Five Years Ago

This week in 2012, we saw some copyright insanity when BMG issued a YouTube takedown on a Mitt Romney campaign ad for including a clip of Obama singing an Al Green song, and then the next day went on to take down the original clip, because even the President was a pirate in the eyes of the entertainment industry. Thankfully, by the end of the week, YouTube decided the videos were fair use, and restored them. Meanwhile, Viacom was blacking out web clips as part of a spat with DirecTV, leading Jon Stewart to blast them on their own network and get them to reverse the decision for at least some clips. And in New Zealand, the judge in Kim Dotcom's extradition trial spoke out against the TPP and copyright extremism, which forced him to step down from the case (even though the same thing never seems to happen to pro-copyright judges).

Ten Years Ago

This week in 2007, the RIAA finally found itself on the hook for legal fees in one of its aggressive lawsuits, despite its usual strategy of dropping cases whenever that looked like a possibility. The head of an LA news agency who made headlines by being the first person to sue YouTube for copyright infringement decided he might take his misguided fight to Apple as well. The MPAA was speaking out against net neutrality because it might interfere with anti-piracy enforcement, Clear Channel was trying to use the Sirius-XM merger as a reason to get looser restrictions on terrestrial radio ownership, and Microsoft was making promises about future Windows editions as damage control after the poor reception of Vista.

Fifteen Years Ago

This week in 2002, webcasters were appealing the new royalty rates that would cripple them, tech executives were seeking a better starting point for a conversation about piracy with Hollywood, and Universal was doing the kind of thing Universal does and appointing a new "senior vice president of anti-piracy". At least one analyst was looking at broadband adoption in a more positive light than usual at the time, while others were not too sanguine on the future of 3D TV — but we also took a moment to celebrate how it's often unglamorous technology that changes history the most, on the 100th birthday of the air conditioner.

As you may know, San Diego Comic Con is going on right now. And, like many techie/geeky people, while I've never attended the show, I always look forward to what comes out of the event. However, SDCC is increasingly looking like a massive censorial bully. A few years ago, we covered what we believed to be a fairly silly trademark dispute that SDCC had filed against the organizers of the Salt Lake Comic Con. We pointed out that trademarking "Comic Con" seemed silly and there was no problem with multiple Comic Con's happily co-existing. And, really, SDCC is the 800-lb gorilla here. It's the dominant comic con and has been for many, many years, as it seems to grow larger and larger. Other cities having their own comic conventions doesn't take away from SDCC (if anything they tend to reinforce the dominance of SDCC).

Last month, in covering some news about the case still going on, we added a long (longer than the post itself...) editor's note about the truly weird situation in which SDCC had sent us a ridiculous subpoena demanding (among other things) any internal documents ever mentioning SDCC and implying that we had some sort of business relationship with the organizers of the SLC event (to be clear, we have zero relationship with anyone involved in either event -- we just found a story written about the case and used that as the basis for our posts on the topic). We pushed back on SDCC and noted that it really appeared that their fishing expedition was an attempt to intimidate the press from reporting on this case. It was... really strange.

And now, with SDCC happening right now, the Hollywood Reporter has the latest on the case, in which SDCC has filed for one of the strangest legal gag orders I've seen in a while. I mean, I've seen these kinds of gag order requests filed by pro se plaintiffs, but rarely by competent lawyers working at giant famous law firms.

You can read the demand for a protective order here or below, and if I had to summarize it, it's basically: "it's no fair that Salt Lake Comic Con is getting good press coverage and we're being mocked, so the court should silence them." I read through the document and I kept expecting more... and... that's really it. They literally complain that they're losing in "the court of public opinion" and argue that it's somehow unfair that one side is talking about this case publicly and they should be barred from any further conversation. And, it gives some more context to the paranoid view that was clear in the subpoena we received: SDCC and/or its lawyers are so focused on the negative press coverage that they seem to assume that something more nefarious is going on... beyond the basic likelihood that lots of people think this lawsuit is over-aggressive bullying by SDCC.

Since the inception of this dispute, Defendants have brazenly engaged in a strategic public campaign to disparage SDCC and “win this case in the court of public opinion.” Defendants’ public campaign has included statements made in numerous press releases, news articles, on websites and on social media including Facebook and Twitter. Indeed, Defendants boast they have secured more than 200,000 media articles reporting on the case that are “favorable” to Defendants.

Um, so? I have no idea what's wrong with someone trying to get their story out when they've been sued -- especially by a much larger entity. While some people choose not to go that path, there's nothing illegal about telling your story when you've been sued -- and nothing wrong with the media picking up on the story. It's news.

SDCC goes on to claim that many of the statements made by the defendants in the case "are misleading, prejudicial, inflammatory or false." If that's the case, then go after them for defamation. Don't ask for a gag order.

Defendants repeatedly litigate their case by using media outlets to mischaracterize the parties’ positions and taint the public’s perception regarding the issues in dispute in this case. Defendants’ media campaign is increasing in intensity as this case nears trial. Defendants’ goal is to win this case by using media outlets to tarnish the reputation of SDCC and taint the jury pool. As Defendant Bryan Brandenburg stated in one of Defendants’ many press releases, “I am asking for support from the community and all the powers of the Universe to bring victory to us in this case.”

