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Looks like we need to spend some time talking about the Parler lolsuit against Amazon and why it's deader than a Mitch McConnell comedy special. They've brought three claims - antitrust, breach of contract, and tortious interference. None will survive. Here's why

 Here's the meat of their intro: Amazon isn't being fair to us. They're holding us to a higher standard than Twitter - they say we allow violent content, but look what Twitter does!
There are a few problems with this approach. First, there's a factual problem: Twitter and Parler take very different approaches to moderation. Hell, *that's Parler's entire pitch.* So "we're the same as Twitter, why are you treating us different" isn't going to fly
ALSO, the hashtag was mostly people saying "these folks are calling to hang Mike Pence!"

https://t.co/3ixZYQ8nRc
And ALSO also, did anyone notice any prominent right wingers complaining about losing tens of thousands of followers yesterday? You know why they did? Because Twitter has been active in deleting accounts that violate its TOS
So factually, this complaint isn't going to fly.

But more fundamentally, Parler has a legal problem: There's no right to have a contracting party apply its rules equally. If you and I sign a contract with a supplier that says the supplier can stop providing us with beer if
we support the NE Patriots (and by "sign a contract" I mean we sign 2 separate contracts, 1 for me and 1 for you), and we both tweet out love for that horrible organization, and the supplier terminates me but not you, you know what happens if I sue them?
https://t.co/8aOSh2bTjf
The only thing that governs my contract with that supplier is my contract with that supplier. If they have discretion to terminate me, the fact that they exercised that discretion for me, but didn't for someone else, doesn't give me a cause of action. Not even a little bit
(Note: The one exception to this would be if I could show the company was exercising its discretion as a means of discriminating against a protected class - i.e. it terminated all white people who did X but no black people who did, ever. That's not and couldn't be alleged here)
So ... this is NOT what you would call a good start to a complaint. If your intro - which is the part of the complaint that should hit the reader in the gut, set the hook, and make them start thinking "you have a case" - is "they did something they were allowed to do"
Moving on. They then *specifically allege* that Amazon is motivated by "political animus" before ALSO claiming that it's an antitrust violation.

Folks ...
https://t.co/LDAxWRH5X0
Words can't express how bad a job this is. It really can't.

But I guess I'll try
First, "political animus" is NOT a problem in our society. Parties are allowed to choose to do or not do business with counterparties whose politics they dislike. "Republican Pollsters & PR R Us" does not have to take on the DSA as a client.
I don't have to take on David Duke if he comes looking for a lawyer. Tom O'Halloran's Irish Pub is allowed to boot out Unionists if it wants to.
So when Parler says "Amazon booted us because they don't like our politics" they are *specifically alleging* that Amazon was doing a thing it was entitled to do
This is a problem, because Parler is *also* trying to allege a Sherman anti-trust act claim based on wishes and innuendo. Essentially, Parler - which sued only Amazon and not Twitter - is alleging that Amazon is working with Twitter to shut down competition for Twitter
There are lots of reasons why this won't fly, and we'll get there as they get to the meat of the claim.

But when your core argument is "this conduct makes me think it's an anti-competitive conspiracy," DON'T SPECIFICALLY ALLEGE AN ALTERNATIVE, NON-CONSPIRACY EXPLANATION FOR IT
Also, it's worth pausing here to talk about Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, which is the "Tw" in the term "Twiqbal", the cases that set up the "plausibility" standard we've discussed in prior threads. (Refresher on plausibility here https://t.co/RIwlukf497)
The claim in Twombly was that telephone companies were conspiring to reduce competition by not entering into their competitors' markets, violating the Sherman Antitrust Act.

Here's the wikipedia summary of what the Supreme Court held, which is good enough to work with.
Do you see the problem this poses for Parler?

If so, you're a step ahead of Parler's lawyers, who apparently completely missed it.
Onward for the rest of the intro, which sets out the claims: Aside from the Sherman Antitrust Act, they're also alleging breach of contract, based on a provision they say gives them a right to 30 days notice of termination (spoiler, it does not), and tortious interference
To show tortious interference, btw, you need to show that someone: Knew you had (or were about to have) a contract, and did something that you weren't allowed to do, or for an improper reason, specifically designed to cause your contracting party to breach the contract
Tl;dr, that's also not going to fly here, for various and many reasons
Now we move into the "Parties" section, where Parler tells the court who it's suing. This particular paragraph is basically "but your Honor, we REALLY REALLY want to use AWS"
The problem?
No, seriously. There is no cause of action for "a business we really want to partner with doesn't want to partner with us".

