[David Post, March 2, 2007 at 4:16pm] Trackbacks
Careful, the Network is Watching:

The extraordinary story of pianist Joyce Hatto's fake recordings (best recounted in this article from Gramophone, but also given heavy coverage in the NY Times and elsewhere) has an interesting angle that hasn't gotten much play. The whole story (of how Hatto's recordings were actually not hers at all, but had been recorded by other artists and re-mastered and re-released under Hatto's name by her husband) was uncovered, in a sense, by the network. The whole thing unraveled when someone in England put Hatto's recording of Liszt's "Transcendental Etudes" into his computer and tried to rip it to iTunes, and itunes retrieved the information from the CDDB database that it was actually a performance by the Hungarian pianist Laszlo Simon.

I had my own little brush with how smart the network can sometimes be a few years ago. I was preparing to teach one of my classes (Copyright law) in which I was going to be talking a little bit about US copyright history, and I realized I didn't have a copy of the first US Copyright Act. So I googled it, figuring I'd find it somewhere and print it out — "Copyright Act of 1791." Lo and behold, the first two references Google pulled up were citations to papers that I had written. Wow! I got over the flush of excitement, because I also noticed that there were only a dozen or so citations in total. That's odd, I thought — it's not Britney Spears' haircut, maybe, but surely lots of people have written about copyright history, and about the first copyright statute, and all of that. A little poking around and I had the answer — I had been one of the few people to write about the Copyright Act of 1791 because there was no Copyright Act of 1791 — the first statute had been enacted in 1790. Googling "Copyright Act of 1790" pulls up the predicted zillions of hits.

"Boy, was my face red," as we used to say back in Brooklyn. Exposed, by Google, as having screwed up the dates of the first US copyright statute. [I fixed the paper, though copies with my error intact are probably still floating around there somewhere].

And then this afternoon I got an email from a student, who's working on a paper about personal jurisdiction and patent law, and he tells me that a paper of mine shows up as citation #1 when you google "personal jurisdiction over the plaintiff" — which makes me oddly nervous that I've done something wrong again.

Cornellian (mail):
The power of Google is scary. Soon everyone will have mobile, high speed internet connections everywhere they go and will be able to Google everything in real time. Imagine trying to give a speech while questioners are digging up and pointing out some prior paper where you said the exact opposite to what you're saying now.
3.2.2007 5:29pm
James Dillon (mail):
I hope that last bit is a joke, because the doctrine of personal jurisdiction only applies to defendants-- the plaintiff, by virtue of filing a lawsuit in the forum state, necessarily consents to that state's exercise of personal jurisdiction over him/her.
3.2.2007 6:26pm
Steve:
Why wonder if it's a joke? Just google it...

Restrictions on the court's exercise of personal jurisdiction over plaintiffs are negligible; after all, the plaintiff -- Alice, in our prototypical case -- has initiated the suit by choosing Place4 as the jurisdiction in which to file, and the court's power over her can and is easily justified on the theory that she has thereby consented to the exercise of court's power over her.

I wonder, though, what would fit into the "negligible" category.
3.2.2007 6:49pm
David Post (mail) (www):
Well, here's the answer. There are situations in which questions arise about personal jurisdiction over plaintiffs. Imagine: plaintiff files a lawsuit in NY against defendant, who moves to transfer the case to California. Question: does the CA court have personal jurisdiction over the plaintiff? It's a perfectly reasonable question (and it is the one my student was researching. It's just an unusual one -- which is why, when you google "personal jurisdiction over the plaintiff", you don't get many hits.
DavidP
3.2.2007 6:57pm
James Dillon (mail):
That is an interesting question. If venue is more appropriate in another state, could the courts of that state require the plaintiff to consent to the new forum's exercise of specific jurisdiction for purposes of litigating the action there? Compelled consent to personal jurisdiction seems less problematic where the state's exercise of jurisdictional authority is for the party's benefit-- e.g., giving the plaintiff the opportunity to litigate his claim against the defendants and potentially recover whatever damages he seeks-- rather than to its potential detriment (the usual case in which the defendant faces a potential judgment in favor of the plaintiff). But what about an instance in which the defendant successfully moves to transfer venue to another state, and then files a counterclaim against the plaintiff? Obviously, the plaintiff could not challenge personal jurisdiction as to the counterclaim while pursuing the primary action, but could he discontinue that action and then challenge the new forum's personal jurisdiction over him as to the remaining counterclaim?
3.2.2007 7:14pm
Steve:
The question seems to have no single answer. Compare Hilti Aktiengesellschaft v. Milwaukee Electric Tool Corp., 2004 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 16373 (E.D.N.Y. July 22, 2004)

Plaintiffs object that the Northern District of Mississippi lacks personal jurisdiction over plaintiff HAG under a constitutional "minimum contacts" analysis, and that transfer to that district is therefore improper under § 1404(a) because the lawsuit could not have been brought there. This argument is baseless. The question is not whether plaintiffs could be haled into the proposed transferee court as defendants, but whether plaintiffs could have brought the same declaratory judgment action in the transferee court.


with Manufacture des Montres Jaguar, S.A. v. Jaguar Cars, Ltd., 2000 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13731 (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 22, 2000)

Defendants have also moved to transfer venue of the action pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a). As an initial matter, it would be manifestly contrary to the interests of justice to force the plaintiff to litigate in a forum in which it does not have the minimum contacts to satisfy the requirements of due process.


I think the better rule is that when you file a lawsuit in federal court, you consent to the jurisdiction of the court, with full knowledge that one of the things the court has the power to do in the exercise of its jurisdiction is to transfer the case to a more convenient forum. Since the personal jurisdiction problem wouldn't have prevented you from bringing suit in the transferee forum, had you wanted to, then it's a proper forum for transfer under 1404(a).

My hope is that, years from now, someone will be confronted with this exact issue and will spend hours trying to find the VC comment thread where it was improbably discussed.
3.2.2007 7:27pm
StevenK:
Are you implying "Boy, was my face red" is not that common a phrase outside Brooklyn?
3.2.2007 7:44pm
Kat (www):
Speaking of such errors -- it was <i>Joyce</i> Hatto.
3.2.2007 9:50pm