The "jury" tainting is the only aspect of any of this that seems to have a kernel of reasonableness -- but seems easily dealt with during jury selection, in which you ask the potential jurors if they're familiar with the dispute. Despite the supposed 200,000 articles on this (more on that in a moment...) I find it hard to believe that the average potential juror has heard about this dispute at all. Hell, we covered it and I had totally forgotten about it until we got that stupid subpoena (it was so ridiculous that I told the process server that he must have the wrong guy when he showed up at my front door).

From here, SDCC's high priced fancy lawyers then admit that this goes against the basic First Amendment protections anyone has... but argues that's fine and dandy because -- *gosh* -- some people are being mean to them online.

It is appropriate, however, to impose greater restrictions on the free speech rights of trial participants (such as parties and their attorneys) than on the rights of nonparticipants. Levine, 764 F.2d at 595. As the Ninth Circuit noted when considering a district court’s order restricting statements of trial participants, “several other courts have considered similar restraining orders. The overwhelming majority of those courts have upheld the restraining orders.” Id. at 596 (citing numerous cases in which restraining order on trial participants were upheld).

Now, it's important to look at the details of the case that they cite as precedent for why they can gag the people they sued: Joel Levine v. US District Court for Central District. First off, that was a criminal case, not a civil one, and it involved the lawyer for one of the people who had been charged with espionage talking to the press, and the court arguing that in certain circumstances, you could issue a very narrow injunction on this type of thing. But there are lots of conditions on that and it's hard to see how those conditions apply to a civil dispute -- and especially one where the civil dispute involves a large organization (SDCC) suing a smaller one (SLCC) and then trying to further silence the small one.

Indeed, the ruling in the Levine case specifically notes that because it's talking about lawyers the standards are different:

As officers of the court, court personnel and attorneys have a fiduciary responsibility not to engage in public debate that will redound to the detriment of the accused or that will obstruct the fair administration of justice. It is very doubtful that the court would not have the power to control release of information by these individuals in appropriate cases and to impose suitable limitations whose transgression could result in disciplinary proceedings.

But in this case, SDCC is trying to gag the actual defendants, not the lawyers.

Further, the Levine opinion makes it clear that there should be strict scrutiny applied before issuing such a gag order, as it clearly is prior restraint. From the opinion:

Accordingly, the district court's order may be upheld only if the government establishes that: (1) the activity restrained poses either a clear and present danger or a serious and imminent threat to a protected competing interest,... (2) the order is narrowly drawn.... and (3) less restrictive alternatives are not available

And, really, is "people are being mean about us online" really going to qualify as "a clear and present danger or a serious and imminent threat to a protected competing interest"? Come on!

The rest of the request for the gag order is basically "damn, the other side has been effective in telling their story to the press. That's so unfair."

Since the inception of this dispute, Defendants have engaged in a willful, open, and consistent strategy to win this case “in the court of public opinion.” See Edge Decl. Ex. 1, at p. 6. Through numerous press releases, articles, interviews with various media outlets, and the pervasive use of social media, Defendants (most notably Bryan Brandenburg) have been posting material and making statements that are designed to tarnish the reputation of SDCC and thereby influence the public (including the jury pool) regarding who should prevail in this litigation. In many instances, these statements are misleading, prejudicial, inflammatory, or false. Indeed, Defendants have made their strategy and intention clear from the outset. On August 11, 2014, shortly after the dispute between the parties began, Brandenburg commented extensively in an article in Inside Counsel titled “Salt Lake Comic Con founders fight back” with the subtitle “Use the court of public opinion to combat trademark infringement claims brought by the San Diego Comic-Con.” Id. The article paints Defendants as “David” to SDCC’s “Goliath,” and compares SDCC to Superman’s nemesis Lex Luthor. Brandenburg is credited in the article with the following statement “[a]fter consulting with their lawyers, the team behind the Salt Lake Comic Con knew they had strong legal ground to stand on, but they didn’t want to go to court, they wanted to win in the court of public opinion.” Id. (emphasis added). Brandenburg is further quoted as saying “[o]ur strategy was, if we are going to spend legal fees vs. legal fees, we wanted to be creative. We put it out to the public, challenging the cease and desist letter publically.” Id. at p. 7 (emphasis added) (noting “anecdotally, the fans seem to be on the side of Salt Lake’s David rather than San Diego’s Goliath”).

Again, I'm trying to understand what the issue is here. Lots of people involved in court cases look to get support in the court of public opinion, but none of that really matters compared to the court of actual opinion: the court that is hearing the case. And, sure, the jury tainting bit is potentially an issue, but only if you really believe that the entire jury pool is going to be tainted by this. And that seems... difficult to believe.

Of course, the whole "200,000" articles bit is part of the effort to argue that this info is widespread... but the details there are... lacking. It appears the vast majority of those 200,000 are... because the Associated Press wrote about the case and it has 160,000 distribution partners.

Defendants boast that an article written by the Associated Press about this dispute was published in more than 160,000 news outlets worldwide and claim many media outlets have already declared Salt Lake Comic Con the winner in the court of public opinion.