That's just not a thing.
Next, they describe what's happening: We built our product around AWS, they're kicking us off, and it's going to really suck for us.

Also, we're a competitor of Twitter. This is important, because we're about to segue into their evidence of an antitrust conspiracy
In my head, I call this section "This is Evidence of a Conspiracy, Right? (No)"
Let me explain.

No, it is too much, let me sum up:

Amazon serves us and also Twitter. It was afraid we would grow at Twitter's expense, so it shut us down to prevent that.

That's their conspiracy theory. All of it. One problem
Your ... your theory is that ... that Amazon has a financial interest in preventing your growth because Twitter is a client?

And that's why it kicked, you, ALSO AN AMAZON CLIENT, off their servers?
Idiots, user migration from Twitter (an Amazon client) to Parler (an Amazon client at the time) literally CANNOT harm Amazon. It's a zero net business effect for Amazon; whichever of the two of you the users go to, they're still on platforms using AWS
In fact, the only way that could possibly harm Amazon is if users migrate from platforms that use AWS to platforms that DON'T. On your "protect its business" theory, Amazon should be *encouraging* Twitter competitors on its platform, so it has a better chance of retaining users
Instead, you just argued that Amazon did the one thing that could *harm* Amazon, economically, in this particular environment: Cut off a within-Amazon-ecosystem destination for users exiting Twitter
Not only do you have a Twombly problem - nothing here comes close to alleging an agreement between Amazon and Twitter - but the allegations directly contradict any claim that could have possibly been the motivation
Or, in gif form
Also, they talked about Amazon's letter to them. Here it is. Note what it says: We've been raising issues about this stuff for weeks, you haven't responded effectively, and you've affirmatively told us that you won't be responding effectively
Because of that, you are in breach of the terms of service and we think you're a risk to public safety, so we're terminating you on Sunday.

Wow.

Can they do that?
In a word, yes.
Let's take a look at Amazon's relevant agreements and terms.

Amazon's AWS Terms of service, which expressly bind any customer to the Amazon Acceptable Use Policy
Amazon's Acceptable Use Policy, which says "nothing illegal, or that may harm others, or that may harm our reputation, or offensive"
And Amazon's AWS Customer Agreement, which has a few relevant sections. 4.2, which requires customers to make sure their users' content complies with the Acceptable Use Policy, and holds customers responsible for end-user content that violates it
4.5, which says, basically, you are responsible for your end users and you MUST ban end-users for violating the acceptable use policy if you know about it. So, for example, when Parler deleted Lin Wood's post about killing people, but didn't ban him for it, they violated this
6.1: We get to suspend your access to AWS *without any notice at all* if you violate the customer agreement (which, as referenced in the above Tweet, Parler inarguably did)
Section 7.2, which has the 30 days notice provision Parler is relying on - but which ALSO says (check the red) "except we don't need to give you any notice at all if we could suspend you under Section 6"
And also, just to cap it off, a limitation of liability that says "you can't recover any lost profit damages against us, you can just get a refund"
With all of this background, you can see why this case is deader than a year-old fruit fly. They're suing for breach of contract based on a 30-day notice provision that the contract EXPRESSLY says doesn't apply. And they are no-doubt unquestionably toast
Anyway, back to Parler saying "but we were positioned to do so well before we got shut down for violating the terms of the contract we agreed to"
More paragraphs of "but having consequences for breaching our agreements with Amazon will really suck for us", to which a court will reply ...
https://t.co/d3yAblmwsD
Seriously. Parler signed a contract that said "Do NOT allow your end users to post violent, harmful stuff that might damage Amazon's reputation."

They agreed that if they violated that contract, Amazon could terminate them without notice.

