Tag: Carter Law Firm

  • Go Topless Day 2013

    scar web by istolethetv from Flickr
    scar web by istolethetv from Flickr

    International Go Topless Day is coming up on Sunday, August 25th. I’m not kidding; it’s a real holiday aimed at bringing awareness to gender inequality when it comes to how much of your torso you have to have covered when you walk out of the house.

    In every state in the U.S., men can walk around in public without wearing a shirt. The same is generally not true for women. Every state has a law against showing at least part of the female breast in public. In Arizona, women must keep their areolas covered so women can go shirtless in public as long as their wearing at least a pair of pasties, band-aids, or pieces of electrical tape. Other states, like California, are weird and require women to cover not only their areolas but also the bottom half of their breasts at all times. (Who would have thought that California would be more closed-minded than Arizona on this issue?)

    There are a handful of cities that have passed local laws that allow men and women to be topless in public – like New York, Washington D.C., and Austin. (I wish I knew that when I was at SXSW.) These laws are technically unconstitutional but the states have bigger fish to fry than to go after a handful of topless women.

    Wherez all da love ppl? by TheeErin from Flickr
    Wherez all da love ppl? by TheeErin from Flickr

    To bring awareness to the inequality between men and women under these indecent exposure laws, Go Topless protests have been organized in a handful of cities. At these events, if it’s illegal for women to be topless in public in that city, men and women are encouraged to dress within the limits of the law for women by wearing pasties, body paint, bikini tops, or the like. If the city law allows both genders to be topless in public, it’s more of a celebration and everyone’s encouraged to bare their chest. (If you want to wear pasties, I strongly recommend Nippies – they’re high quality and have an excellent adhesive.)

    Please check out this map to see if there is a Go Topless event being organized in your community on August 25th. If you go, please make sure you act within in the limits of your state and city’s laws and wear sunblock! For my Phoenix people, there will be a Go Topless protest in Tempe starting at 10 a.m. where people will be walking down Mill Ave. sans shirts but with their areolas covered.

    If you want more information about decency laws and these types of events, I talk about indecent exposure in relationship to the annual No Pants Ride in my new book Flash Mob Law: The Legal Side of Planning and Participating in Pillow Fights, No Pants Rides, and Other Shenanigans or contact a First Amendment attorney in your community.

    You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me.
    You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • How to Prevent Cyberbullying – Tips for Parents

    Hopscotch by Dean McCoy Photography from Flickr
    Hopscotch by Dean McCoy Photography from Flickr

    It’s back to school time and most parents are rejoicing that their little angels are going to be at school 6-8 hours a day for the next 9 months. They’re going to be spending a lot more time than their peer group than during the summer so it might be a good time to review your family’s rules regarding where and how they spend their time online.

    I know a lot of parents are concerned about cyberbullying – from a victim and perpetrator perspective. Here are my tips to help parents prevent their child from being involved in a cyberbullying situation.

    1. Wherever your children are active online, you need to be there too.
    Whatever social media sites your kids are using, you need to have an account and be connected to them, to at least be aware of how and to whom they are communicating. There should be a clear expectation that they can’t create a profile on a site or add an app to their phone without your permission.

    2. Address behavior where your child may be bullying others or being bullied.
    Have high expectations for your child’s behavior. They can have fun with their friends, but it shouldn’t cross the line into being cruel. You don’t want them to develop the habit of shooting their mouth off whenever they want online.

    Likewise, be understanding and empathetic if your child is being targeted by their peers for being different. Support them and don’t ignore it. Work with them to decide the best way to deal with it.

    3. Educate your children about communicating with strangers online.
    Each family is free to set their own rules, but in general, I don’t recommend that parents allow their children to form relationships with people online that they don’t know in real life.

    Carter Law Firm's Postcards
    Carter Law Firm’s Postcards

    4. Educate your children about the potential effects of every post.
    Once a post is out there, you can never fully take it back. It will always be on a server somewhere. Even if the original post is deleted, you have no control over whether others took a screenshot or shared it with others before it was deleted. My rule of thumb is never post anything online that you wouldn’t put on the front page of the newspaper. The same idea should apply to sending text messages and taking pictures with your phone.

