The operator of the dating service be2.com sued the CEO of the competing dating service be2.net for trademark infringement. The suit was brought in a federal district court in Illinois. Defendant was a New Jersey resident. The only evidence of his contact with Illinois was a list of 20 Illinois members of be2.net. After the court granted a default judgment when the defendant did not respond to the complaint, defendant moved to vacate the judgment for lack of personal jurisdiction.16 Should Illinois courts have jurisdiction? Explain.
Business in the cyber world raises puzzling new legal problems. The Internet, after all, is borderless. We can and do communicate and engage in transactions around the world. When a dispute arises from one of those billions of communications and transactions, where will that dispute be litigated? If an American website provides child pornography viewed by a resident of Germany, which nation will have the authority to prosecute the offense?12 If a Massachusetts resident posts an arguably libelous article on an Internet bulletin board sited in New York, may the Texas resident who claims harm from the libel sue the author and the bulletin board host in a Texas court?13 These are jurisdictional questions. The party filing suit must take its claim to a court that has both subject-matter jurisdiction (the authority to address the particular kind of legal problem raised) and personal jurisdiction (the power to compel the defendant to respond).