Beck v. Eiland-Hall

Beck v. Eiland-Hall
WIPO headquarters in Geneva
Court	World Intellectual Property Organization
Full case name	Mercury Radio Arts, Inc. and Glenn Beck v. Isaac Eiland-Hall
Decided	October 29, 2009
Citation(s)	WIPO Case No. D2009-1182
Transcript(s)	Beck v. Eiland-Hall
Court membership
Judge(s) sitting	Frederick M. Abbott (arbitrator)
Case opinions
Complaint denied.
Keywords
Defamation, Freedom of speech, Parody, Political satire, Satire, Trademark

Beck v. Eiland-Hall was a case filed in 2009 before the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), a United Nations agency. It was filed by political commentator Glenn Beck against Isaac Eiland-Hall, concerning the website "GlennBeckRapedAndMurdered­AYoungGirlIn1990.com". Eiland-Hall created the site as a parody to express the view that Beck's commentary style challenged his guests to prove a negative. The site's name was based on a joke first used by comedian Gilbert Gottfried at the 2008 Comedy Central Roast of Bob Saget, in which Gottfried jokingly implored listeners to disregard the (non-existent) rumor that Saget had raped and murdered a girl in 1990. Online posters began an Internet meme comparing Gottfried's joke with Beck's style of debate, by requesting Beck disprove he had committed the act in question. Eiland-Hall launched his website on September 1, 2009.

Beck filed a complaint to the WIPO under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP), arguing the domain name of the website was defamatory and asserted trademark infringement in its use of his name. Eiland-Hall filed a response brief to WIPO which cited the U.S. Supreme Court case Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, asserting the website's domain name was a form of free speech and satirical political humor.

Beck made a supplemental filing in the case arguing the domain name was misleading and might lead individuals to believe it contained factual information. Eiland-Hall filed a surreply and stated Beck had depreciated the value of the First Amendment by attempting to evade its reach in a legal proceeding outside U.S. courts. On October 29, 2009, WIPO ruled against Beck, concluding that Eiland-Hall was making a political statement through parody in a justified usage of the Glenn Beck mark.

Commentators noted Beck's actions led to a Streisand effect; his suit against the website drew increased attention to it. Representatives of Public Citizen, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Citizen Media Law Project were all of the opinion that Beck's trademark argument in his complaint against the website was ridiculous. The assistant director of the Citizen Media Law Project applauded WIPO's decision, saying, "It's good to see that this WIPO arbitrator had no interest in allowing Beck to circumvent the guarantees of the U.S. Constitution."^[1] Beck's representative declined comment to PC Magazine about the conclusion of the case. Lawyers for Beck did not respond to a request from National Public Radio for a comment about the WIPO ruling.