    5. Know how to access your child’s cell phone.
    I generally support respecting your children’s privacy but parents should be able to check their child’s text messages, pictures, and apps if a situation warrants it.

    6. Cut off the bully’s access to your child.
    There are ways to block users and report abusive people on every social media site that I know of. One of the best ways to help a child begin to feel better is to cut off the bully’s ability to communicate with them. If they’re being bullied via text message, consider changing their number.

    7. If your child is being abused, report it to the appropriate social media forum, email provider, or cell phone service provider.
    The terms of service have rules against using their forum to harass others and a social media site has the authority to suspend an abusive person’s account if they think it’s necessary.

    8. Keep a record of the abuse.
    There are times it makes sense to pursue a civil lawsuit or get law enforcement involved. If you do that, you will have to prove that the harassment occurred. A court can be sympathetic to your story, but they cannot punish the wrongdoer without sufficient evidence. Take screenshots of abusive posts on social media sites and don’t delete the abusive emails or text messages.

    If you prefer to hear me talk about this topic, I made a video of cyberbullying tips for parents.

    If you want more information about the legalities of social media, please check out my book The Legal Side of Blogging: How Not to get Sued, Fired, Arrested, or Killed. If you need information or advice about a situation involving your child, please contact a social media attorney in your community.

    You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me.
    You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

     

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    Ruth Carter

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  • New & Improved – The Legal Side of Blogging: How Not to get Sued, Fired, Arrested, or Killed

    LSB - option 3In case you haven’t heard the news, the revision of my ebook The Legal Side of Blogging: How Not to get Sued, Fired, Arrested, or Killed, is out and available in the Kindle Store!  (For those of you who don’t have a Kindle, there are free Kindle apps that will let you download and read it on your phone, tablet, and even your desktop computer.)

    I love blogging. I love that every week I get to stand on my digital soapbox and pontificate about anything I want. (Don’t you just love the word “pontificate?”) Early on in my writing career a journalist friend told me that a journalist’s job is to “Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” That has become my motto as well. I love that I get to write things that other people are thinking but maybe don’t have the guts to say themselves. I find it validating when people do that for me and I’m happy to pay it forward for others.

    ruthcover smallerOf course when you’re an outspoken blogger and a law student (now a lawyer), you start asking a lot of questions about what you can say without getting into trouble. That led to me to writing a blog series about the legal side of blogging, taking a class on cyberspace law where I wrote a paper on the topic, and eventually this book. When you have a blog, you have an obligation to know how far you can push the envelope without crossing the line. And then when people get pissed at you because of a post, there’s often nothing they can do about it because you’ve done nothing wrong.  The law rarely gives you any type of recourse just because someone made you sad.

    I wasn’t planning on writing a revision of my ebook so soon, but a conversation with the Copyright Office earlier this year forced my hand.  Apparently the word “published” had different meaning to normal rational people and the Copyright Office so I had to revise my chapter on copyright registration and I’m even more convinced that the Copyright Act needs a complete overhaul because it makes no sense when it comes to a lot of material that is only released on the internet.

    Since I was doing revisions, I also added a section about anti-SLAPP laws too. SLAPP stands for strategic lawsuit against public participation. This is the type of counterclaim you can file when someone files a lawsuit against you because of your blog in an effort to shut you up. We don’t like it when people sue people just because they don’t like what they have to say but what they’re saying is not illegal.

    I hope you enjoy The Legal Side of Blogging: How Not to get Sued, Fired, Arrested, or Killed and recommend it to all your friends who are active on social media. I wrote this book with bloggers in mind but the lessons apply equally well to all types of social media.

    You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me.
    You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • News Reporter Shea Allen Fired because of her Personal Blog

    TV Camera on the grass by Simon Yeo (smjbk) from Flickr
    TV Camera on the grass by Simon Yeo (smjbk) from Flickr

    Shea Allen was a TV reporter in Alabama who has a personal blog. She was fired after she released a post of “No Apologies: Confessions of a Red Headed Reporter” where she, among other things, admitted she is “frightened of old people,” has “taken naps in the news car,” and that she’ll stop recording if you ramble and she deems you unnecessary for her story but let you think otherwise. You can check of her post for the full list. I’m not sure what to think of her statement that her best sources have secret crushes on her.

