Can I object to a flight attendant praising TV characters for 5 minutes? During a domestic flight, one of the flight attendants started making rather annoying praises of them being a fan of Disney and Mickey Mouse, Mickey Mouse' birthday, and asking whether anyone was going to visit Disney Land after arriving at LAX, which not a single person seemingly was. This continued for at least 5 minutes (or what seemed like eternity), over the PA system. He also mentioned his success of converting the other flight attendant to become a fan, and of his quest to convert the third one as well. I was distressed of being subjected to this instance of an unexpected commercialism out of nowhere. If I knew I'd be subjected to 5 minutes of various praises for one of the most commercial objects to have ever been created, and the most hated character in the context of public domain sabotage (Disney heavily lobbied for copyright term extensions), I might as well have not have taken this very flight. From where I come from, one of my friends refused taking his girlfriend to Disney World, because of the negative connotations of Disney within the copyright world, so, it was very disappointing of having to endure the praises. Is there any recourse? I was thinking about chanting, "SAY NO TO COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION LOBBYING FROM DISNEY", but I wasn't sure if that would have been allowed to do within an airplane or not. What would be the best course of action? Do flight attendants have an unlimited leeway of forcing the passengers to listen to their gibberish that are completely unrelated to their duties?
Do flight attendants have an unlimited leeway of forcing the passengers to listen to their gibberish that are completely unrelated to their duties? Pretty much, I'd say. It may not be a good customer experience, but the flight attendant certainly isn't doing anything illegal. You don't have a legal right not to hear speeches that offend your IP sensibilities. I don't think it's legally any different than if they were showing an in-flight movie that you didn't like. If you try to forcibly stop him, you are likely to be found in violation of 49 USC 46504, which prohibits "assaulting or intimidating a flight crew member or flight attendant of the aircraft, interferes with the performance of the duties of the member or attendant or lessens the ability of the member or attendant to perform those duties". Even if making speeches about Mickey Mouse is not part of his duties, anything physical you did to try to stop him would likely tend to also lessen his ability to perform his actual duties. Violation of 49 USC 46504 is a felony and carries a prison term of up to 20 years. If you try to shout him down, you might be charged with disorderly conduct under state or local law, like this guy. You could probably push your call button to summon another flight attendant, and politely state that you object to the loquacious crew member's behavior, and could they please ask him to stop. Alternatively, you can put on your noise-cancelling headphones and turn up the volume on your music. Anything beyond that and you're in a bad legal position. Of course, you can certainly file a complaint with the airline after the fact. There's a fair chance you'll get an apology, maybe some extra air miles, and the flight attendant might be disciplined or fired. But that's an internal customer service or personnel matter; nothing to do with law.
It would seem that your song is a derived work. You took the original work and found words that sound the same. If the original work had used different words, your work would have ended up differently. So you have a derived work. Same as making a translation; if the original was different, then the translation would be different, so the translation is a derived work. I was asked "How is this not straight up infringement". But it is. Not only copying is an exclusive right of the copyright holder, but also the creation of derivative works.
In general, people have less expectation of privacy in cars than in their homes. To challenge a search and/or seizure under the Fourth Amendment, a person must have standing - the right to sue (that is, you must have had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the place where the search happened; if you didn't, no standing - can't claim your privacy was violated if you had no privacy). The US Circuit Courts are split on the issue of unauthorized rental drivers and whether they have the same reasonable expectation of privacy as the authorized driver of a rental car would have. Some Circuits allow the unauthorized driver to challenge a car search if the authorized driver gave them permission. Some Circuits look only at the agreement and if the driver isn't authorized on that, they're out of luck. The 6th Circuit is more case-by-case, with a presumption that driver can't challenge the search that can be overcome based on the facts. (All this info from US v. Haywood, 324 F.3d 514) There's a current case before the Supreme Court (argued January 9, 2018), Byrd v. US, on this very issue. This SCOTUSblog page has a lot of information on the case. Edited to add: Texas is in the Fifth Circuit, which follows the rule that unauthorized drivers don't have standing to challenge a search/seizure even with the authorized driver's permission to drive the car; unauthorized drivers of rental cars don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy because they lack a possessory interest in the car and/or they're violating the rental agreement. Basically, even though it seems the cops' stop of the car would've violated the Fourth Amendment if he were the authorized driver, since this happened in Texas, he's not going to be able to challenge the stop. IMO, this is incredibly unjust especially when the cops admitted there was no probable cause, so hopefully the Supreme Court makes this rule obsolete and allows unauthorized drivers to exercise their Fourth Amendment rights. Some law review articles on the topic of unauthorized rental drivers: "Hertz and the Fourth Amendment" "Resolving a Three-Way Circuit Split"
