“A company that owns the right to tattoos on NBA players is suing Take-Two Interactive and Visual Concepts, makers of the popular video-game franchise ‘NBA2K,’ for graphically representing those tattoos on NBA players without its permission.” [ESPN] We covered the legal issue two years ago.
Posts Tagged ‘sports’
Here comes the fantasy-sports litigation
Game of skill, or game of chance? “The [class-action] suit, filed in Manhattan federal court on behalf of FanDuel and DraftKings players nationwide, accuses Visa, MasterCard, American Express and other defendants of participating in a racketeering scheme to facilitate illegal gambling operations.” [Alison Frankel, Reuters]
Schneiderman to fantasy sports companies: get out of New York
“After a month-long investigation, New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is sending cease-and-desist letters to DraftKings and FanDuel — essentially banning the two sites from operating in New York. Schneiderman feels that they are illegal gambling sites, rather than offering games of skill as both companies argue.” [Neal Ungerleider/Fast Company, David Marcus/Federalist, earlier]
More: “I challenge you to a fantasy football duel, Eric Schneiderman” [Paul McPolin, New York Post]
Liability roundup
- “Is Arbitration Awful? The New York Times Thinks So.” [New Jersey Civil Justice Institute, earlier here and here] And speaking of that paper, I’m going to miss Joe Nocera’s incisive coverage of the litigation business in his column, often linked here; he’s off to other duties at the Times [Politico/New York]
- Yet more from the Times, longread on litigation investing and champerty: “Should You Be Allowed To Invest In a Lawsuit?”
- Mikal Watts through the years: “It was part of my strategy to affect the stock price, which I was very successful at.” [Madison County Record, more]
- “No negligence liability for injuries by fellow players in contact sport” [Eugene Volokh, martial arts, Colorado Court of Appeals]
- Defense lawyer claims adversary had advance word about jury deliberations, grabbed $25 million settlement [Chicago Law Bulletin]
- Is data privacy the next source of mass lawsuits? [Chamber Institute for Legal Reform]
- Funds needlessly drained: “Asbestos reforms needed to protect first responders and veterans” [Rep. Blake Farenthold, The Hill]
Claim: scandal author should pay for hurting value of U. of Louisville degrees
“A University of Louisville student has filed a lawsuit against Katina Powell and her publisher, claiming Powell’s book, ‘Breaking Cardinal Rules: Basketball and the Escort Queen,’ has damaged the value of a degree from the school…. The suit is seeking class action status on behalf of the student body at UofL.” [WDRB]
Fantasy sports leak
No need to invoke insider trading law, “breach of duty under agency law” will do fine, says Prof. Bainbridge. More: Slate.
A mixed Ninth Circuit ruling on antitrust and the NCAA
“Colleges can’t be required to let star athletes cash in on their celebrity status, a Ninth Circuit panel ruled Wednesday, reversing part of a landmark antitrust decision that had called into question the NCAA’s entire business model.” [Marisa Kendall, The Recorder; W$J] From August: “How Sports Got Blitzed By the Plaintiff’s Bar” [Ross Todd, The Recorder]
School and childhood roundup
- Why campus trigger culture and offense bans aren’t just anti-intellectual and a foretaste of wider speech regulation, but fail at specific therapeutic goal of reducing psychological upset [Greg Lukianoff/Jonathan Haidt, The Atlantic cover story]
- Newtown shooting advanced existing trend toward a regular police presence in schools; consequences may include escalation of low-level discipline [ACLU of Pennsylvania report “Beyond Zero Tolerance,” pp. 28-34]
- “Scottish Government’s named person scheme criticized by experts who will implement it” [The Courier (Dundee), earlier]
- “Kids Dig for Worms, Sell to Fishermen. Town Says Not So Fast: That’s Illegal!” [Cornwall, Ont.; Lenore Skenazy]
- “British Universities See Ethics Committees as ‘Easy and Convenient’ Censors” [Zachary Schrag, Institutional Review Blog]
- “His son’s school requires student athletes to carry their own insurance, a move that many other schools also have had to make because of the rising costs from lawsuits.” [Charleston, S.C.-area Palmetto Business Daily] “NYC has paid nearly $20M from playground injuries since 2010” [Reuven Blau, NY Daily News]
- Mom in famous Silver Spring, Md. “free range kids” episode is writing book, solicits stories of unattended kids and CPS abuse
Pan Am Games: link to us and we’ll sue
“The organizers of the Pan American Games in Toronto…[saw fit to] require that people seek formal permission to link to its website at toronto2015.org.” [The Register] We’ve been here before, and before that, and so on. After only a little press attention, as The Register notes in an update, the organizers quietly changed the website’s terms and conditions to remove the ban.
FIFA: “Use of an American bank”
The federal government is bringing charges against the leadership of FIFA, the international soccer association, and Switzerland has arrested them in accord with American wishes. But are the jurisdiction of U.S. courts and U.S. criminal law really proper for this alleged international wrongdoing? David Post:
…ask yourself: if you think that the “use of an American bank” is a sufficient basis for the exercise of US jurisdiction over foreign nationals residing and conducting business abroad, then presumably you’re OK with being hauled into court in Singapore because you have used, say, a Singaporean bank, or into a Mexican court because your money found its way to a Mexican mortgage broker, or into a Danish court because you have at times used a Danish Internet Service Provider. Yes? When you look at it that way it becomes a little more difficult to applaud wholeheartedly – shouldn’t we have been able to count on the Swiss, within whose jurisdiction FIFA undoubtedly lies, to do something?