Chicago IP Attorney & Lawyer : R. David Donoghue : Chicago IP Litigation Blog

Funny Cide Ventures, LLC v. Miami Herald Publishing Co., No. 4D06-2347, Slip Op. (Fla. 4th Dist. May 16, 2007).

Funny Cide Ventures is not a Northern District opinion, nor is it about intellectual property, but it is worth reading.  In a two-page per curiam opinion, the appellate panel dismissed Funny Cide Venture's ("FCV") claims of injurious falsehood against defendants the Miami Herald and Knight-Ridder.  FCV's horse Funny Cide won the Kentucky Derby in 2003.  After the race, the Miami Herald falsely reported that Funny Cide's jockey admitted carrying something during the race and implied that the jockey had cheated by carrying an illegal, battery-operated device perhaps to shock Funny Cide.  Funny Cide and his jockey went on to win the Preakness Stakes with a substantial lead over the field, completing two-thirds of the Triple Crown.  But they lost the final race at Belmont and, with it, the Triple Crown.  FCV filed suit against defendants claiming that the Miami Herald's erroneous story caused the jockey to run Funny Cide too hard at the Preakness in an effort to prove his and Funny Cide's superiority and, therefore,  their innocence.  As a result of that effort, Funny Cide lost at Belmont and, therefore, lost the revenue generated by a Triple Crown winner.  The Court held that despite the "novelty and creativity" of the claims, the loss was not a direct result of defendants' article.

While the opinion is timely (the Preakness was run last weekend), what is most interesting about it is Judge Farmer's concurring opinion.  His concurrence does not make any novel legal arguments or take issue with the substance of the per curiam decision.  Instead, it leads with an argument against "dreary," "tedious" and unnecessarily long judicial opinions.

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Mader v. Motorola Inc., No. 92 C 8089, 1999 WL 519020 (N.D. Ill. Jul. 14, 1999) (Manning, J.).

This opinion intersects with IP only to the extent that you consider the opinion a derivative work based on its use of Beatles and Pink Floyd song titles and quotes.  But it does highlight a fun area of legal writing -- the use of song lyrics in judicial opinions.  A recent law review article,  [Insert Song Lyrics Here]: The Uses and Misuses of Popular Music Lyrics in Legal Writing, by Professor Alex Long analyzes the use of music in legal writing (Bob Dylan is the most cited artist in judicial opinions, followed by Paul Simon and Bruce Springsteen). (Note: If my wife were a federal district judge, you might see a sharp increase in judicial citations to Judas Priest and KISS. Thankfully – at least for the sake of good musical taste – she is not, although she would otherwise make a great judge.)

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