Roundup

Defamation Litigation Roundup: Candace Owens, Firm DQ

By Theresa Schliep

In this month's review of defamation fights, Law360 highlights a new suit over right-wing media personality Candace Owens and her conspiracy theories about the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, as well as Quinn Emanuel's disqualification from a suit against a former client.

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3rd Circ. Calls Westlaw AI Fight 'Ordinary Copyright Case'

By Ivan Moreno

The Third Circuit said the first appellate fight over artificial intelligence training and fair use ultimately came down to an "ordinary copyright case," affirming that Ross Intelligence infringed Thomson Reuters' Westlaw headnotes when it used them to train a competing legal research platform.

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Paramount Gets OK On Deal With State AGs Over Merger

By Rachel Riley

A California federal judge gave the green light Wednesday to a settlement to end a group of state enforcers' challenge of Paramount Skydance's planned $110 billion purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery, saying the resolution reflects a "good faith approach" to alleviate concerns that the merger will stifle entertainment industry competition.

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9th Circ. Judges Doubt X's Claims Against Anti-Hate Group

By Dorothy Atkins

Ninth Circuit judges appeared skeptical Wednesday of X Corp.'s bid to revive claims against two nonprofits for scraping tweets to study online hate speech, with one judge questioning X's contract damages claim and another doubting that the nonprofits could be held liable for publishing true information.

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Marilyn Monroe Home's Owners Lose Landmark Fight, Again

By Gina Kim

A California federal judge nixed claims that Los Angeles officials improperly landmarked the home where Marilyn Monroe died without properly compensating the owners, ruling Monday that the landmark status isn't a regulatory taking and that the city never authorized or encouraged lookie-loo trespassers.

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DOJ Accuses Judges Of Ethics Violations With Press Remarks

By Jack Karp

Several Minnesota federal judges ran afoul of their ethical obligations when they commented on President Donald Trump's immigration policies in a recent news article, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a judicial misconduct complaint filed Wednesday.

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Analysis

IP Notebook: AI Dilution, Alamo TM, India Copyright Ruling

By Ivan Moreno

An unsettled copyright theory over competition from artificial intelligence-generated works and a trademark clash between Texas and an association representing descendants of those who fought at the Battle of the Alamo lead this edition of Law360's look at emerging copyright and trademark issues.

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Analysis

College Sports Overhaul Still Uncertain Despite Senate Lift

By Alex Lawson

A yearslong effort to comprehensively regulate college sports surged ahead this week with the U.S. Senate's easy approval of bipartisan legislation, but lingering concerns about the bill's NCAA antitrust shield and other fraught policy fights are clouding its future.

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Ga. Judge Must Justify No Sanctions In Alice-Doomed IP Case

By Dani Kass

The Federal Circuit on Wednesday ordered a Georgia federal judge to explain why it wasn't appropriate to sanction Epic Tech LLC when there were three major signs the patent it asserted against Pen-Tech Associates Inc. was invalid.

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Victoria's Secret Violated Deal For Instagram Ad, Model Says

By Gina Kim

Victoria's Secret unlawfully used a professional model's entire face in a recent Instagram perfume advertisement, despite explicit restrictions in the parties' contract to use less than 30%, and refused to pay additional compensation for doing so, according to a right-of-publicity lawsuit filed in California federal court.

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Senate Panel Seeks To Hold AI Giants Liable For Rogue Hacks

By Allison Grande

Several U.S. senators made a bipartisan push Wednesday to impose both civil and criminal liability on the makers and users of advanced artificial intelligence models for the misuse of these systems, arguing that such a move would give these companies more incentive to combat cyberattacks carried out by rogue AI agents and other potential harms. 

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Paramount Can't Ax Most Claims In Pluto TV Privacy Action

By Craig Clough

A California federal judge Tuesday allowed seven claims to proceed in an amended action alleging Paramount Skydance Corp. unlawfully disclosed the personally identifiable information of children who streamed content on its Pluto TV service, finding the parents sufficiently alleged privacy injuries after an earlier dismissal.