Okay... well, I went looking for the AP stories on the case... and they're pretty damn balanced (as you would expect from the AP). Here's one from 2015 that seems unlikely to bias anyone:

Salt Lake City co-founder Bryan Brandenburg said the trademark announced Thursday will be decisive in the suit, but attorneys for the established San Diego Comic-Con disagree. The case appears headed for trial after settlement talks broke down earlier this month.

And a more recent article:

Settlement talks have broken down between the organizers of two pop-culture conventions in California and Utah known for guests' elaborate costumes, Salt Lake Comic Con officials said Tuesday.

Both sides are asking a judge to decide the contest over naming rights, said Bryan Brandenburg, co-founder of Salt Lake Comic Con.

"They want us to change our name," Brandenburg said. If the federal judge overseeing the case in San Diego doesn't side with either convention, the case could go before a jury later this year. Salt Lake has already spent nearly $1 million legal fees on the case.

Those are both snippets from longer articles, but hardly proof that a jury will be biased.

What about social media? SDCC whines that one of the organizers of the SLC event has 5,000 Twitter followers and the SLCC Twitter feed has 30,000:

Importantly, Defendants’ public campaign is not limited to press releases and contact with news media outlets. Bryan Brandenburg has waged war against SDCC on social media as well. Brandenburg uses his Twitter feed, which has more than 5,200 followers, to comment on the dispute and disparage SDCC. See Edge Decl. Ex. 4. Similarly, Defendants use the Salt Lake Comic Con Twitter feed, which has more than 30,000 followers to comment on the dispute and accuse SDCC of fraud.

I mean, 30,000 Twitter followers is nothing to sneeze at, but... uh... let's take a look at SDCC's Twitter followers, shall we?

Now, I'm no math genius, but 1.55 million followers seems like... a wee bit more than 35,000 or so. But... but... but, SDCC replies: it's not fair that the SLC guys speak out because SDCC has specifically chosen not to comment:

It is also worth noting that in the face of Defendants’ public attacks, SDCC has exercised incredible restraint and has not responded in kind. SDCC believes this dispute should be litigated and decided in this Court. However, if Defendants’ conduct goes unchecked, SDCC will have no choice but to defend itself publically in order to protect its reputation and set the record straight when Defendants disseminate false or misleading information. This type of public exchange regarding ongoing litigation is not productive or conducive to judicial integrity and SDCC hopes it can be avoided.

Incredible restraint. We're so proud of you SDCC. Of course, it didn't stop you from sending a bogus subpoena to us (and who knows how many other media properties), potentially creating massive chilling effects on media companies reporting on your silly dispute. And, really, what exactly is the problem with responding publicly? If you don't want to, don't. If you do, do. But, if you're just concerned about the outcome of the court case, focus on that, not gagging anyone.

Unfortunately... it appears that the court granted the gag order just days before SDCC was set to start. It does limit the request though, noting that the first two parts of the request would be unconstitutional prior restraint. That covers "any false or misleading statements about SDCC or any of its board members" or "any false or misleading statements about the merits of this dispute." What the judge did grant was a gag order on statements that "accuses, suggests, implies or states that SDCC lied and/or committed fraud," "any statement about the genericness of the term comic con," "any statement about whether the term comic con is descriptive" and "any statement about whether SDCC abandoned any trademark rights."

I have trouble seeing how the first two are unconstitutional prior restraint, but the rest are allowed to be gagged -- especially something as mundane as discussing whether comic con is generic or descriptive. But, really, since the court apparently doesn't want anyone discussing that kind of thing, perhaps go ahead and have a discussion in the comments about that very question. And, in case SDCC's high priced lawyers are looking at this yet again, I'll remind you once again that we have no relationship of any kind with the organizers of the Salt Lake City event. We just don't like big bullies silencing people or filing questionable lawsuits.

It's no secret that Major League Baseball has proven themselves to be happy bullies regarding its trademarks. Between thinking it owns the letter 'W', forgetting that fair use exists, and its decision to bully amateur baseball leagues, the legal staff for MLB has shown that they can produce some really head-scratching moments.

Which brings us to the present, in which Major League Baseball has asked for an extension to decide if it wants to oppose the new logo for Overwatch League, the eSports league dedicated to playing -- you guessed it -- Overwatch.

As noted in a post on the website of law firm Morrison / Lee, the Overwatch League’s logo was approved for a trademark on March 28. Under the standard practice of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, this meant that any other parties with trademarks of their own had one month to respond to the logo—either to oppose it outright or to request more time to be able to oppose—before the logo’s trademark would actually be registered. Just one day before the end of that 30-day window, MLB filed for a 90-day extension to investigate the likeness of the OverwatchLeague’s logo to its own and potentially oppose it. Their request was considered valid and they were granted the extension immediately.

The extension expires in mere days, so we're all going to find out very soon if MLB thinks it should oppose the trademark for the following logo, helpfully placed next to the MLB logo so you can decide for yourself how confusing any of this is.

So, let's just get the obvious out of the way: these logos look nothing alike and will not cause any confusion. Period. Other than having a white outline of a "player" of each sport separating two colors and some words on the bottom, there's nothing even similar here. The colors are different, the outlines are different, the names of the leagues are both different and specifically descriptive. Confusion is simply not going to be a thing in this case.

