New Health Care Provisions Go Into Effect Today

New health care rules go into effect today, as required by the health care overall signed into law by President Obama last March. These rules include requirements on the percentage of premium-based revenue insurers must spend on payouts to consumers and on other consumer benefits; a partial closing of the infamous "doughnut hole" (which requires that some prescription drug costs be borne 100% by medicare recipients); and free preventative services screenings for seniors. One wonders whether, as the new health care law continues to be rolled out, the law will prove popular and thus put political pressure on Congress to maintain comprehensive health care legislation even if the Supreme Court holds unconstitutional the insurance mandate scheduled to take effect in 2014.

Is Skype Dead in China?

According to the Washington Post, "China has moved to ban all VoIP services except two state-owned networks, China Unicom and China Telecom, likely making Internet telephony services such as Skype illegal to use." If that's true, and if the ban works, that would be a major impediment to free discussion with people in China, although email would still be available of course. Last April, I used Skype from various locations in China for audio communications to contacts in many U.S. locations. Access was easy and 1.5 cents per minute -- that is, nearly free for a middle-class U.S. user like myself. The Post quotes a university professor in Beijing, who noted a political problem in making Skype illegal in China:

Skype is the market leader, but there is also MSN and Gmail Talk. The children of Chinese government officials, who are studying abroad, use these services to call home, so I do not think anyone is going to cut the lines.

NHTSA Provides Recall Alerts Via Email

Here's a nice new government-sponsored safety alert system. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will now send to any email address notification of recalls for tires, child safety restraints, school buses, motorcyles (and related equipment), and all passenger vehicles. On the latter, you can sign up to receive alerts about all vehicle recalls, or you can register to receive only recall alerts for up to five makes and model years (e.g., 2008 Hyundai). The make-and-model-year alerts may be the way to go because, otherwise, the consumer will have to wade through alerts for about 600 vehicle recalls each year. Go here for more information and to register.

Courts address a section 230 question that seems hard at first blush– what happens after a defamation plaintiff wins against the poster?

by Paul Alan Levy

We have previously blogged about the crucial role played by section 230 of the Communications Decency Act in protecting the ability of consumers to speak effectively about corporate or political wrongdoing, by protecting the hosts of web sites and email services from being sued over the contents of communications that are made using their services.  Absent such protection, Internet hosts would have to worry about being held liable each time the target of speech complained about posted content, and many hosts would take the communications down rather than run the risk of having to defend a lawsuit or even the risk of being held liable.  Indeed, just before the new libel tourism bill was passed with specific protection against enforcement of judgments that defy section 230, the bill's sponsor expressly acknowledged on the House floor this fundamental aspect of section 230's purpose.  Instead of subjecting Internet hosts to liability, Congress decided to put them in a litigation-free zone that enables them to make judgments of what speech to leave alone and what to take down.  Instead, the law says, if someone is disgruntled about speech, the remedy has to be against the speaker and not the medium.

But what happens after the plaintiff wins that case against the speaker?  Must the plaintiff accept the fact that the content remains online?  This week, two courts addressed that question, and although the cases are distinguishable on their factual and procedural contexts, the results point in different directions.  Not surprisingly, both cases involve postings on Ripoff Report.

Elizabeth Warren Is Looking for a CFPB Head

The Wall Street Journal reports that Elizabeth Warren is consulting with business and consumer groups to find someone to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The implication is that the President is likely to be influenced by Warren's recommendations. "Among the names being discussed are Iowa's attorney general, Tom Miller; New York state bank regulator Richard Neiman; and former Office of Thrift Supervision director Ellen Seidman."

NCLC Publishes Report on the Role of the States Under the Dodd-Frank Act

The National Consumer Law Center has published this helpful nine-page report on the role of the states (and those seeking to enforce state law) under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. The Report covers two basic topics: (1) the extent to which Dodd-Frank expressly authorizes state Attorneys General and other state regulators to enforce federal consumer protection law; and (2) Dodd-Frank's position on preemption (or not) of state consumer protection and other law.

    Here's an excerpt of the Report's executive summary (with minor edits and links added): 

Obama Administration Announces Final Meat Labeling Rules

The LA Times explains:

Coming soon to a grocery store near you: Those nutrition labels slapped on everything from cereal to soda pop will soon be required on packages of meat. The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Wednesday morning that the new rule, slated to start Jan. 1 of 2012, requires that 40 of the most common cuts of poultry, pork, beef and lamb include labels that disclose to consumers the total number of calories, the number of calories from fat and the total grams of fat and saturated fat.

Read the entire article here.

 

The Inefficiency of Gift Giving Vol. II

We discussed here the inefficiency of gift giving. Now, the Consumerist tells us that "Amazon has patented a system that could intercept the yet another sweater Aunt Janice has sent you and automatically return it and exchange it for something you actually want."

Unsealed Google Brief in Rosetta Stone Appeal Shows Baselessness of Original Redactions

by Paul Alan Levy

Over the past couple of months, I have discussed the heavily redacted filings in Rosetta Stone’s appeal of a ruling that Google did not violate the trademark laws by allowing advertisers to bid on the display of ads to Internet users who searched on Google for the term “Rosetta Stone.”  The parties responded to Public Citizen’s request for consent to motion for leave to intervene and to unseal Rosetta Stone’s brief by allowing it all to be filed publicly; once that happened, review of the former redactions (shown here) made it apparent that there was never any basis for sealing in the first place.

At the same time, Google filed its own brief on appeal, containing a number of redactions which, Google’s counsel told me, had been made at Rosetta Stone’s insistence.  Again Public Citizen asked for consent to motions for leave to intervene and to unseal, and again the parties promptly agreed to seek leave for unsealing; again the Fourth Circuit gave its consent. And once again, now that Google has filed its brief without any redactions, comparison of the brief with the former redactions leaves me scratching my head about why any reasonable litigant would have thought that the facts concealed here could have outweighed the public interest in access to judicial records.

Local Community Radio Act Gets Congressional Approval After 10-Year Battle

The Local Community Radio Act won Congressional approval last week after a 10-year battle led by groups such as the Prometheus Radio Project, which is dedicated to "freeing the airwaves from corporate control." Basically, the legislation will enable the FCC to license many more small, local, independent radio stations. Here's Prometheus's short-version explanation of the legislation:

The main impact of the legislation is that it repeals the restrictions on Low Power FM radio licensing that were put into place by the Radio Broadcast Preservation Act (RBPA) of 2000. The RBPA said that the FCC couldn't give a license to a Low Power FM radio station (an LPFM) if there was a full-service radio station nearby on the third-adjacent channel (that is, three "clicks" away on the dial). The stated purpose of this rule was to prevent interference to full-service stations, but there has been some good research showing that it's highly unlikely that LPFMs will interfere with full-power stations that are so far away on the dial. The new legislation removes the restrictions on spacing between Low Power FM radio stations and full-service radio stations on third-adjacent channels. That's what LPFM advocates have been hoping for for years, and it makes space for lots of new LPFMs! Yay!