In some ways, the Internet is the Wild West . . . and Web 2.0 is like the Wild West meets the Sci-Fi Channel — unpredictable, potentially dangerous, and often bizarre. If you’re involved in, or thinking about, doing business online at all, the Electronic Frontier Foundation is a great resource. They’re even hosting a one-day Compliance Bootcamp on October 10, 2007 for people who handle issues arising from users and user-generated content.Â
There are “basicâ€? legal issues that online content raises (such as defamation, copyright and trademark infringement, privacy, to name a few — see my article on “Common Legal Perils of Bloggingâ€?). In addition, here’s a great post from Rafe Needleman — endearingly called 9 Fun Ways Web 2.0 Startups Can Commit Legal Suicide. He points out two handfuls of other legal pifalls, including ignoring safe harbor rules (by not registering as a copyright agent), collecting data from children, failing to create a reserve fund for settling trumped-up lawsuits.Â
His suggestion: “The best bet is to keep a lawyer around.�
This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 26th, 2007 at 9:58 am and is filed under Intellectual Property. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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September 28th, 2007 at 5:50 am
[...] this helpful, albeit brief, blog entry, Nina Kaufman introduces some helpful online resources about the legal risks that accompany [...]