class-action

SpaceX launches new era in space travel

We have lift-off! It's a new era for social media, space exploration and... shoes?

Update: The SpaceX rocket launch was aborted at the last minute and rescheduled for Tuesday, May 22 at 3:44 a.m. Eastern.

Facebook ended its first publicly traded day right where it began: at $38 a share. CEO Mark Zuckerberg rang in the Nasdaq opening bell virtually from the Silicon Valley campus, and later, shares began trading at around $42 each. Facebook's bankers saved the IPO, keeping shares barely above $38. From this IPO, Facebook raised $16 billion. That's almost 10 times … Read more

New details reveal Steve Jobs involved in e-book lawsuit

New details have surfaced in the class-action e-book price-fixing lawsuit against Apple, according to tech news site paidContent. The most notable revelation is an e-mail from Steve Jobs to one of the bookseller's executives that was previously redacted and is now public.

The gist of the case, which was filed in April and now has 29 states, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico involved, is an allegation that Apple and a group of book publishers illegally fixed e-book prices to "boost profits and force e-book rival Amazon to abandon its pro-consumer discount pricing."

The Department of Justice … Read more

Apple faces e-book price-fixing lawsuit in Canada too

According to the Montreal Gazette, a local lawyer has seized an opportunity to sue Apple on behalf of any Canadian citizen who has purchased an e-book over the last two years, piggybacking on the U.S. Department of Justice's recent lawsuit (video), claiming Apple and its publishing partners colluded to fix the prices of e-books and drive down competition.

The Canadian class action suit was filed in February in Quebec Superior Court by Montreal lawyer Norman Painchaud, asserting that Apple (in tandem with its publishing partners) had conspired to raise prices of e-books from the $9.99 previously commonly … Read more

Why you can't sue your wireless carrier in a class action

When AT&T slowed down Matt Spaccarelli's unlimited data plan on his iPhone, the unemployed truck driver from Simi Valley, Calif. took the country's largest phone company to court. And as a surprise to all, he won.

But Spaccarelli's victory rings hollow. In fact, the route he was forced to take -- suing AT&T by himself as opposed to employing a more influential and wider ranging class-action lawsuit -- illustrates just how difficult it is to change a carrier's business practice through legal means. Rather than big changes and a return of his … Read more

Netflix pays $9 million to settle privacy violation lawsuit

Netflix experienced a bumpy year in 2011. Its shares spiked and plummeted, it lost thousands of subscribers then gained them back, it faced growing competition, and a class action lawsuit was filed against it alleging that the video subscription service violated consumer's privacy.

But things seem to be looking up for Netflix--not only did it do better than expected in the fourth quarter and now has more subscribers than ever, it also settled the lawsuit.

On Friday, Netflix filed an agreement to pay $9 million to settle the class action suit, which was originally submitted in January 2011.

The … Read more

Apple agrees to MagSafe power adapter settlement

Apple's MagSafe connections for its laptop power adapters allows the connections to be quickly detached from systems, the benefits of which are obvious to anyone who has ever caught a foot in the power cord of a charging device and yanked it to the floor from its resting perch.

The MagSafe adapter is a great idea, but a number of people complained that its first iterations did have a couple of flaws that resulted in the cable getting twisted and bent (a situation called "strain relief"). In some instances this strain would cause the cable components to … Read more

Questioning Sony's new class-action waiver

The Sony Network Entertainment has added a controversial change to its Terms of Service and User Agreement (PDF) for users of the PlayStation Network and the Sony Entertainment Network (Music Unlimited, Video Unlimited). In the revised terms, consumers must waive the right to participate in any class-action lawsuit filed after August 20 against the gaming and content delivery portion of Sony.

If you don't agree, then your PS3 can't get online or purchase media content from Sony. Future disputes between consumers and SNE must occur individually in court or through an arbitration procedure.

Licensing agreements with restrictions like this are actually more common than you might think. In fact, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of class-action waivers last April in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion. In that case, the court held that federal law pre-empted state rules against class-action waivers. Sony will have difficulty enforcing this policy outside of the U.S., as some other countries make agreements like this impossible.… Read more

Apple facing possible $25.6M location suit in Korea

Hot on the heels of Apple's $945 legal settlement to a Korean man over location logging behavior in iOS in June, a new suit in the works reportedly seeking class action aims to bring similar settlements to some 27,800 other individuals.

The Korea Herald reports that law firm Miraelaw plans to file the suit against Apple in Korea later this month, once again claiming that the iPhone violated the country's domestic privacy laws. If those listed on the suit end up with a similar payout to the one provided in June, Apple could be facing an overall … Read more

AT&T has to track down $1 billion in data tax case

AT&T may need to knock on a few doors and place a few calls to get back nearly a billion dollars it payed to states and other governments on behalf of its wireless customers. That's one of the requirements of a class-action settlement approved last week over taxes the company is alleged to have levied improperly for wireless data.

Lawyers from Bartimus, Frickleton, Robertson & Gorny filed suits in every state claiming that AT&T was in violation of the Internet Tax Freedom Act, which placed a moratorium on taxes for Internet access until November 1, … Read more