...As he pored over the mass of texts and thumbnail photos that the eBay search engine had pulled up on that day in 2005, one strangely worded listing caught Schein’s eye. It read, “Old Snapshot Blues Guitar B.B. King???” He clicked on the link, then took in the sepia-toned image that opened on his monitor. Two young black men stared back at Schein from what seemed to be another time. They stood against a plain backdrop wearing snazzy suits, hats, and self-conscious smiles. The man on the left held a guitar stiffly against his lean frame. Neither man looked like B. B. King, but as Schein studied the figure with the guitar, noticing in particular the extraordinary length of his fingers and the way his left eye seemed narrower and out of sync with his right, it occurred to him that he had stumbled across something significant and rare... the more convinced he became that it depicted one of the most mysterious and mythologized blues artists produced by the Delta: the guitarist, singer, and songwriter whom Eric Clapton once anointed “the most important blues musician who ever lived.” That’s not B. B. King, Schein said to himself. Because it’s Robert Johnson.

Searching for Robert Johnson reveals not only what may be the third picture of Robert Johnson but a Byzantine struggle over his legacy as well.
posted on Oct 9, 2008 - View this thread

Enterprising kids in Connecticut spend a few weeks clearing weeds out of an empty lot, planning a halcyon summer of wiffleball. They scavenge some plywood out of a dumpster, buy some paint, dig some holes, pour concrete, and next thing you know, they have their own custom built playing field. As one kid put it, "if we build it, they will come." But the outcome was not what they expected.
posted on Jul 10, 2008 - View this thread

Where's Lionel Hutz, Attorney at Law, when you need him? Circumcision is sexual abuse. CIA is Brainwashing. Don't wait, choose your class action today!
posted on Apr 16, 2008 - View this thread

He keeps his white gloved hands where parents can see them. And buys liability insurance, just in case.
posted on Dec 21, 2007 - View this thread

The Other Side of the Wind is the lost last film of Orson Welles, a reputed unseen masterpiece, that may finally see the light of day in late 2008. The film tells the story of Jake Hannaford (played by John Huston), an aging movie director who has to film a low budget sex-and-symbolism flick to avoid getting overtaken by the Movie Brats of the Spielberg/Coppola generation. After providing voiceovers to two documentaries on the Persepolis ceremonies of 1971 and an intimate portrait of the Shah of Iran, Welles obtained Iranian financing to finish The Other Side of the Wind. Unfortunately, after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, the bank accounts of his Iranian financier were seized, which led to the negatives for the film getting locked in a French vault. After Orson Welles died in 1985, his lover/collaborator Oja Kodar had to settle his estate with Orson's estranged (but never divorced) wife Paola Mori. There the matter might have rested, if not for an unfortunate coincidence. (More inside.)
posted on Apr 15, 2007 - View this thread

Steve Carell may be hilarious in the office, but how much would his jackass behavior cost in real-life? clips (youtube)
posted on Feb 13, 2007 - View this thread

The French do some things well and, well, some things not so well. (see)
posted on Oct 20, 2006 - View this thread

Forum: The Pros and Cons of Director Liability. [more inside]
posted on May 31, 2006 - View this thread

Man Claims Firing Over Drinking Wrong Beer He works for one mega-beer brand and, on his own time, partook of a competitor's.
posted on May 18, 2005 - View this thread

Farmer Homer McFarland is being sued for hundreds of thousands of dollars by the Monsanto corporation. His crime? Replanting his crops' own seed, as farmers have done for millennia, which violates the biotech giant's intellectual property rights, the company claims. Quietly, Monsanto's aggressive "seed police" have been suing farmers in 25 states for years, often settling out of court for huge sums, according to the Center for Food Safety's new report, Monsanto vs. US farmers [PDF link]. For more information, also see a new documentary called The Future of Food.
posted on Jan 15, 2005 - View this thread

S&M Barbie ... and S&M Barbie
posted on Jul 13, 2004 - View this thread

Think the RIAA is doing something new by threatening and suing? Think again... it's all part of a 4-step process.
posted on Nov 10, 2003 - View this thread

SCO is at it again ... this time they've asked a federal judge to declare that Linux's general public license — a backbone of the free software movement — unconstitutional. Let's hope the judge has more sense than SCO.
posted on Oct 31, 2003 - View this thread

Eolas® Technologies Inc. owns the plugin concept. Meet US Patent 5,838,906: "The patent claims to cover mechanisms for embedding objects within distributed hypermedia documents, where at least some of the object's data is located external to the document, and there is a control path to the object's implementation to support user interaction with the object." Eolas sued Microsoft, was awarded $521 million, Microsoft is appealing, and the W3C held (Macromedia hosted) an ad hoc meeting on the recent court decision and launched a discussion list. Microsoft plans to promptly make changes to Internet Explorer. If this follows through, what are the negative and positive implications?
posted on Sep 2, 2003 - View this thread

