Friday, December 2, 2011

Yes, the Ticketmaster class action settlement is appalling

Yes, we know about the Ticketmaster class action settlement, which over a dozen class members have emailed us about. There's no question that this coupon settlement (complete with questionable cy pres) would be illegal in federal court. Unfortunately, the case is pending in California state court. This limits the precedential value of the case (it's only a jurisdictional accident that it's not in federal court; if it were brought today it would be), and I'm sufficiently discouraged by the last few ventures into state court that I'm reluctant to devote limited resources to it. Including objections and a notice of appeal we've committed to file but haven't yet, we have nineteen cases pending, including eight appeals where the briefing isn't finished.

However, many of the class members who have written us are attorneys. So a possibility is that sufficiently angry attorney class members volunteer to write the briefs (working off of briefs we've previously filed on these issues). Then someone based in California (or me) could attend the fairness hearing. Other class members could submit their objections saying they're joining that one. We're going to try to coordinate that over the course of this month; if you've written to me, and I haven't emailed you yet on this, I will this weekend.

9 comments:

  1. I got so angry after I received the settlement email that I dashed off a 9-page objection and filed it by FedEx... it just arrived at the court this morning. I am an attorney in Boston, but am prepared to appear in LA in May to support my objections and requests for alternative relief if necessary.

    I actually already cc'd a paper copy of my objection to CCAF, but here it is:

    http://www.scribd.com/doc/74322776/Ticketmaster-Settlement-Objection

    I have also started a Facebook group called (appropriately enough) "I object to the proposed 9/2/11 settlement in Schlesinger v. Ticketmaster." Feel free to join!

    Anyway, after doing a bit more research on CA class actions, I'd like to further brief my objections... this was really intended as an opening shot (with jokes!). I think the angry attorney subclass is a pretty great idea... the more people who file, the more they have to listen to us.

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  2. Ha! I liked your proposed settlement much better. I'm a law student and pissed off class member (certified to appear in CA court with supervision) and would be happy to help out with this. You can email me at brigidd at stanford dot edu.

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  3. The proposed is quite interesting.

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  4. I was actually planning on filing my own objection and created a facebook page to reference in the objection: http://www.facebook.com/ticketmastersettlement

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  5. I'm a class member and am interested; email me. -Joe B

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  6. And how am I supposed to do that, Joe?

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  7. I am a class member and I am interested but I have no legal background other than small claims court (which I feel was taken more seriously than this multi-million dollar atrocity). Is there anything I can do?

    Jason
    wings2004 -AT- gmail -DOT- com

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  8. I am a class member and an attorney, but my firm does not work on these types of cases. I'd have to get them to agree to let me work on it if I were to do so, but I do not believe there is any impediment to me just being an objector represented by counsel. I have done so in another case before (Honda civic hybrid class action settlement)

    glttrgrrl a t g mail d o t co m

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  9. I am a lawyer/class member from Texas. I filed a short objection a few months ago, but am working on a formal objection to the motion for final approval. I would love it if someone in California would appear on my behalf in May and argue against the settlement. my email is sboyd 100973 at yahoo.

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