There are three e-commerce related lawsuits
I am going to analyze. The first one is an e-commerce retailer, Gotham City
Online, sue Art.com for allegedly stealing information. The second one is that
Amazon be accused by its Prime member that claims Amazon is cheating customers
through "so-called" free shipping. The last one is the famous law
firm, Jones Day, sue Block Shopper, an e-commerce company, for linking back to
it.
In the first case, both parties are
e-commerce company. Art.com sells fine arts online while Gotham City Online
that sells discount brand-name shoes. According to San Jose Mercury News,
Gotham City Online claims that Art.com illegally accessed their web server and
changed the security passwords and ownership credentials to prevent Gotham City
employees from accessing email or company files. In the news, it also mentioned
that Gotham City files have been copied and altered during the process. The
lawsuit already been filed in the U.S. District Court in San Francisco. Art.com
be accused of trade secret violations and computer fraud. In my opinion, if the
server attack has been proved coming from Art.com the charge should be
convicted. The attacker accessed Gotham City's servers that could easily to get
their customer list. However, a customer list is an important trade secret, and
the attacker acquisition of the trade secret through an illegal act. This
behavior should be punished.
In the second case, the Prime member Marcia
Burke professes that Amazon encourages third-party vendors to increase their
prices to Prime members by an amount they charge for un-Prime members'
shipping. Marcia Burke accuses Amazon using the a portion of those
"inflated" prices as its shipping cost. Burke alleges in the lawsuit
that Amazon's third-party vendors will arise their goods price when it has been
posted on Amazon's site. In my opinion, if what Burke said had been proved is
true Amazon is chatting to their millions of members worldwide; they are using
a "so-called" free shipping disguise to charge $79 a year to its
Prime members.
In the last case, Block Shopper sued by
Jones Day for linking to it with the anchor text "Jones Day." Block
shopper is an e-commerce company that reports real estate purchases information
including the buyer's name, profession, photos and the price of the real
estate. Block Shopper posted a few Jones Day lawyers name and photos from their
firm's website and the price and location of the house they bought. According
to the lawsuit, Jones Day is suing Block Shopper using its name as anchor text
for a link to its website. Jones Day believe its mark is being diluted, and it
may cause confusion. In my opinion, I believe this charge it a little bit
farfetched. I believe it should focus on privacy claims.