Nestle, the makers of Poland Spring water are being sued for selling their bottled water as "naturally purified" or "spring water" when in fact it does not meet the scientific criteria for spring water, is worse than some area tap water, and is sourced near "asphalt parking lots or other areas of dangerous contamination".
posted on Jun 19, 2003 - View this thread

Judge, citing al-Qaida-Iraq link, awards $104 million to Sept. 11 families A judge ruled yesterday that lack of evidence should be no barrier to suing people who cannot be found. "The judge wrote that lawyers relied heavily on 'classically hearsay' evidence, including reports that a Sept. 11 hijacker met an Iraqi consul to Prague, Secretary of State Colin Powell's remarks to the United Nations about connections between Iraq and terrorism, and defectors' descriptions of the use of an Iraq camp to train terrorists." --This would hardly be the first documented example of a court being overtly political, but the judge himself has no problem commenting on how shoddy the case was. "The judge noted that the experts provided few actual facts that Iraq provided support to the terrorists." --Apparently, the judge had just been waiting for Saddam to cease to be a diplomatically immune head of state before ruling against him. Is the low standard of evidence needed for civil rulings allowing the courts to begin establishing something that the military and intelligence can't? [more inside]
posted on May 8, 2003 - View this thread

Sticking to the gay stuff: The ACLU is threatening legal action against a middle school in Arkansas whose administrators have gone to extraordinary lengths to punish a student for being gay, including outing him to his parents, forcing him to read passages of the Bible, calling him "abnormal" and "unnatural," and disciplining him for mentioning between classes to a female friend that he thought another boy was cute. (via CalPundit) [more inside]
posted on Mar 16, 2003 - View this thread

Another way around sneaky agreements: A Californian is suing (PDF) Microsoft and Symantec over shrink-wrapped agreements and EULAs that are only readable when you first install the software, making a return or refund absolutely impossible. Many courts have upheld shrinkwrap licenses. Conversely, reverse engineering has been determined to constitute fair use. If this case sets a precedent, could we see abridged legalese on the side of future boxes or a rethinking of software licensing trends? Or will the cluttered tower of consumer rights, protection for software companies and code evolution and innovation topple over?
posted on Feb 10, 2003 - View this thread

I made my claim. Have you? This Web site was established to provide information about a proposed Settlement of lawsuits brought by Attorneys General of 43 states, Commonwealths and Territories, and by counsel for the Plaintiff Settlement Class entitled In re: Compact Disc Minimum Advertised Price Antitrust Litigation. You may be a member of the Settlement Group and your rights against Defendants may be affected if you are a person or entity that purchased these prerecorded Music Products from a retail store during the period of January 1, 1995 through December 22, 2000.
posted on Jan 7, 2003 - View this thread

Girl to sue over detention "The family, who want compensation, will argue that the detentions were unlawful because they took place in Freya's free time. " If you can't give kids detention, how else are they going to be punished for breaking school rules?
posted on Dec 28, 2002 - View this thread

Salman Rushdie defends fellow writer Michel Houellebecq, the autonomy of the literary text and its right to be considered on its own terms with characters of every sort.
posted on Oct 4, 2002 - View this thread

Thai company employs Spider-man to deliver cooking gas. Marvel sez: "use monkey suits because monkeys don't have intellectual property rights." 'Nuff Said?
posted on Aug 27, 2002 - View this thread

Is there really a $7 billion lawsuit against the Bush administration -- filed on behalf of 14 of the victims' families -- charging that he let 9-11 happen on purpose? Seems like kind of a weird thing for a few web sites to fabricate, but a google search doesn't reveal many mainstream news sources. And what do folks think of the "Let It Happen On Purpose" theory... or more importantly, the evidence that the theorists cite?
posted on Aug 16, 2002 - View this thread

Georgian Rep. Bob Barr is a fragile and delicate man. So fragile, in fact, that he has filed a lawsuit against President Bill Clinton, James Carville and Larry Flynt for "loss of reputation and emotional distress" and "injury in his person and property." He's seeking damages in excess of $30 million. This from the man who called for the impeachment of Bill Clinton before the whole Monica thing. James Carville said, "To call this suit 'frivolous' would be to elevate the status of 'frivolous.'"
posted on Jun 13, 2002 - View this thread

"He's not gay, and the judge so ruled," says Bert Fields, attorney for Tom Cruise. Yes folks, Tom Cruise is now the world's only legal heterosexual. While this is old news, I've always been fascinated with how much zeal Cruise prosecutes these allegations. This case, though, is unique in that the ruling in favor of Cruise contains a stipulation which states that Cruise is not, nor ever has he ever been, gay. In other words, Tom's heterosexuality is now enforced by the courts. Should we, the moviegoing public, now file a class-action lawsuit to force Cruise to publicly prove his unique legal status as a compulsory heterosexual? Would Tom being a backdoor boy really damage your enjoyment of his movies, as Cruise seems to think? Just how stupid do Hollywood stars and their publicists think we are? Discuss.
posted on Apr 4, 2002 - View this thread