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Meta Fights 'Monster' Proposed $1.1B CIPA Judgment

By Rae Ann Varona

Meta has urged a California federal judge not to grant a partial final judgment of more than $1.1 billion against it for unlawfully obtaining sensitive data from users of the menstrual tracking app Flo, saying the judgment it criticized as "Frankenstein's monster" violates its due process rights.

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Google Looks To Toss 'Implausible' Amended AI Spying Action

By Taylor Bowie

Google is seeking to permanently end the third iteration of a proposed action alleging its "Smart Features" unlawfully give Gemini AI access to users' private correspondence, asserting Google's privacy policy allows it to automatically collect such communication data.

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Ohio Parents Say Netflix Hooks Kids For Ad Data

By Jonathan Capriel

Netflix falsely marketed itself as a "kid-friendly" streaming alternative to Big Tech platforms while secretly building an addictive surveillance machine around children, Ohio parents have claimed in a proposed class action, which is at least the third lawsuit accusing the company of harvesting families' personal data.

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Valve Order Allows 15K Antitrust Arbitrations To Be Closed

By Ben Adlin

A federal judge in Seattle refused Wednesday to issue a preliminary injunction to curb the closure of nearly 15,000 gamers' antitrust arbitrations against entertainment giant Valve Corp., finding that plaintiff Jeffrey Smith failed to show that closing the arbitrations would cause irreparable harm.

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Ex-NFL Players Object To Proposed Race-Norming Settlement

By Tom Lotshaw

More than 100 former NFL players spoke against a proposed class action settlement over allegedly discriminatory cognitive disability assessments, telling a federal judge it threatens to release the league's benefit plans from claims raised in other litigation and deliver largely empty rescoring promises.

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Parler Ex-CEO Makes Final Trial Pitch For $100M Damages

By Cara Salvatore

The former CEO of social media site Parler made his final argument Wednesday that he was wrongly stripped of a stake worth up to $100 million, with his lawyer telling a Nevada jury a valuation finding the entire company worth $10.81 was "bunk."

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Amazon, Investor Clash Over Del. Forum Limits On Records

By Jarek Rutz

Amazon.com Inc. and a stockholder seeking company records clashed before the Delaware Supreme Court on Wednesday over whether the investor should be restricted to using those documents in Delaware litigation, with the stockholder arguing the condition is too broad and Amazon saying it protects against duplicative lawsuits in multiple courts.

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FCC Eases Federal Enviro Reviews Of Broadband Projects

By Christopher Cole

The Federal Communications Commission voted Wednesday to substantially pare back environmental impact reviews of broadband deployment projects.

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FCC Opens 2 Spectrum Bands For Satellite Services

By Christopher Cole

The Federal Communications Commission on Wednesday opened two portions of spectrum totaling more than 1,000 megahertz to expand satellite broadband as part of a long-range plan to free up the airwaves for space-based activities.

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FCC OKs Cable Biz Waiver To Fix Banned Routers

By Nadia Dreid

The Federal Communications Commission has come through with another waiver that will allow certain companies to make changes to foreign-made routers that the agency has banned from being imported, in the hopes of avoiding the supply chain shortages that the ban created.

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Rapper Rick Ross Sued For Being A No-Show At NC Concerts

By Hayley Fowler

A concert production company has accused rapper Rick Ross of bailing at the last minute on two concerts in North Carolina during his anniversary tour, allegedly causing hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses in the form of ticket refunds and cancellation fees.

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Blank Rome Seeks Time To Exit LIV Golf's Fla. Office

By Ben Zigterman

Blank Rome LLP on Wednesday filed a limited objection to LIV Golf's motion to reject its sublease at an office building in West Palm Beach, Florida, saying it didn't receive any advance notice and would like until the end of October to transition to a new office.

