The Law and Business of Social Media
April 14, 2017 - Advertising, User-Generated Content, Copyright, Free Speech

Social Links: Burger King ad triggers Google Assistant devices; suits allege infringement of copyrights in content posted to social media; Twitter’s hidden “dislike” button

Without Google’s permission, Burger King ended one of its television commercials with a statement designed to automatically cause Google Assistant devices to read a list of the Whopper’s ingredients out loud.

Having passed the 1.2-billion-user mark, Facebook Messenger is now twice as popular as Instagram.

A lawsuit alleges Anheuser-Busch and one of its distributors impermissibly used a photo from a woman’s Facebook page in promotional materials for the brewer’s Natural Light beer. We addressed some of the legal risks in seeking to commercialize user-generated content in a Socially Aware blog post last year that can be found here.

And while on the topic of copyright law and social media, a much smaller California business is being sued in federal court by one of its competitors, Founder’s Creek Media, for allegedly copying a copyrighted promotional product video from a Founder’s Creek page on Facebook and using the video as an advertisement for its own, similar product.

Germany may fine social media companies up to 50 million euros ($53 million) if they fail to remove posts that contain hate speech.

A court in Egypt sentenced a lawyer who has represented torture victims to ten years in prison for criticizing that country’s government on social media.

Using the data it aggregates about its users’ whereabouts, Snapchat introduced a new feature that allows marketers to determine whether the Snapchat users who view ad campaigns on the messaging app actually wind up visiting the advertisers’ retail locations and venues (in other words, whether their Snapchat ad campaigns are actually working).

Unbeknownst to most of its users, Twitter rolled out a “dislike” button months ago—but the consequences of using it aren’t clear.

A Business Insider article identifies ten things prospective employers and recruiters should be able to tell about you immediately upon viewing your LinkedIn profile.

An eight-year-old in Ohio took his four-year-old sister for a ride to McDonald’s in his family’s van, apparently after watching driving instruction videos on YouTube.