"It's really like rape" say lawyers for a college student who sued Arco Media (makers of "Wild Party Girls Video") and won 5 million dollars. From what I was able to find, alcohol was not forced down her throat (she used intoxication as part of her defense) so I am having a difficult time seeing where the "rape" part comes in.
posted on Feb 28, 2002 - View this thread

I'm fat and I'm suing Twinkies. Art imitating life? Who else saw this past Sunday's episode of The Simpson's? First a bus driver named Otto kidnapping children and now this.
posted on Jan 24, 2002 - View this thread

Who says DeCSS litigation is dead? Norwegian court indicts the fellow who cracked DVD protection.
posted on Jan 11, 2002 - View this thread

Avoiding Wrongful Birth Lawsuits , ob/gyn's in France have decided just to "not know" about problems before birth. So, no more ultrasounds. Original wrongful birth thread can be found here.
posted on Jan 10, 2002 - View this thread

Legal fun with SeanBaby - The Probe sinks its teeth into America's favorite pasttime - morons using the legal system to profit from their own idiocy.
posted on Oct 18, 2001 - View this thread

Toy Yoda... Expecting a Landcruiser, but getting the land speeder instead, a Hooter's waitress uses the Force to fight against her employer's dark side in court.
posted on Jul 28, 2001 - View this thread

How often are legal threats used to silence Internet activity? Help us to find out and counter baseless threats with the "chilling effects clearinghouse." Harvard Cyber Law and the EFF combine forces to get a handle on over-zealous cease-and-desist orders issued over websites. Mattel has been so active in this area that they became the butt of jokes about it. Hopefully stupid stuff like this will start decreasing, or at least, there will be a group you can contact when you need support against these types of actions.
posted on Jul 26, 2001 - View this thread

Verizon sues Covad for creating thousands of false trouble tickets. So that's why my DSL took so long!
posted on Jun 13, 2001 - View this thread

Ashcroft and Bush make their move. "Justice Department lawyers have warned that they may soon be forced to abandon the federal government's landmark lawsuit against the tobacco industry because the Bush administration has not proposed enough funding to keep the litigation alive, according to a confidential memo reviewed by The Washington Post."
posted on Apr 25, 2001 - View this thread

Columbine parents sue game makers Claiming computer games partially at fault for Colombine killings, parents of victims have brought a law suit against game makers...will this be viewed as unprovable cause of the shootings or bring about a study of relationship between violence and games?
posted on Apr 25, 2001 - View this thread

Phillip Greenspun speaks about what's happening (to him) at aD.
posted on Apr 22, 2001 - View this thread

Stacy sues Survivor. She claims that producer Mark Burnett urged Dirk and Sean to vote against her rather than against Rudy, in hopes that the last older contestant would not be booted.
posted on Feb 6, 2001 - View this thread

When asked, Apple said "Of course we're going to sue them, what sort of silly question is that?"
posted on Nov 18, 2000 - View this thread

Julia wins
posted on Jun 2, 2000 - View this thread

my.MP3.com Loses to RIAA In case you didn't see it on Slashdot and everywhere else.
posted on Apr 28, 2000 - View this thread

Are americans really this stupid or does the rest of the world just have better things to do? TV owners are suing a company for running an ad with a CGI cockroach in it after destroying their TV's while trying to kill the roach. Will wonders never cease?
posted on Apr 18, 2000 - View this thread

WTF!?! Everyone's favorite band (back in high school) Metallica is suing Napster and a handful of universities for unlawful trading of their music. This is ridiculous, and I hope it doesn't set a precedence. If anyone would just slap a revenue model on napster so artists could get paid for their work, none of this piracy crap would happen. And Metallica, what about the other apps that do the same thing, are you going to sue them too? And what about every other band on earth? What do you expect to get out of universities, tighter controls over bandwidth, or student monitoring of internet usage? What about every cable modem and DSL provider that lets people use Napster, are you going after them too? Why don't you sue everyone on earth that's heard your songs but didn't pay for them? Side question: Is it better to burn out or fade away?
posted on Apr 13, 2000 - View this thread

It looks like the Microsoft vs. DOJ case might be worth paying attention to again, as their settlement talks have ended. "After more than four months, it is apparent that the disagreements among the parties . . . are too deep-seated to be bridged," said mediator, U.S. Circuit Judge Richard Posner. U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson will probably issue a verdict any day now.
posted on Apr 2, 2000 - View this thread