IP: Personal Jurisdiction based on Web Sites (fwd)

[Dave Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

<fontfamily><param>Times New Roman</param>Date: Thu, 19 Sep 1996 22:25:17
-0400








Forwarded message:


From:   Robert_W._Hamilton () JONESDAY COM (Robert W. Hamilton)


Sender: CYBERIA-L () LISTSERV AOL COM (Law & Policy of Computer
Communications)


Reply-to:       CYBERIA-L () LISTSERV AOL COM (Law & Policy of Computer


Communications)


To:     CYBERIA-L () LISTSERV AOL COM


Date: 96-09-18 16:12:03 EDT




On August 19, 1996, The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of


Missouri ruled that it had personal jurisdiction over the defendant in


Maritz,


Inc. v. Cybergold, Inc., Case No. 96CV01340.  The Missouri plaintiff has
sued


Cybergold for violation of the Lanham Act.  The defendant's only contact
with


the state of Missouri was the accessibility of its web site (presumably


maintained somewhere in Berkely, California) to Missouri residents.  
The


decision is very troubling in its implications.  It is also contrary to
the


recent ruling by Judge Rhoades of the Southern District of California 
in


McDonough v. Fallon McElligott (dismissing copyright infringement action
for


lack of personal jurisdiction over defendant whose principal contact
with


California was the accessibility of its web site to California
residents).




Information Law Alert reports that the same issue is pending in a lawsuit
by


the Hearst Corp., publisher of Esquire, against a Philadelphia lawyer
named


Ari


Goldberger.  Hearst's action is in the Southern District of New York
before


Judge Peter Leisure, the same Judge who issued the Cubby v. CompuServe


decision


back in 1991.




Apparently, these cases present the troubling issue of personal
jurisdiction


over Internet participants without many of the complicating facts that
make


the


U.S. v. Thomas case so difficult to interpret.  On a practical level,
the


court's ruling in Maritz v. Cybergold, if followed by other courts,
could


have


an enormous impact on the development of the Web.






 Robert W. Hamilton


 rwhamilton () jonesday com


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