But let's say you're not convinced. Fine. Please tell me if the following logo also confuses you.

Of course it doesn't. The NBA uses a logo with the same style and yet MLB is not at their throats over it. That's because this logo style for sports leagues is fairly standard and there hasn't been issues with confusion before.

Perhaps as MLB's legal staff considers whether to oppose Overwatch League's logo, they'll happen to come across this post. If they do, I have but one bit of advice: don't.

The Maryland Court of Special Appeals has handed down a ruling [PDF] on quasi-cell site location info. The evidence offered by the state isn't being so much suppressed as it is being rejected. The information wasn't obtained illegally and no rights were violated. Rather, the court finds the evidence to be questionable, as in "evidence of what, exactly?" [via EvidenceProf Blog]

The defendant in the case is charged with murder. Bashunn Phillips filed a motion to exclude the evidence, which was granted by the lower court. The state appealed. But there's nothing in it for the state.

The "evidence" -- which is going to carry around scare quotes for the remainder of this post -- doesn't tie Phillips to anything. What was submitted isn't even the equivalent of coarse cell site location info. What the state submitted is something that can easily be obtained without a warrant… because it doesn't actually target any person at all.

Phillips filed a motion in limine on August 7, 2015, seeking to exclude the RF signal propagation map and related testimony. Phillips argued that the method used to create the map was not generally accepted as reliable within the relevant scientific community under Maryland’s Frye-Reed test for admissibility of evidence based on novel scientific methodology. Phillips acknowledged that cell phone tower “ping” evidence is admissible, but drew a distinction between the method used to create the RF signal propagation map and the collection of historical cell phone “ping” evidence.

This is an interesting form of evidence -- something that amounts to cell tower hearsay. It's not like it's much trouble to obtain historical cell site data. This can be done without a warrant in Maryland, despite the recent ruling that requires warrants for Stingray deployment. Historical cell site location data is still a third-party record as far as the federal courts are concerned, so good faith, if nothing else, would have salvaged the warrantless harvesting of this data.

For whatever reason, local law enforcement chose to have the FBI perform a "drive test" of cell towers in the area of the criminal activity, ten months after it happened. Perhaps law enforcement wanted to believe this data would indicate something and allowed itself to be persuaded by pitches like this one, from a company that offers "cell site forensics" to law enforcement agencies.

Cell Site Analysis (CSA) the science of reconstructing the physical movements of a mobile telephone or telecommunication device. The evidence produced from such advanced investigations can be especially powerful in attributing contact between individuals, proximity to a scene of crime, patterns of movement of suspects, and testing the strength of alibi evidence.

These assertions are undermined further down the page when the company explains the limits of drive tests:

How accurate is Cell Site Analysis? This is a common question and there is no short answer. A number of factors come into play, including the type of signalling technology used (GSM/UMTS/CDMA), the local topology (man made or natural obstructions), the height of the antennae, type of CDRs available, physical location of other masts, angling of the transceivers, and degree of network activity (other subscribers). In some instances Cell Site Analysis can be accurate to a few metres, or sometimes a few streets (approximately a postcode).

In other words, most likely not all that accurate. Pinning down a historical cell signal based on a 10-month post facto RF analysis is extremely iffy. Being within a few streets of a committed crime proves nothing. Given the number of variables, these tests are perhaps best left to their original purpose: providing cell service providers info on possible dead zones. That doesn't stop Afentis Forensics from wrapping up this paragraph in an overconfident manner.

However, the technique remains an extremely powerful tool to test an alibi, to show that a number of people were together at a certain time, or to highlight the fact that a suspect was at a crime scene.

The defense in this case pointed out drive tests are indicative of nothing:

Phillips maintained that drive tests are routinely performed by cell phone companies to improve coverage and minimize “dropped calls,” but that they are not generally accepted in criminal investigations. Testifying for the defense, William Folson, accepted as an expert witness “in the field of cellular technology and historical cell site analysis” explained that he “consider[s] [drive tests] a waste of time” because “[t]hey add no value to the historical analysis of a cell phone.” He further testified that the manner in which Special Agent Fennern had performed the drive test was not accepted as reliable in the relevant scientific community. Mr. Folson explained that the RF signal range in December 2013 when the murder occurred would be different than the range in October 2014 when the drive test was conducted because the strength of RF signals fluctuate. Because of this, according to Mr. Folson, a drive test is not representative of the strength of the RF signals on any other date. He also pointed out that drive tests were not peer reviewed, accepted by the scientific community, or used in criminal investigations.

It's almost impossible to find a drive test submitted as evidence in a criminal investigation. Granted, a search for this terminology is bound to miss a few cases, especially those behind the US government's PACER paywall, but the lack of hits suggests this "evidence" is very rarely submitted in criminal trials. What can be found suggests the method used by the FBI agent in this case is completely wrong. Ten months after the fact gives you nothing but garbage.

[T]he coverage area of a cell tower should never be part of an analyst's mapping or court presentations unless that information comes directly from the wireless telephone company in the form of a radio propagation map or in some rare cases, in the form of drive testing that occurred contemporaneous to the date and time of the incident.