They violated the contract.
And now they're complaining that they are getting the consequences they agreed to for doing the thing they agreed not to do?
That's ... that's not gonna move the needle, son.
Back to "no fair, what about Twitter", which just isn't a thing that a court will give even 1 fuck about, let alone 2
Now they're arguing that "hey, we finally took this stuff down" should be good enough. But it isn't. Not under the contract they signed. And especially not when they deleted the content but left the users
And here we get to the actual causes of action. First, antitrust, which I've been mentally referring to as
"Let's Do the Twombly Again"
Seriously, look those allegations over again. They're even less meaty than the ones the Supreme Court looked at in Twombly and said "nah, that's not enough to let your antitrust claim survive in court". Basically "Twitter is now an Amazon client and this thing will help Twitter"
"They could suspend us without notice, sure, but this is really a termination so we needed notice" is NOT a good argument when your contract says "we can terminate you without notice for anything we can suspend you for"
Seriously, this is the worst possible version of this breach of contract claim; by conceding that they could've been suspended without notice, they affirmatively argued that there was no breach
Full disclosure - in my first run-through of the AWS agreement I missed 7.2(b) (the "we can terminate if we can suspend"). But, um ... I wasn't being paid to litigate this claim, so "we were just as careless as the guy reading it for sport" is not a strong argument, guys
"Give us an injunction, because this is really going to suck for us": sorry, that the contract specifically says you lose means no injunction.

Also, the fact that the contract says "your only possible damages are what you paid us" means they are very very easy to calculate
Seriously, did these attorneys just not bother reading the relevant contract before Leeroy Jenkinsing this filing? How do you build your irreparable harm claim around lost profits that the contract specifically bars you from recovering??
Last, we have our turtle law claim (tortoise interference, yeah, I got dad jokes). This isn't going to fly for any number of reasons.
For one thing, tortious interference claims are based on "you made Dave, who had a contract with me, breach it, and therefore harmed me"

This seems to be "you made me breach my contract with Dave"
That's ... um ... not a thing.

Also, and I guess this is a minor note, but when you're alleging tortious interference you need to show that there was an existing contract that was breached
Maybe I missed it in the Complaint, but did any of you see any paragraphs detailing what Parler's "contract" with its users are or explaining how "not being able to provide Parler for a while" is a *breach* of that contract?
Seriously - they're essentially alleging that any Parler user can now sue Parler for breach of contract due to Parler being down, which ... well ...
I mean, I haven't reviewed the Parler terms of service but I feel preeeetty preeeeetty confident that isn't a good faith reading of them
Also, as our returning Threadnought sailors know very well, you can't get to tortious interference based on "third parties doing things they're allowed to do"
If your contract says "hey, Amazon, you can terminate me without notice if I don't delete Lin Wood's account now that he's called for murder", and then you don't delete the account and get terminated, you can't say "no, actually, turtle law says that's a problem"
That's not "improper means" or "improper purpose"

It's (again) what you SPECIFICALLY agreed would happen if you did the things you actually did.
Bottom line - this suit is a heaping pile of garbage with no chance of any success at all. It won't even make it to discovery. Whatever they paid their lawyers for this - even if it was on contingency - was too much.
/fin

cc @DefiantlyFree you may be interested in the above

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In the cold light of morning, I'm still completely amazed by the legal belly flop that @ThomasMoreSoc filed in the DC District Court. It's the legal equivalent of watching the butt fumble, live

EVERYTHING you could possibly get wrong in a complaint, they managed


Start with the plaintiffs. The ONLY claims in the lawsuit are that the Constitution gives state legislatures the right to set the manner of elections, which they have allegedly (we'll get to this insanity) failed to do.

There's oodles of caselaw saying "since that's a right of the state legislature, only state legislatures, as a body, can bring such a claim"

Are the plaintiffs state legislatures?

https://t.co/KJGEvm8Owp


OK, what about the Defendants? They've sued Defendants from, IIRC, five states (GA, PA, WI, MI, AZ) based on claims that the State Legislatures there didn't pass election rules that the plaintiffs insist the Constitution requires (I promise, we'll get there).
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@AkivaMCohen
Let's talk about this North Dakota attempt to legislate around Section 230 and create a civil right of action for users censored by social media sites. CC @mmasnick

Forget, for a moment, that this law, if it passed would immediately be deemed void as preempted by Section 230 (Federal law is supreme over state law where they conflict, and this would create an express conflict). This bill is a really good example of why this stuff is hard

Here's the key provision of the bill. The various highlighting on these versions shows areas we'll touch on


First of all, let's look at the last of those images. There's no question that this would target conduct immune under federal law - and, in fact, if 230 were repealed nobody could ever be liable under this law (since it only reaches immune conduct). So it's incredibly stupid.


