Unauthorized Sellers are a growing and ubiquitous problem for brands selling their goods on eCommerce marketplaces, such as Amazon, eBay, and Walmart. Unauthorized resellers sell products without the brand’s authorization or consent, which hurts a company’s brand,...
eCommerce
Amazon Prime’s Ongoing Battle Against Fake Reviews
E-commerce juggernaut Amazon continues to grapple with an issue that has plagued its platform—false reviews. Whether a false review is fabricated, biased, or does not genuinely reflect the experiences or opinions of customers, false reviews pose a problem for both...
Jack Daniels v. Bad Spaniels: Trademarks Triumphant Win Over The First Amendment Satirical Speech
Whether you operate a large e-commerce company on Amazon, a specialized artisan store on Shopify or Etsy, or a local t-shirt company, all brands producing products resembling famous marks should consider the implications of the seminal Supreme Court ruling in Jack...
Supreme Court to Chew on First Amendment Protections in Jack Daniels v. Bad Spaniels: Are Parodies Protected Speech or Trademark Infringement?
Creative expression through the sale of parody-based dog toys has recently caught the attention of the United States Supreme Court. On March 22, 2023, the Supreme Court listened to arguments to decide whether dog toys modeled after well-known alcohol brands should be...
Senators Brown and Cassidy Propose Legislation to Ease Burdens for Small Businesses and Raise IRS Reporting Threshold for Online Sellers
The advent of online shopping has revolutionized consumer behavior, offering convenience, a wide range of products, and competitive prices. However, one notable concern has been the inconsistency in the collection of sales taxes, with online sellers often enjoying a...
AI Tells the Dangers of Having it Write Amazon Reviews
Amazon has been at war with unscrupulous actors and a new contender just entered the battlefield. An examination of various sites reveals the presence of AI-generated reviews. These reviews consistently incorporate the statement "As an AI language model," a frequently...
Considering Your Audience for Cease-and-Desist Letters
So, you’ve identified a party infringing on your brand’s intellectual property rights, and in response, you issued a cease-and-desist letter to the infringer. What you say in that letter is just as important as how you say it. Today, more and more recipients of...
Spring-Time Brand Preparations
As spring comes into bloom, brands should begin planning and preparing for the not-so-far-off holiday season. Right now, a brand has approximately six months to strengthen its presence in ecommerce marketplaces until the holiday shopping season begins. In addition to...
The DMCA Subpoena Remains Invaluable
When tackling the problem of unauthorized resellers on Amazon.com and other e-commerce websites, one of the biggest hurdles faced by brands is unearthing a reseller’s identity. Resellers are able to hide behind DBA’s, various storefront names and other shell entities,...
More Than Just Unauthorized Sales: Scammers are Creating Whole New Websites
We have written extensively about the problem of unauthorized resellers. These are resellers that source a company’s products (whether legitimately or illegitimately) and then resell those products on eCommerce websites such as Amazon, eBay and Walmart. Often, these...