Is it libel if a company lies about being the first to achieve something? If a company publishes false statements claiming that it was the first to achieve some notable technological milestone, or that it currently provides the most of some measurable service, can that count as libel against the company which truly achieved that or holds that record? Because claiming to be the first seems to include saying that the other company was not the first, so is that libel if that's false?
Typical in any of the several united-states No, this fails to meet two of the core elements of libel. The statement must be Adverse (fails) Stated by one party To a second party About a third party (fails) The case you're thinking of, where a company brags excessively about their company or products, are covered by a variety of securities and trade laws, such as false advertising. Many of these are applicable in the Federal domain, i.e. are Federal rather than state laws. Edit: Now I see you've changed the question a bit to claiming to be first. Yes, the injured party can sue for that, but they are more claiming false advertising than libel. Accusing someone of not being first-to-market is not a particularly powerful or damning claim. Oreo didn't invent the sandwich cookie nor did Apple invent the computer. So such a claim is really a lot more about the publicity than actual, provable damages; so the controversy is more likely to be aired outside the court system, or in the courts but mainly for the publicity. (an example of the latter being the &quot;Taco Tuesday&quot; trademark-busting action; IIRC Taco Bell even paid the other party's legal fees, despite prevailing.)
If a factual statement is implied, rather than explicit, it can still constitute defamation. &quot;T looks like a thief&quot; may be an expression of opinion (&quot;I think that T might be a thief&quot;) or it might be a slightly oblique way of saying &quot;T is a thief&quot;. That would ultimately be a matter for the finder of fact, often a jury in the united-states, to determine. See HG.org,s page on &quot;Defamation by Implication&quot; The article &quot;Libel and Slander 101: Defamation By Implication&quot; by Daniel R. Warner of RM Warner, a lawyer specializing in Internet defamation, among other kinds of cases, cites and discusses as cases where US coiurts have upheld defamation by implication: Kendall v. Virgin Island Daily News in March 2013. (3rd Circuit) Plaintiff was a public figure and had to show actual malice, defendants were a reporter and a newspaper; Woods v. Evansville Press Co: (7th Circuit). The Court held that &quot;an implied statement, just as a statement made in direct language, can be defamatory.&quot; Newton v. National Broadcasting, Co.:
Art. 15(4) GDPR says: (4) The right to obtain a copy referred to in paragraph 3 shall not adversely affect the rights and freedoms of others. If I was the controller in this situation, and I believed that this would endanger the students that have criticised the professor, I would base my argument for not complying on this. In addition, Art. 85 GDPR requires member states to: [...] reconcile the right to the protection of personal data pursuant to this Regulation with the right to freedom of expression and information [...] So you may be able to argue that the students posting messages are engaging in "processing for journalistic purposes and the purposes of academic, artistic or literary expression", depending on the laws of the particular member state. (edit: this could be difficult since you mention it is a private database). The second case seems just like the first in terms of GDPR, but may constitute defamation. Defamation (or libel) laws differ wildly in each country; he Wikipedia article on Defamation explains the situation in each member state in more detail. In the third case: if the professor submits a request based on the rights of a data subject other than himself, they don't need to comply. These requests need to come from the data subjects themselves, not just a random person assuming authority. (although I suppose it's possible for them to give power of attorney to the department head if they wanted to) Personal data and the rights that GDPR provides to data subjects always relate to a natural person, not an institution or a company.
