The case is ancient, but see Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc. v. Bucci, 42 U.S.P.Q.2d 1930 (S.D.N.Y. 1997) holding against a site with a misleading name.

On Thu, May 12, 2011 at 3:21 PM, Ben Sheffner <ben.sheffner@gmail.com> wrote:

Here's a link to the Koch Industries case to which Allison refers:

http://pubcit.typepad.com/files/kochindustries.pdf

On a quick glance, the facts seem very similar to the fake Corwin site. In the Koch case, the defendants created a fake press release and web site purportedly announcing that Koch Industries had reversed its position on climate change. The court dismissed Koch's claims for trademark/unfair competition (no commercial use), violation of the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (no "bad faith intent to profit"), and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (no violation for allegedly accessing Koch's public web site to gain info for use in the fake site). It does not appear that the plaintiffs brought a copyright claim. My guess is that the court would have rejected it on fair use grounds in any event; there's a strong current of affording vigorous protection to political speech that runs through the opinion.

Additional info here:

http://pubcit.typepad.com/clpblog/2011/05/federal-court-dismisses-koch-brothers-trademark-suit-over-climate-change-prank.html

On Thu, May 12, 2011 at 11:43 AM, Allison Hayward Gmail <allisonhayward@gmail.com> wrote:

Similar arguments failed in a case described here.

 

From: law-election-bounces@department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces@department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Rick Hasen
Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2011 2:38 PM
To: law-election@uci.edu
Subject: [EL] Cybersquatting/Issa-Wertheimer

 

Cybersquatting vs. Political Opposition/Parody

I'm not sure if this is a question for Matt Sanderson, Eugene Volokh or Ben Sheffner.

Check out what has got to be the funniest (and perhaps nastiest) parody site for a congressional campaign that I've seen, www.janecorwin.org (e.g., "Together we can make delicious soup from the bones of the poor. Sign up now to be served by Jane Corwin."). This site appears to be more than just an attempt to grab traffic from voters guessing at the name of Corwin's real site; it mimics the look and feel of that site and appears to me to be a political critique of Corwin's policies.

So how do the rules on cybersquatting and copyright protection etc. interact with the First Amendment in this context? Would there be a First Amendment defense to a lawsuit brought by Corwin to move this to a differently-named site (or to shut down the portions that appear to steal some of the Corwin website's look and feel)?

Posted by Rick Hasen at 11:37 AM

Issa Gags Wertheimer

See here.

Posted by Rick Hasen at 10:42 AM

--
Rick Hasen
Visiting Professor
UC Irvine School of Law
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William H. Hannon Distinguished Professor of Law
Loyola Law School
http://electionlawblog.org

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