Apparently, this "evidence" is a bit more popular in Australia. A paper by a legal aid group discusses several problems with using drive tests/RF signal propagation maps as evidence.

Topography, weather, usage load, broadcast wattage, and overlap of cell coverage entail that to go to point A and make test calls now with the result that some or all of those test calls go through a specified sector of a particular base station does not ‘prove’ that at some other earlier time calls from point A went through that same specified sector. At that other time they may have gone through another sector. When a user places a call, the cell phone connects to the cell site with the strongest signal. Indoor or outdoor use of the phone and cell phone orientation to the user’s head can alter the strength of the signal. These are important considerations when attempting to recreate an alleged past event.

In general it is often easier to be more definitive about the converse proposition, namely that from the Cell ID information it is unlikely that the call was made (or received) outside a specified area. Access from the Telcos to propagation prediction modelling (ie for both ‘dominant’ and ‘possible’ coverage of relevant sectors) is helpful but insufficient to be certain about phone location.

In this context of qualified uncertainty, it is highly misleading to infer positive location with the phrase ‘the Cell ID identified with a call is consistent with the call being made in that location.’

In the Maryland case, the state offered up two witnesses to rebut the "this data doesn't prove anything" defense argument.

Providing a different opinion and testifying for the State, Special Agent Fennern was accepted as an “expert in the field of historical cell site analysis, cellular technology, and [] radio frequency drive testing for cell phone mapping.” Agent Fennern opined that factors such as weather only have a “minimal” impact on radio frequency strength. He also testified that, relying on information provided by cell phone companies, the RF signal strength only varied by five or ten percent.

The State also offered the testimony of T-Mobile employee Stephen Willingham, accepted as an expert in radio frequency engineering. He testified that cell phone companies use drive tests for “competitive analysis reasons.” He explained that when a customer complains about a missed call, a cell phone company will use a drive test to attempt to recreate that dropped call to identify a gap in service. Mr. Willingham testified that, over time, radio frequency “[f]ootprints remain consistent as long as nothing major has changed[,]” referring to the physical layout of the cell site, such as antennas and equipment. He stated that the maximum variation he had seen for a footprint was a quarter mile.

Even if all the variables stay the same, the only thing that can truthfully be said is they're possibly accurate within a quarter mile. If that's the case, it's impossible to claim someone was at the scene of a crime using nothing more than an RF propagation map. And, if the arguments made by the defendant are any indication, the state never bothered obtaining or submitting historical cell site location info (the "ping" evidence).

The appeals court agrees with the lower court's opinion: the state can't show anyone has accepted drive tests as a reliable source of evidence in criminal cases.

After determining that the digital forensic science field is the relevant scientific community, the court found that the State’s experts lacked familiarity with that field and were unable to produce studies or peer-reviewed articles in that field supporting the reliability or general acceptance of drive tests for forensic purposes. The court ultimately concluded that the State did not establish that drive tests as used by the FBI are generally accepted in the digital forensic science community. The court then mused that, even if the drive test were considered generally accepted and reliable, the State’s experts were not qualified to testify because they were not members of the digital forensic science community and failed to satisfy the requirement of Maryland Rule 5-702.

This case is exceptionally weird, considering local law enforcement had help from the FBI. Unless the defendant's provider was extremely proactive in scrapping old location data and/or was unresponsive to subpoenas for call records, the state should have had something better than a drive test to place the defendant at the scene. But this is the only evidence the defendant sought to exclude, which suggests other cell records were never introduced. If so, this is a case where law enforcement had several options, but for some reason chose to use the worst one.

Lots of anti-harassment laws have been written over the years. The creation of these laws has sped up as legislators look to find some way of handling cyberbullying and online harassment. These laws have been uniformly bad. Those that make it to governors' desks are often struck down shortly thereafter by courts.

The problem is legislators try to target certain behavior with these laws, but seldom consider the amount of protected speech that will be caught in the laws' webbing. Or maybe these thoughts never enter the minds of legislators, who tend to write these bills badly and broadly.

We've seen multiple statutes come tumbling down after a Constitutional challenge. Eugene Volokh -- along with Venkat Balasubramani -- is challenging Washington state's harassment law over its stripping of free speech protections.

A Washington state statute criminalizes (among other things) “mak[ing] an electronic communication to … a third party” “with intent to harass, … torment, or embarrass any other person” if the communication is made “[a]nonymously or repeatedly.” This deliberately extends beyond unprotected speech (such as true threats or libel). It deliberately extends beyond unwanted speech said to a particular person and forbids embarrassing speech said about that person. Repeatedly criticizing a politician on your blog, for instance, could send you to jail if a prosecutor and judge or jury concludes that you were intending to “harass,” “torment” or “embarrass.”

There are several problems with the law, not the least of which is its addition of anonymity to the list of criminal stipulation. As Volokh notes, the law could be used to imprison bloggers who repeatedly criticize politicians -- an activity the term "blogging" is pretty much synonymous with.

Raising the challenge is Richard Rynearson, a retired Air Force major who has repeatedly criticized politicians for failing to condemn the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act, which authorizes the indefinite detention of US citizens thanks to our engagement in the Forever War on Terrorism.