    Shea’s boss was not impressed and fired her because the post did “irreparable harm to the station’s image.” She did an interview about the situation with Keith Yaskin from The Flip Side Communications and shared her thoughts about what happened here.

    Shea doesn’t think that she should have been fired since the alleged inappropriate post appeared on her site where she’s sharing her personal views, and not representing the TV station and because she offered to take the post down once she became aware of her employer’s objections to it.

    The First Amendment protects Shea’s right to free expression; however the fact that her statements were not illegal is not enough to keep her boss from firing her, at least if she was an at-will employee. At-will employees can be fired for any legal reason, including the fact that your boss doesn’t like what you posted on your personal blog as long as what you wrote about isn’t protected (i.e., your gender, race, religion, disability, etc.)

    Keith hit me up for an off-the-cuff response interview and here’s what I had to say about bloggers like Shea being fired because of their blogs here.

    What about the statement that she was just being funny? I believe that was her intent; however blogging gives you a voice but not necessarily a voice tone. You can’t guarantee that what’s funny to you will be seen as such by others, especially when it’s your boss reading about things that you do at work that he/she may frown upon.

    I agree with Shea that her situation highlights a “gray area in social media.” It’s because of situations like this that every company needs a social media policy that provides clear dos and don’ts when possible but more importantly provides guidelines for employees when it comes to their online posts, whether they’re using the company’s social media accounts or their own. Companies should remind employees that their posts are permanent and that they should treat each post like a digital billboard that millions of people might see.

    I also think that Shea’s confused about the limits of the freedom of speech. It applies to everyone in the U.S., but it doesn’t protect you from all the consequences that may occur because of what you said.

    If you want more information on this topic, please check out my newly revised book, The Legal Side of Blogging: How Not to get Sued, Fired, Arrested, or Killed.

    You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me.
    You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • How to Avoid Screaming Matches in Coffee Shops

    Office Cleaning Prank Played On Janitor In Frederick Md from Flickr
    Office Cleaning Prank Played On Janitor In Frederick Md from Flickr

    When you and a friend have a great idea for a new business, you create an LLC.

    When you create an LLC, you get super-excited about your new venture.

    When you get super-excited about your new venture, you forget to put in the business infrastructure behind the scenes.

    When you forget to put in the business infrastructure behind the scenes, you and your partner may have different ideas about how you’re going to run the business.

    When you and your partner have different ideas about how you’re going to run the business, you get frustrated with each other.

    When you get frustrated with each other, you get into screaming matches at coffee shops.

    Don’t get into screaming matches at coffee shops.

    Get an operating agreement at the beginning of your business relationship.
    This will make sure that everyone is on the same page and you can predetermine how you’re going to address certain problems before they arise.

    You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me.
    You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • When’s the Last Time You Reviewed Your Contract Templates?

    Inspiration as Commodity by exquisitur from Flickr
    Inspiration as Commodity by exquisitur from Flickr

    I had the pleasure of speaking to the Photographer’s Adventure Club last week. In addition to discussion the basics of copyright and how to protect their rights in their work, we talked a lot about the importance of contracts.

    I know the subject of contracts makes a lot of people’s eyes glaze over – it’s that fine-print-legalese-crap-that-no-one-reads-anyway stuff. A lot of people think contracts are boring and a lot of contracts are . . . but they don’t have to be.

    I love contracts. They create the basis of so many relationships – whether they are written, oral, or pieced together through a series of emails. Too often people come to me with a question about a problem in one of their professional relationships and when I ask, “What does your contract say about this?” the answer is “I don’t know” or “We don’t have a contract.” We can still resolve the problem but we could have avoided a lot of headaches and frustration by putting everything on paper in advance so everyone’s on the same page from the beginning.

    Having contract templates is often the best way to create the relationship with others that you want. In regards to photographers they should have a file of contract templates for clients who hire them, for other photographers when they have to hire an additional person to work a shoot, a copyright license for publications, a model release, and a location release. And contracts don’t have to be long, complicated, or riddled with crazy legalese to be effective. I prefer to write contracts in straight-forward English and I wish more of my legal counterparts would get on board with this idea.

    And contracts can be fun. Recently I saw an episode of Man v. Food where Adam Richman took on the Hellfire Challenge at Smoke Eaters – 12 wings covered in crazy hot sauce. Before he could begin the challenge he had to sign a waiver that required the person signing to acknowledge that “I am an idiot.”

