What Is RSL Media and Why Does the Human Consent Standard Matter?
On May 12, 2026, RSL Media launched as a public benefit nonprofit co-founded by CEO Nikki Hexum, Cate Blanchett, Doug Leeds, and Eckart Walther. Its mission is to make human consent machine-readable and discoverable to AI systems through the Human Consent Standard, which…
Ticket sellers, resellers, and consumers in California should be aware of two bills making their way through the legislature that could vastly change how secondary ticket markets work in California. One aims to end speculative selling and the use of bots in buying tickets, and the other seeks to cap the markups ticket resellers can…
Targeted public protests can quickly place businesses and individuals in highly visible and legally sensitive situations. When demonstrators gather outside a workplace or private residence—for example, if an activist group takes issue with an organization’s business practices and elects to target that organization’s executives—the activity may feel disruptive, intimidating, or even threatening.
The legal framework…
Last month, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law Senate Bill 683, which makes a significant addition to Civil Code § 3344, California’s Right of Publicity statute. With the amendment, § 3344 now expressly authorizes injunctive relief, which strengthens individuals’ ability to protect their name, image, voice, and likeness from unauthorized use.
Previously, under the…
In a recent interview with The Recorder, Venable partners Lee Brenner and David Fink, based in Los Angeles, weighed in on two major developments shaping today’s defamation litigation landscape: the sharp increase in defamation lawsuits and the troubling erosion of California’s anti-SLAPP protections.
According to Brenner, 2025 has become what he calls “The Year…
In the past few months, the administration, the Copyright Office, and the courts have weighed in on several material issues at the cross section of copyright law and AI. The White House’s recent announcement of its AI Action Plan offers an opportunity to examine the interesting alignment and discord on key issues relating to fair…
Statements of pure opinion are not actionable as defamation, as they do not imply facts capable of being proven true or false. Qureshi v. St. Barnabas Hosp. Ctr., 430 F. Supp. 2d 279, 288 (S.D.N.Y. 2006); Cochran v. NYP Holdings, Inc., 58 F. Supp. 2d 1113, 1121 (C.D. Cal. 1998).
However, not every opinion qualifies…
In the second landmark decision this week relating to whether use of copyrighted content for training generative AI qualifies as a fair use, Judge Chhabria, in the federal court for the Northern District of California, ordered summary judgment in favor of Meta Platforms Inc. (Meta), finding that Meta’s copying of a group of 13 bestselling…
On June 23, 2025, Judge Alsup in the Northern District of California issued an order in Bartz et al. v. Anthropic PBC, granting in part and denying in part Defendant Anthropic’s motion for summary judgment on the sole issue of whether its use of Plaintiffs’ books as training data for Anthropic’s large language models…
In the age of group chats and rumor mills, telling even one person a damaging rumor can unleash consequences far beyond the intent of the original conversation. But when does gossip cross the legal line?
A recent decision out of the Central District of Illinois, Holzgrafe v. Lozier, offers key guidance on this interesting defamation…