And it's no longer a hypothetical question of whether Washington's anti-harassment law can be used to prosecute people for criticizing politicians. There are potential criminal charges awaiting Rynearson, thanks to a local politician's decision to leverage this law against a critic.

Rynearson, of Bainbridge Island, has repeatedly written posts that criticize — but don't threaten — Clarence Moriwaki, a key activist behind the formation of the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial, commemorating the World War II internment of Japanese Americans.

He insists that those who condemn the internment should also strongly speak out against the government's indefinite detention powers in the war on terror, but that Moriwaki hasn't.

After Moriwaki obtained a temporary restraining order and filed a police report last spring, saying he was being harassed by incessant text messages and Facebook posts, investigators recommended that Rynearson be charged with cyberstalking.

A deputy prosecutor in Kitsap County suggested in an email to Rynearson's lawyer in that matter the office might file charges if his behavior continued, but he has not been charged.

Volokh and Balasubramani have filed a motion [PDF] asking the court for an immediate injunction preventing the enforcement of the law while it's being challenged in court. Hopefully, this temporary injunction will be followed by a permanent ban on enforcement, because it's an unconstitutional law.

The breadth of the statute extends in several dimensions. First, the intent provision — sweeping in speech that a jury might find was intended to “harass, intimidate, torment, or embarrass any other person” — reaches broadly. The terms “harass, intimidate, torment, or embarrass” are not defined by the statute. The Washington Supreme Court, in a case examining the similarly-worded telephone-harassment statute, has defined “intimidate” to include “compel[ling] to action or inaction (as by threats),” Seattle v. Huff, 767 P.2d 572, 576 (Wash. 1989), but it did not provide a definition for the other proscribed purposes.

When statutory terms are undefined, however, Washington courts generally give them their ordinary meaning, including the dictionary definition. See id. (defining “intimidate” by reference to definition in Webster’s Third New International Dictionary). The dictionary definition of “harass” includes “to vex, trouble, or annoy continually or chronically,” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged (online ed. 2017), and the meaning of “torment” includes “to cause worry or vexation to,” id. Finally, “embarrass” means “to cause to experience a state of self-conscious distress.” Id. As a result, even public criticisms of public figures and public officials could be subject to criminal prosecution and punishment if they are seen as intended to persistently “vex” or “annoy” those public figures, or to embarrass or make them “self-conscious” about something.

The granting of a temporary injunction rests on the plaintiff's ability to prove he's being harmed. To date, Rynearson hasn't been arrested, but the local prosecutors have refused to say whether they're taking any action or are dropping the complaint against the blogger. So, it's not a case of hypotheticals. Others criticized by Rynearson could file similar complaints under the harassment law, hoping to nudge prosecutors towards bringing criminal charges.

The permaban, however, hinges on the First Amendment. Given the language used in the law, it certainly doesn't appear the statute can be read to steer clear of infringements on protected speech. This law was passed in 2004, but no one felt like abusing it to silence criticism until just recently. Now, the law will finally be examined by a federal court where it's unlikely to withstand Constitutional scrutiny.

At some point, even the dimmest of lawyers will understand that parody and fair use are not infringement. There may be all sorts of reasons why big companies send dubious cease-and-desist letters over protected speech. Sometimes it's because lawyers are misinformed. Sometimes it's to silence criticism.

But in an odd and all around hilarious exchange between the company that owns the Olive Garden chain of restaurants and the owner of a website that reviews Olive Garden dishes, I can't think of a single reason why a sane lawyer would want to fire off the following letter to allofgarden.com.

To Whom It May Concern:

As you are likely aware, Darden is a full-service restaurant company, and owns and operates over 1,500 restaurants through subsidiaries under the Olive Garden®, LongHorn Steakhouse®, The Capital Grille®, Yard House®, Seasons 52®, Bahama Breeze®, and Eddie V's Prime Seafood® brands and has a portfolio of over 650 trademarks in over 70 countries related to the same (collectively "Trademarks”.)

In connection with Darden Corporation’s proprietary rights over its famous trademark(s) we are notifying you of the following:

Darden Corporation has recently learned that the trademark Olive Garden appears as a metatag, keyword, visible or hidden text on the web site(s) located at the below listed URL(s) without having obtained prior written authorization from Darden Corporation. This practice infringes upon the exclusive intellectual property rights of Darden Corporation.

http://allofgarden.com/

As a trademark owner, Darden Corporation is obligated to enforce its rights by taking action to ensure that others do not use its trademarks without permission. Unauthorized use of the trademark(s) could create a likelihood of confusion with Darden Corporation’s trademark as to the source, sponsorship, affiliation, or endorsement of your web site(s), online location(s), products or services.

In light of the above, we request that you respond to this e-mail within ten (10) days, informing us that you have removed all metatags, keywords, visible or hidden texts including trademark(s) presently appearing on the above-cited website(s) and any other website(s), or draw this issue to the attention of the appropriate person(s).

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter.

