Google Avoids Another Lawsuit Over Rankings (For Now)–Roberts v. Google
from Eric Goldman at his Technology & Marketing Law Blog looks at how a case
involving rankings on Google got dismissed before going to trial, thanks in
large part to a counter-suit that Google threatened.
Mark Roberts was claiming breach of contract, in part because of Google’s add
URL feature and help pages supposedly formed a promise that his pages (which he
doesn’t say but assumes are most relevant) should be top ranked. They were in
2003 but later dropped.
Google threatened to file an
anti-SLAPP motion against Roberts, a means of effectively getting the court
to agree that the case is without merit and recovering costs. I haven’t read the
actual documents in Roberts case, but from what Eric describes, I have no doubt
it would be easy to dismiss any claims of promise or contract.
A somewhat similar case (over ranking issues and the laughable claims being
made) involving
KinderStart and Google apparently continues, despite Google having actually
followed through with an anti-SLAPP motion on that.