    You can put almost anything you want in your contract as long as it isn’t illegal. And if you downloaded your contract templates off the internet, that’s not a bad place to look for ideas, but you should at least consult an attorney to make sure it suits your needs before you start using it. If the contract is valid and you sign it, you’re stuck with the terms so you want to make sure you’re not opening yourself up to get screwed over.

    If you need additional information about the minimum you need for a valid contract, please check out my video below or here.


    If you want to chat about your contract needs, please send me an email or contact a business attorney in your community.

    You can also connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn.
    Please subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter for additional information about running your business more effectively. Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • Networking Should Be Fun

    The Other Side of the Trampoline by Peter Werkman from Flickr
    The Other Side of the Trampoline by Peter Werkman from Flickr

    If you’re a business owner, networking is part of your job. It’s a significant part of my job. I attend two to four events to shake hands and kiss babies every week. My goal at each of these events is to make connections and build relationships with other professionals in my community.

    Because my goal is to create relationships, I prefer to network in smaller groups and one-on-one than at large networking events. Larger events tend to be loud, crowded, and you never know who you’re going to meet. You may meet some interesting people at these events but it also feels like it would be easier to find a needle in a haystack than to find the people you really want to meet. I prefer personalized introductions and specialized networking events like those geared towards entrepreneurs, social media professionals, local business owners, artists, and my fellow legal eagles.

    Most of the time, a networking meeting involves meeting for coffee. Coffee is fine, especially from awesome independent shops like Luci’s and Lux. (The last cup of coffee I had at a Starbucks was so vile it made me never want to go there again.) I’ve networked so much that I’m a little coffeed out and I’m looking to change it up a bit.

    I’m a big believer that if you don’t love your job, you should change it. In that spirit, I want to make networking more fun. Networking is really about making connections by sharing information and ideas between people. The location is simply the forum. So why not make it a fun-based experience?

    I recently invited my email list to meet me for ice cream (ICE KREM!) instead of coffee this summer. Come on – it’s freakishly hot in Phoenix. We should have something refreshing. Besides ice cream, I’d love to network over a game of cards or Skip-Bo. For people who are a more adventurous we could go bowling or hit my favorite trampoline playground. I would be happy to meet with people before attending a book signing at Changing Hands or a movie screening by the AZ Tech Council or wander around the Phoenix Art Museum on a Wednesday night when it’s open to the public for free.

    When the weather cools down, I think it would be fun to meet people while feeding the fish at the Japanese Friendship Garden, wandering around First Friday, or taking our dogs to the dog park.

    So, if you are a professional networker who wants to kick the experience up a notch and you work in the same circles as me, drop me a line. Of course, if I find you unbearable or you hit me with a hard sell, I will assume you don’t understand the real purpose of networking and invoke the Law of Two Feet.

    You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me. You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • Value Your Rights this Independence Day

    American Flag by joewcampbell from Flickr
    American Flag by joewcampbell from Flickr

    Happy Independence Day! I hope you all enjoy your holiday with your loved ones. While you’re enjoying your barbecues and fireworks, please take a minute to reflect on the reason we have this holiday – our nation’s founding fathers were unhappy with their government and so they stood up for themselves.

    I’m so grateful that we live in a democracy that gives us the freedom of speech. Thanks to the social media platforms, online petitions, and blogging, it’s easier than ever to be heard. Now more than ever Joe Average has a voice that can reach millions.

    Of course the freedom of speech comes with the responsibility of accepting the consequences of our statements. If you have something to say, you better be ready and willing to own it in every arena and face the backlash (good and bad) that may result.  We don’t have the right to be forgotten and everything we say online is permanently saved on a server somewhere. So before you make a post or send a text, be ready to have it follow you around for the rest of your life. I constantly tell people my two rules of thumb.

    • Don’t post anything online that you wouldn’t put on the front page of the newspaper.
    • Assume everything you post will be seen by your best friend, worst enemy, boss, and mother. If you don’t want one of them to see something, don’t post it.