Sincerely,

Darden Corporation
brandenforcements@mm-darden.com

There's much to unpack there. First, claiming trademark infringement for use of marks in metatags and simple text within a website is a highly dubious practice. But when even the most cursory glance at allofgarden.com makes it clear that it's a site dedicated to reviewing Olive Garden, it should be immediately obvious that even the most direct reference to the chain would be squarely covered by fair use. Even the name of the site, something of a homophone of the Olive Garden name, would be covered as parody, if not as part of the site's status as a review site. Even more strangely, it's not as though this is one of those so-called "sucks sites" dedicated to simply slamming Olive Garden at every turn. Some reviews, such as this one, are purely positive, devoid of snark at all.

But if Malone is a talented reviewer of chain-based "Italian" food, he's a savant in responding to frivolous legal threats, as he has happily posted his response on his website for all to see.

Mr. Forcements -- may I call you Branden? Since this an asynchronous mode of communication, I'm going to assume you are magnanimously acquiescing, and I will refer to you as Branden forthwith -- I received your email yesterday.

I am not aware of any law against reviewing food and describing it using the name of the company from which it was procured. Some might even call it Nominative Fair Use. I have helpfully included a link to Wikipedia™, The Free Encyclopedia™, for more information on this concept, in case you are new. Just click on the blue words to access the HyperLink™, and you will be transported there in great haste.

With that in mind, can you be more specific about what you would like me to do? If you want me to remove references to the Olive Garden from my blog, which, I remind you, solely consists of references to Olive Garden, I'm afraid I must decline.

If you are asking me to simply add TradeMark® Symbols™ I must also decline, as I do not know the alt keycode for writing them.

Perhaps you are asking me to take down my blog entirely. In doing so, Darden Corporation would commit its largest crime against humanity since they started charging extra for toppings. Seriously, $2.99 for two lousy meatballs? And you're saying I ripped you off?

Please respond within nine (9) days, in limerick form.

Wishing the whole Forcements family a pleasant day,

Vincent "Vino" Malone
Olive Garden Connoisseur
Age 29 and a Half

Every part of this response is pure gold, from the intentional misreading of the emailer's name to the refusal to comply with every request and link with the reasons why. Malone is being a pleasant pain in the ass in this response, yes, but it's funny. It's also now public, thanks to Malone's posting of it. And, most importantly, the request from Olive Garden is a silly one when viewed with an eye towards the law.

Still, I have to admit I'm slightly hoping that Branden Forcements replies in limerick form as requested, just to see what they come up with. If Olive Garden wants to get on the right side of this thing quickly, that limerick will be in the form of an apology.

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It only took a month for a court to dump a bogus defamation suit brought by someone who sued one person for things someone else said. Jim Myers wrote an article for The Tennessean discussing changes made to a culinary arts program. The former director of the program -- Thomas Loftis -- didn't like characterizations made in the article. For reasons known only to him and his lawyers, Loftis sued the new director of the culinary arts program, rather than the columnist or the paper that published his article.

The lawsuit is now dead, thanks to a swift, verbal ruling by the presiding judge. Following a couple of complaints and motions to dismiss, attorney Daniel Horowitz has secured a win for his client.

In his verbal ruling from the bench dismissing the lawsuit against Mr. Rayburn, Judge Jones noted that under Tennessee law, an allegedly defamatory statement must “be read as a person of ordinary intelligence would understand it in light of the surrounding circumstances.” Judge Jones also observed that whether a statement is capable of being understood as defamatory “is a question of law to be determined by the court.” Finding that Mr. Loftis’s Complaint could not satisfy these basic standards even at the motion to dismiss stage, Judge Jones dismissed Mr. Loftis’s lawsuit with prejudice and assessed him the costs of the litigation.

The only thing going for Loftis is the swift dismissal, which means he won't be out much in terms of legal fees. Whatever Loftis did end up paying for his own counsel can hardly be considered money well-spent. His lawsuit seemed to be motivated out of professional jealousy, rather than any sincere belief his reputation had been harmed. But that sort of personal issue shouldn't be allowed to make its way into court:

The legal system should not be used to litigate hurt feelings or to deter people from speaking to the media.

Despite multiple rewrites, Loftis' lawsuit never managed to tie the defendant -- the new arts director the Tennessean columnist considered to be a huge improvement over his predecessor -- to any actual defamation, much less any disparaging words that actually came out of the new culinary director's mouth.

The reply motion [PDF] by Rayburn is worth a read, simply because it hammers home just how objectively terrible this lawsuit is. Fortunately, the plaintiff wasn't given much of a chance to annoy the target of his bogus suit and certainly won't be leaving him in a worse financial situation.

You might recall that when HBO comedian John Oliver originally addressed net neutrality on his show in 2014, the FCC website crashed under the load of concerned consumers eager to support the creation of real net neutrality rules. When Oliver revisited the topic last May to discuss FCC boss Ajit Pai's myopic plan to kill those same rules, the FCC website crashed under the load a second time. Both instances did a fantastic job highlighting how satire often tops traditional journalism in driving interest toward what can often be rather wonky tech policy issues.

