Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Litigation Blogs -> How Appealing

OR PHONE (866) 635-1838 for Bankruptcy Help, (866) 635-6190 for Divorce,
(866) 635-2689 for Personal Injury or (866) 635-9402 for Criminal Defense

Find a Local Lawyer

Bankruptcy (866) 635-1838
Divorce (866) 635-6190
Personal Injury (866) 635-2689
Criminal Defense (866) 635-9402

Litigation

: How Appealing

"McLean Students Sue Anti-Cheating Service; Plaintiffs Say Company's Database of Term Papers, Essays Violates Copyright Laws"

ADVERTISEMENTS

"McLean Students Sue Anti-Cheating Service; Plaintiffs Say Company's Database of Term Papers, Essays Violates Copyright Laws": An article published in the March 29, 2007 issue of The Washington Post begins, "Two McLean High School students have launched a court challenge against a California company hired by their school to catch cheaters, claiming the anti-plagiarism service violates copyright laws. The lawsuit, filed this week in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, seeks $900,000 in damages from the for-profit service known as Turnitin. The service seeks to root out cheaters by comparing student term papers and essays against a database of more than 22 million student papers as well as online sources and electronic archives of journals. In the process, the student papers are added to the database."

In March 2008, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia issued a ruling that rejected the plaintiffs' lawsuit. At BNA's "E-Commerce and Tech Law Blog," Thomas O'Toole had a post about that ruling titled "Turnitin.com Lawsuit Yields Rulings on Browsewrap Contracts, Fair Use of Copyrighted Expression."

Today. a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit issued a decision that affirmed the district court's rejection of the plaintiffs' complaint. The Fourth Circuit's ruling also contained additional bad news for the plaintiffs, because the appellate court reversed the district court's dismissal of the company's counterclaims and remanded those counterclaims for further proceedings in the district court. In coverage of today's ruling, at BNA's "E-Commerce and Tech Law Blog," Thomas O'Toole had a post titled "Fourth Circuit's Turnitin.com Ruling Brings More Trouble for Plaintiffs."

Full post as published by How Appealing on April 17, 2009 (boomark / email).