterate, do they think the public is totally ignorant of the ability of today's technologists to combine government surveillance reports, names on membership lists, and "data mining" by private snoops to create an instant dossier on law-abiding Americans?
Consider the new reach of federal power: the income-tax return you provided your mortgage lender; your academic scores and personnel ratings, credit card purchases and E-ZPass movements..."
When all the 9/11 stuff happened I had a knee-jerk reaction: "Let's give our guys some high-tech tools and if we have to forego some liberties to let them catch the bad guys then so be it..." Well, now it's starting to look like our guys had tools and didn't know how to use them, and I'm feeling like maybe giving up more rights isn't going to help them as much as it is going to potentially hurt me....
4:09:50 PM
From GigaLaw: "Sen. Joseph Lieberman's office has been straining under the unrelenting embarrassment of an e-mail that will not stop replicating itself. "To my knowledge, this is one of the most severe episodes" of unintended spam mail in Senate history, said Dan Gerstein, a spokesman for the senator in Washington." [Story Link]
Apparently, he was using "cc:mail" as his E-mail program. Does anyone really use that anymore?
2:22:06 PM
From The Trademark Blog: "T-Shirt Hell, Inc. is suing Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne, Epic Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Signature Network, Monolith, Hot Topics, and Lexitrends for trademark infringement. T-Shirt Hell is claiming its T-shirt design reading "Fuck My Family I'm Moving in with the Osbournes" has been ripped off by the Osbournes on a T-shirt that reads, *&@# My Family! I'm Moving in with … The Osbourne Family." [Story Link]
T-Shirt Hell is looking for $15 million and has an interesting site wherein the litigation is prominently featured, and of course, T-Shirts are for sale. As Jar-Jar Binks would say "Isa tinking dat de Osbournes be habin dee advantage..."
1:23:42 PM
From TVC Alert: A professor who anonymously ran a Web site that criticized administrators at the University of Louisiana at Monroe revealed his identity last week, and the site was shut down, after a vice president of the university sued the Internet company that hosted the site.
John L. Scott, an associate professor of economics at the university, disclosed that he has operated the Truth at ULM Web site, which discusses news and rumors about the university.[Story Link]
Boston Globe. Students at Williams college build site to evaluate teachers. The new information flow has irked teachers. Sample: >>>Said another about a veteran astronomy professor: ''Completely inaccessible, patronizing and unsympathetic. Why teach if you can't seem to stand students?''<<<
>>>At least a few people are responding to the new system with humor, however. Someone - anonymously - recently created ''Studentrak'' on the Williams Web site, where faculty are invited to rate students. In a parenthetical, Studentrak adds: ''This is a PARODY site. We would never really do this.''<<<
Of course, the site is only available to University insiders.
From Law.com: "Despite their names, the only thing uniting the Washington Legal Foundation and the Legal Foundation of Washington is a battle over millions of dollars routed annually from lawyers' trust accounts to nonprofit organizations. Washington, D.C.-based WLF says Washington state's Interest on Lawyer's Trust Accounts program is a taking. The U.S. Supreme Court will consider at its next private conferences whether to hear the case."
For the non-lawyers IOLTA stands for "Interest on Lawyer Trust Accounts" and here's what happens. A lawyer can't ethically hold client money in trust bearing accounts, but some smart people figured out that when this happens the banks are the ones that win. Why not, they thought, have the money put in interest bearing accounts where the lawyers don't get the money, but instead it goes to nonprofit legal services organizations? A win-win deal (only the banks don't "win" 'cause they don't get to keep the money they used to keep). Anyway, believe it or not, there are legal issues here that have to be sorted out so that they good guys can get the money that would otherwise go to the banks.
8:06:07 AM
From Law.com: "Reversing a lower court's ruling, the Texas Supreme Court has held that an insured can sue its liability insurance company for damages incurred because the insurer unfairly delayed settling a third-party's claim. The court ruled in favor of the insurer but the decision is considered a victory for insureds because they can sue insurers if they meet certain standards of proof for liability."
From Law.com: "A New York judge has thrown out a $2 million punitive damages award against Merck & Co. for defaming a woman in a brochure marketing an AIDS treatment drug. The judge found that though Merck and its advertising agency's conduct may have been negligent, it didn't "rise to the level of hatred, ill will, spite, criminal mental state or willful wanton and deliberate disregard" of the woman's interests to merit the award."