But then something weird happened. In the midst of all the attention Oliver was receiving for his segment, the FCC issued a statement (pdf) by FCC Chief Information Officer David Bray, claiming that comprehensive FCC "analysis" indicated that it was a malicious DDoS attack, not angry net neutrality supporters, that brought the agency's website to its knees:

"Beginning on Sunday night at midnight, our analysis reveals that the FCC was subject to multiple distributed denial-of-service attacks (DDos). These were deliberate attempts by external actors to bombard the FCC’s comment system with a high amount of traffic to our commercial cloud host. These actors were not attempting to file comments themselves; rather they made it difficult for legitimate commenters to access and file with the FCC."

But this claim that a DDoS disabled the FCC website at coincidentally the exact same time Oliver's segment was airing raised a few eyebrows among security experts, who noted they saw none of the usual online indicators pointing to a DDoS attack, nor any evidence of an attack via publicly-available logs. Security analysts noted the FCC provided no evidence to support their claim of an attack, and the agency has consistently and repeatedly refused to offer any additional hard detail, despite being prodded by several Senators on the subject.

Hoping to glean a little more information, Gizmodo recently filed a FOIA request asking for server logs or documents offering more insight into this supposed attack. What they found is that the FCC never conducted said "analysis" of the attack in the first place:

"The FCC now tells Gizmodo, however, that it holds no records of such an analysis ever being performed on its public comment system; the agency claims that while its IT staff observed a cyberattack taking place, those observations “did not result in written documentation."

Gizmodo's FOIA request asked for "all communications between employees in the offices of Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner Michael O’Rielly" concerning the alleged cyberattack, as well as copies of "any records related to the FCC 'analysis' (cited in Dr. Bray’s statement) that concluded a DDoS attack had taken place." What they got instead was 17 pages of heavy redactions and nonsense (including several user complaints about what Pai's been up to) and a rotating crop of excuses for why the FCC couldn't be more transparent about the alleged attack:

"The agency cited a variety of reasons for why it was refusing to release 209 documents related to the purported DDoS attack. Some of the records, it says, contain “trade secrets and commercial or financial information” which it deems “privileged or confidential,” citing the Trade Secrets Act. Other documents were withheld in an effort to “prevent injury to the quality of agency decisions,” citing a FOIA exemption that typically protects attorney-client communications but also extends to documents that reflect “advisory opinions, recommendations and deliberations” as part of the government’s decision-making processes."

It didn't take long for news outlets to highlight the FCC's refusal to be clear about what happened, prompting the agency to e-mail this press release to reporters, deriding said reports as "completely irresponsible":

"Media reports claiming that the FCC lacks written documentation of its analysis of the May 7-8 non-traditional DDoS attack that took place against our electronic comment filing system are categorically false. In its FOIA request, Gizmodo requested records related to the FCC analysis cited in Dr. David Bray’s May 8 public statement about this attack. Given that the Commission’s IT professionals were in the midst of addressing the attack on May 8, that analysis was not reduced to writing. However, subsequent analysis, once the incident had concluded, was put in writing. Indeed, analysis was made public in response to a request from Capitol Hill.

“Moreover, the FCC has never stated that it lacks any documentation of this DDoS attack itself. And news reports claiming that the Commission has said this are without any basis and completely irresponsible. In fact, we have voluminous documentation of this attack in the form of logs collected by our commercial cloud partners."

But while the FCC's statement proclaims the agency has oodles of documentation detailing the supposed DDoS (it just doesn't want to reveal it), that's the precise opposite of what the agency is telling reporters that have filed FOIA requests to get a hold of it:

So it seems like there's two options here. One is that there really was some kind of non-traditional DDoS attack, but the agency failed to conduct a detailed written analysis of what caused it, and despite boss Ajit Pai's breathless dedication to transparency, has zero interest in being up front about it.

The other possibility is the entire attack narrative was poorly-constructed bullshit, feebly designed to try and deflate the "John Oliver effect" in the media and downplay the volume of consumers pissed off about what Ajit Pai is up to. And now that Senators and reporters are pushing harder for actual evidence, the FCC is having to engage in some comical tap dancing to obfuscate the fact it made up a DDOS attack as a lame (and ineffective) PR ploy.

The former's certainly possible, but the latter's also in character. Either way, expect this and the agency's willful disregard of comment proceeding fraud to pop up in the inevitable lawsuits awaiting Ajit Pai when he rams through the final net neutrality killing vote later this year.

Last month we wrote about the tragic and hugely problematic ruling in Canada that said a Canadian court could order global censorship of content it deems to be illegal. As lots of people pointed out, that is going to have dangerous consequences for speech around the world. If you accept that Canada can censor the global internet, what's to stop China, Iran or Russia from claiming the same rights?

And now we'll get to find out if the EU similarly believes in the ability of one country to demand global censorship online. In another case that we've been following, French data protection officials had been demanding Google censor content globally, and Google had been refusing. Now, the issue has been sent to the EU Court of Justice, the very same court who created this mess three years ago in saying that Google was subject to "right to be forgotten" claims. Google had reasonably interpreted the law to just apply in the EU (where the jurisdiction existed). But now the same court will decide if EU officials can censor globally.

One hopes that the sheer absurdity of the situation may lead the CJEU to start to recognize just how problematic its ruling was back in 2014, but somehow, that's unlikely. We'll certainly be paying attention to this case...