It is any law protecting me from the people that distrubute a video of me falling the stairs and shared without my permision? No. Your permission is not necessary for distributing or watching that video. The recording was from your workplace, where your entitlement to privacy is quite limited unlike few settings such as (1) your attorney's office in the course of obtaining legal advice for which the disclosure was needed, or (2) your home. Even if such an entitlement existed, your decision to share that recording with the person who was with you generally constitutes a waiver of your right to privacy regarding that incident. The waiver would apply even if California had some legislation akin to the EU's GDPR. Your description nowhere indicates that that person had a statutory or equitable duty of confidentiality. It is also highly doubtful that you would wish to block the distribution of the video if people instead of mocking you expressed something pleasant or encouraging to you. people who I don't even know their names come to me to comment about the video and joke about not falling again. That is not unlawful in and of itself. Since the matter does not involve a protected category such as sex, race, religion, or disability, pursuing a claim of hostile work environment would be quite a stretch. It would also be futile because any relief would not cover outsiders who watch the video and feel like joking about it. The notion of harassment entails a pattern of conduct (meaning that a person engages twice or more in that conduct) that causes a reasonable person to feel annoyed or concerned for his safety. Even if someone engages makes a few jokes that cause you to get annoyed, any petition for restraining orders seems unlikely to succeed. Sooner rather than later, the jokes will get old and people will move on.
If we cut through all the entertaining colour commentary around Bob's experience then all that happened is TfL refused him permission to carry a specific item and according to the TfL Conditions of Carriage: 9.2 Staff can refuse permission for you to take any item onto our services. For example, you may be prevented from taking a bicycle on DLR services during the London Marathon. So the rules around the times when non-folding bikes are permitted on the Overground not withstanding there's a catch-all rule which allows them to refuse specific items on specific occasions for whatever reason they want. What remedies does Bob have available for his wasted time, his refusal of carriage, the supervisor's concealment of his identity, general rude treatment, Realistically - none. The refusal may be harsh - but there's plenty of room in the conditions of carriage to allow it. A supervisor concealing his identity may be annoying but it's not illegal, nor is being rude. the BTP's shockingly insulting accusation of his &quot;wasting police time&quot; by simply trying to explain the situation to reason with them upon their arrival, either against TfL, or against BTP? Probably nothing doing here either - the BTP aren't for what Bob's trying to use them for. I doubt they'd actually pursue Bob for wasting police time unless he makes a habit of doing it, but they've got a point. They're not the complaints department for TfL! It's like calling the police because McDonalds won't serve you at the drive through.
A matter of terminology, what you want is not the copyright, but a license to use the copyright, presumably a non-exclusive license. You would probably need to approach a licensing department at Disney. They will ask lots of questions, and if they are open to the possibility, will quote a fee, which will, i would think, be sizable. Anyone should be able to ask, but I suspect that most requests are refused. It would probably be well to have a business plan laid out, and exactly how the images would be used in your plan. Disney can refuse any license, or offer one on whatever terms it pleases.
Daniel Fleetwood, and his wife who watched the movie with him, were bound by a confidentiality agreement: She can't say much more because she had to sign a confidentiality agreement. Basically, both he and his wife signed a contract, if they had said anything they would have been in breach of that contract and could have been sued. Such agreements are standard, even for actors, so presumably, the lawyers at Disney know what they are doing when they write such a contract. NDAs such as this often specify hefty fines. I am doubtful that his illness would have meant they would have lost a case against him in that situation - it would have meant a whole lot of negative publicity, but if the contract was legally binding, the health condition does not matter. Daniel himself died five days after watching the movie.
There are no laws requiring that any company must publish all opinions from its customers. I'll admit it's fundamentally dishonest to only publish the positives, but there's no prohibition against it either. Look at movie advertisements, for example. They'll paraphrase or selectively quote a review, citing only what seems to be positive, yet if you read the review and quote in context, you'll understand the review quite differently. How exactly would you police it if you were to require companies to publish all reviews? Would you have some kind of litmus test to determine whether the critique is justified and fair? How often do people post false reviews (good or bad), and how would you account for them? Company web sites offering reviews form their own customers are doing nothing more than using the web as an extension of their marketing, so one has to expect some manipulation of the information in order to present products and services in their best possible lights. Why, for example, would I tell you how much someone hates my product when my goal is to sell it to you? This is why it would be better to use independent third-party review sites that have no dog in the hunt when it comes to honest feedback about the companies they cover.