This question has been addressed directly, with very similar facts, by the federal courts, and the answer, based on those decisions, is: Maybe. The most famous case in this area is Mirage Editions v. Albuquerque A.R.T. Co., 856 F.2d 1341 (9th Cir. 1988). In that case, the defendant had bought a copy of plaintiff's art book, cut out the pages, and affixed them to ceramic tiles, which it sold. The defendant relied on the first sale doctrine, codified in 17 U.S.C. 109. The first sale doctrine says that if you own a copy of a copyrighted work, you can resell it without the copyright holder's permission. The plaintiff argued that, by altering the original artwork, the defendant had created a new derivative work. The first sale doctrine gives you the right to sell the book to someone else, but not the right to create derivative works, whether by writing and publishing an unauthorized sequel or, they argued, cutting and pasting and tiling and kilning the physical pages. The Mirage Editions court agreed with the plaintiff that the tiles were a derivative work outside the scope of the first sale doctrine, and therefore the defendants had infringed the plaintiffs' copyrights. However, other courts faced with similar facts have disagreed, and to date I'm not aware of any Supreme Court decision resolving the issue. The bottom line is: you are allowed to sell what you bought; you aren't allowed to transform it into something new and sell that. Where the line gets drawn is muddy and likely to remain so at least until the Supreme Court addresses the issue.
I would argue that no, there is no copyright for the restored work. Independent copyright is only possible for any original material added, as previously discussed on this site. In this case, the added work was a technical process rather than a creative process, and technical processes cannot be protected by copyright. Copyright licenses would therefore be ineffective. However, I believe one could still impose a license based on owning the copy as opposed to the copyright (contract might be a better term in this case). However, if a third party managed to obtain a copy through some other avenue, any such contract would not be binding on them and nothing could be enforced against them unlike with copyright laws. Another way a license might be imposed is through patent protections, as technical processes can be protected via patents. However, I'm not as familiar with patent law, and this doesn't appear to be the claim being made.
First-class mail is acceptable for many different kinds of delivery in legal contexts. It is often not sufficient for service of a summons or subpoena, as noted in the other answer. But I don't think any of that is relevant, because you're dealing with a product recall, not legal service. This is almost certainly a voluntary recall, as mandatory recalls are very rare. If that is the case, I don't know of any law that requires a notice to be made in any particular way whatsoever. Instead, the Consumer Products Safety Commission has broad guidelines (see page 18) for how a company may consider communicating the fact of a recall, and they include many mechanisms that are even less verifiable than first class-mail: a joint news release from CPSC and the company ... information on company external websites ... a national news conference and/or television or radio announcements; use of a firm’s social media presence to notify consumers of the recall, including Facebook, Google +, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Pinterest, company blogger networks, and blog announcements ... And so on. I don't have that much experience with consumer-protection law, but I'd be surprised if it imposed any obligation to send certified mail or anything more certain than first-class mail. Separate from the recall requirements, though, it may be that a contract with a dealership or the warranty provides some other requirements.
Yes Loss of income that is directly attributable to a loss of reputation can be part of the damages in a libel case. However, the plaintiff must prove the connection, must show that had the libel and the resulting loss of reputation not occurred, the income would have been received. This can be hard to establish. Testimony from specific people who say that they would have hired the plaintiff or done business with the plaintiff but for the libel is a common way to establish this kind of damage. Showing a sudden drop of income after the libel can also help such a case. And of course, the plaintiff must establish the other elements of libel: (in the US) a negative factual statement, communicated to others, the falsity of the statement, and a resulting loss of reputation.
I am not aware of any cases with a fact pattern at all like this in which there has been an injunction against an individual publicizing accusations against a company. In each of the cases Bosley Medical Institute, Inc. v. Kremer; Lucas Nursery &amp; Landscaping, Inc. v. Grosse; TMI, Inc. v. Maxwell, 368 F.3d 433, 435 (5th Cir. 2004); Cleary Bldg. Corp. v. David A. Dame, Inc., 674 F. Supp. 2d 1257, 1265 (D. Colo. 2009)' Name.Space, Inc. v. Network Solutions, Inc., 202 F.3d 573, 585 (2d Cir.2000) an individual put up a &quot;gripe sit usign teh trademark of the company or something close to it, as a URL. Courts held this was not trademark infringement adn ther was no reason to enjoin such sites. More recently &quot;companySucks.com&quot; sites have been created to host complaints about {company}. Atempts to shut these downishe bottom.&quot; using trademark law have largely been unsucceaful. See this page for more on this. The first amendment makes it hard to shut down such sites, as they are on &quot;matters of public concern&quot; the &quot;actual malice&quot; rule makes defamation cases tough.