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Seyfarth Brings On Glaser Weil RE, Entertainment Pro In LA

By Madison Arnold

Seyfarth Shaw LLP has added an attorney specializing in the intersection of real estate and the entertainment industry to its downtown Los Angeles office from Glaser Weil Fink Howard Jordan & Shapiro LLP.

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How ChatGPT Teen Version Raises Product Liability Questions

OpenAI's recent rollout of ChatGPT for Teens offers younger users a purportedly safer version of the software — but it could also help plaintiffs who are questioning whether earlier versions were safe for minors, when the company identified risks and when safeguards became technically viable, says Michael McCready at McCready Law.

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AI Meeting Recaps Pose New Discovery And Privilege Risks

The New York City Bar Association’s recent ethics opinion, cautioning attorneys not to record nonclient conversations with artificial intelligence tools, reflects an emerging view that AI meeting recaps are now a distinct business record category, meaning counsel should set meeting-level controls and apply framework-level updates, says William Wright at Faegre Drinker.

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UCLA Law Is Latest DOJ Target Over Race Bias In Admissions

By Dorothy Atkins

The U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division accused the UCLA School of Law of discriminating against white and Asian students in its admissions process in a letter sent to the school's counsel Thursday, following multiple other similar letters that the DOJ sent to other higher-education institutions.

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DOJ Outlines New Corporate Fraud Enforcement Priorities

By Phillip Bantz

Federal prosecutors "must place great weight" on a new list of factors when considering potential charges in corporate fraud cases, including whether the matters involve government programs, threats to national security or immigration offenses, according to a memo released Thursday by the U.S. Department of Justice.

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Trump Announces Judicial Noms For 5th Circ., NC

By Courtney Bublé

President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he's nominating Todd Butler, a managing partner at Phelps Dunbar LLP, to serve as a judge on the Fifth Circuit. 

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Blackburn Holds Up White House's Tenn. Judge Pick

By Courtney Bublé

The White House is standing by its nominee for a federal judgeship in the Eastern District of Tennessee amid a holdup from Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., a White House official confirmed to Law360 on Thursday.

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Richards Layton Atty Confirmed To Join Del. Chancery Bench

By Rose Krebs

Delaware's Senate on Thursday confirmed a Richards Layton & Finger PA director to a 12-year term as a vice chancellor on the Chancery Court.

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FBT Gibbons Beats DQ Bid In Suit Over Cigna Payments

By George Woolston

A New Jersey state court judge has rejected a plastic surgery practice's bid to disqualify FBT Gibbons LLP from representing Cigna and a group of employer-sponsored health plans in its suit over the insurer's alleged underpayments, finding the bid appears more of an effort to gain an advantage rather than one to protect the interests of any client.

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Roundup

The Top In-House Hires Of September

By Michele Gorman

Legal department hires during the past month included high-profile appointments at MSG Sports, Nestle and the Associated Press. Here, Law360 Pulse looks at some of the top in-house announcements from September.

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Judge Reinstates Rogoff As Seattle US Atty After Trump Firing

By Rachel Riley

A Washington federal judge issued an order from the bench on Thursday reinstating Roger Rogoff as U.S. attorney for the Western District of Washington, finding that President Donald Trump exceeded his authority when he fired him in July.

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Trump Says Copyright Chief Can't Stay In Office Amid Appeal

By Adam Lidgett

The Trump administration is urging the D.C. Circuit to let it remove U.S. Copyright Office leader Shira Perlmutter, arguing that the U.S. Supreme Court's decision protecting Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook for now does not entitle Perlmutter to remain in office while her firing challenge proceeds.

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Monthly Merger Review Snapshot

By Matthew Perlman

State enforcers settled their case challenging Paramount Skydance's planned $110 billion purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery, while the U.S. Department of Justice probes Fox's planned $22 billion deal for Roku and regulators review massive deals in the energy and railroad sectors.

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