    Our democracy not only gives us the ability to voice our opinions, but it also gives us an obligation to do so when it comes to our leaders. They work for us and the good politicians respect the fact that they their job is to be of service, and it’s a temporary position. If there is an issue that you care about, please write, call, or tweet at your elected official. Go to their town hall meetings and coffee meet-ups. Your opinion matters and it does make a difference.

    I regularly contact my representatives and tell them how I want them to vote on bills. I question candidates about their platforms. Sometimes I tell them why I think their views are wrong or what it will take to get my vote. I’ve told my fair share of candidates who are pro-business by against same-sex marriage that they should support same-sex marriage, regardless of their views about homosexuality, because marriage is good for the economy. People spend a ton of money on weddings.

    And when your representatives vote in a way that reflects your views, thank them. They work for us and they need to be told when they’re doing a good job.

    Happy Fourth of July everyone! And a special thank you to everyone who has served and is currently serving in our military to keep us safe and free.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • Independents Week Specials at Carter Law Firm

    Carter Law Firm Independents Week 2013One of the things I love about being a solo attorney in Phoenix is I get to be part of Local First Arizona. This is an organization for locally-owned businesses and it’s a great place to meet and connect with amazing professionals in the state.

    Independents Week is coming up June 30 – July 7, 2013. Local First created the Golden Coupon program for this week to celebrate these businesses and give you another reason to check out the independent businesses in your community. Dozens of businesses will be giving patrons a 20% discount if they shop with a Golden Coupon during Independents Week. Dozens of Local First members all over Arizona are participating. Check out the full list on the Local First website and my list of places I’m excited to visit on The Undeniable Ruth.

    After seeing the success of last year’s Golden Coupon program, Carter Law Firm is participating in this year’s program and offering 20% off legal consultations. Since there are only so many hours in the day, the firm only requires you to contact us during Independents Week to get in on the discount. You can schedule the consultation itself anytime in July 2013 and use your Golden Coupon.

    Here’s how to use your Golden Coupon with Carter Law Firm:

    1. golden-couponPrint the Golden Coupon from Local First Arizona.
    2. During Independents Week (June 30 – July 7) contact the Ruth and say you want to book a legal consultation with your Golden Coupon.
    3. Schedule you appointment for any mutually agreed upon time during July 2013.

    Please note, that you should schedule an appointment to talk about your business, intellectual property, social media, or flash mob law needs. All other legal questions are outside the firm’s scope of practice.

    Don’t forget to check out all the other locally owned businesses that are participating in the Golden Coupon program. This is a great opportunity to try out a new place or revisit a business you love in your community.

    You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me. You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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  • Poor Man’s Copyright Doesn’t Work

    Self-Addressed Envelope after it's been through the Mail
    Self-Addressed Envelope after it’s been through the Mail

    Every time I speak about copyright to a group of artists or writers, someone always asks me about how poor man’s copyright works and whether it’s valid. Poor man’s copyright is the idea that you can establish that you created something first by mailing a copy of your work to yourself and using the date on the postmark as proof of when you created it. If anyone copies your work and claims a creation date that’s after your postmark, you can use the postmark to show that you created the work first.

    To anyone who’s been sending their work to themselves, you can stop. Poor man’s copyright is crap and a waste of your time and money. A postmark on an envelope tells you when the post office processed the envelope, not what was inside of it. You could easily send an unsealed envelope to yourself and put your work in it later and seal it.

    Self-Addressed Unsealed Stamped Envelope Ready for the Mail
    Self-Addressed Unsealed Stamped Envelope Ready for the Mail

    You get the exclusive rights to copy, distribute, display, perform, and to make derivative works based on your work the second you’ve fixed your work in any tangible medium. (Sorry, there’s no copyright protection for ideas that only exist in your head.) If you want to maximize your rights in your work, including the ability to sue for copyright infringement and collect statutory damages, you need to register your work with the U.S. Copyright Office. You can do it online and most application fees are only $35.

    To demonstrate why poor man’s copyright doesn’t work, I recently addressed an envelope to myself and sent it, unsealed, through the mail. I made a video about the result. You can see it below or here.

    If you want more information about how you can protect your rights in your work, please contact me or a copyright attorney in your community. You can connect with me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, or you can email me. You can also subscribe to the Carter Law Firm newsletter.
    Please visit my homepage for more information about Carter Law Firm.

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    Ruth Carter

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