Weinstein v. eBay, Inc.
United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
819 F. Supp. 2d 219 (2011)
- Written by Steven Pacht, JD
Facts
Andrea Weinstein (plaintiff) wished to buy tickets to see the New York Yankees (club) (defendant) play at Yankee Stadium on July 25, 2010. Weinstein tried to buy tickets from the club’s website, but none were available; instead, the club’s site provided her with a link to the separate website (with its own URL) of StubHub, Inc. (defendant). StubHub was an online secondary-market platform that connected anonymous ticket holders (resellers) for various sporting and other entertainment events with potential buyers. Each page of StubHub’s website advised that it did not own any tickets, prices were set by resellers, and prices might exceed face value. StubHub was owned by eBay, Inc. (eBay) (defendant). Weinstein purchased tickets with a face value of $20 per ticket through StubHub for $33 per ticket, plus fees. Weinstein brought a putative class-action suit, alleging that StubHub, eBay, and the club violated § 25.07 of New York’s Arts and Cultural Affairs Law (ACAL) because the $20 face value was not printed on the tickets she received via StubHub and violated ACAL §§ 25.13 and 25.23 because they aided and abetted the resellers in selling tickets without a license and in failing to disclose tickets’ face values. Weinstein further claimed that StubHub, eBay, and the club violated New York’s General Business Law Deceptive Practices Act (DPA) by virtue of their alleged violations of ACAL because unsophisticated consumers would assume that tickets bought through StubHub came directly from the club and would not realize they were paying more than face value. StubHub, eBay, and the club moved to dismiss the complaint.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Keenan, J.)
What to do next…
Here's why 815,000 law students have relied on our case briefs:
- Written by law professors and practitioners, not other law students. 46,300 briefs, keyed to 988 casebooks. Top-notch customer support.
- The right amount of information, includes the facts, issues, rule of law, holding and reasoning, and any concurrences and dissents.
- Access in your classes, works on your mobile and tablet. Massive library of related video lessons and high quality multiple-choice questions.
- Easy to use, uniform format for every case brief. Written in plain English, not in legalese. Our briefs summarize and simplify; they don’t just repeat the court’s language.