But again, put that aside. Let's look at the substance.

First of all, who gets to decide whether content fits into these highlighted categories? Do they actually think that the government will get to decide what counts as "otherwise objectionable"?
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Akiva Cohen
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@AkivaMCohen
The judge in this case has now issued an absolutely brutal smackdown that you'll enjoy reading. It comes complete with a well-earned threat of sanctions.


Here's the decision. Some highlights follow

Pretty sure I said this, using slightly different words!


Hey, @questauthority, it sounds like Judge Boasberg was about as pleased about the long "none of this matters but we want to say it anyway" section as we expected him to be


You CANNOT run into court claiming there's an emergency and you need an expedited schedule so you can be heard before 1/6 and then just not bother serving anyone for 12 days
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So Dominion sued Rudy for defamation. How are they ever going to allege actual malice?
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Akiva Cohen
Akiva Cohen
@AkivaMCohen
Dear Texas: When your argument is that election procedures were adopted in violation of the Electors clause, the only evidence you need to "marshal" is "what election procedures were adopted and how"

You don't need weeks, a magnifying glass, and Melissa Carone


Also, why is there no other forum? You couldn't have sued in Federal court in Georgia or PA in advance of the election because ...?

Oh, right. No standing. That's still a problem


Also, Texas? I feel like you should take that up with ... Texas


I kind of feel like "look, what you meant by Purcell was let's just wait until after the election and then invalidate ALL the votes" isn't necessarily the *strongest* argument


Also, you don't just get to make up a new principle of constitutional and election law and just call it "a variant of" Purcell (or anything else).

You can tell it's made up by the total absence of any citation to ANY case, ANYWHERE, saying that
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A few divisions - Taobao (B2C marketplace), Tmall (High-end B2C marketplace), Alibaba (B2B marketplace, Cainiu(logistics)..

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Operational practices have an emergent nature to them. They’re affected by people, their expertise, their relationships, their team goals, role perceptions and also member needs as humans and professionals.
In this entangled mess of variables, aspects practice-as-done are

Constantly morphed as a response to economic pressures (deadlines, business demands), workload demands (as people tend to automate or agree patterns to reduce cognitive load of tasks and become more efficient) and understanding of safety and security related barriers.

All of these tend to be fluid and non fixed. In this continuous interaction with the environment and different pressures acting on it, there are numerous opportunities for improvements which have local relevance and emerge out of local needs and interactions of elements. However

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Aurangzeb's huge army, which was adorned with artillery, elephant and horses, under the leadership of Commander Darab Khan had marched to punish the ruler of/1


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The INDIAN NATIONAL FLAG is not just a flag! It's a testimony of patriotism and seamless sacrifice. A symbol representing one of the oldest civilizations on this planet.

Let's hope what happened yesterday never repeats!

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After the revolt of 1857, the first Indian flag was designed. The design was based on western heraldic standards with "Union Jack" in the upper-left quadrant and a "Star of India" enclosed in the royal crown in the middle of the right half.(1)


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In Brahm Puran, Brahma preached this to Marichi. So this Puran of ten thousand shlokas is called Brahm Puran.

In Padma Puran, the base of the story is the appearance of Brahma on a lotus(Padm) from Vishnu' s navel.This has fifty five thousand shlokas.

Vishnu Puran is primarily based in Varah kalp. This book is on Vishnu and this book has twenty three thousand shlokas.

Vaayu Puran is written in Shwet Kalp and has twenty four thousand shlokas. Here Vayudev preaches about Dharma.

In Bhagwat Puran, which is written with the base of Gayatri mantra describes Dharma extensively. It has 18000 shlokas. It also mentions the story of Vritrasur.

In Narad Puran, which has twenty five thousand shlokas, is a sermon on Dharma by Narad based in Brihad Kalp.

Markandeya Puran has nine thousand shlokas and here it is through the birds that Dharma is described.
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