Important note: "skiplagging" while frowned upon and grounds for an airline banning individuals from using them; is not why skiplagged is paying AA $9.4M.
From the article:
Paul Yetter, an attorney for American with Yetter Coleman in Houston, told jurors during opening statements that Skiplagged is not an authorized agent of the airline yet "dresses up" its website with American's trademarks to look legitimate and fool consumers into thinking they are buying from the airline.
> "They ordered New York-based Skiplagged to pay *$4.7 million in disgorgement from the travel site’s revenues* and another $4.7 million for copyright infringement."
The fine is half trademark infringement, half for "costing" AA money through not letting them resell the seat themselves
My bad, thanks for pointing that out. IANAL and generally illiterate when it comes to lawyer-speak, but it sounds like the cost(disgorgement) was due to just being an unauthorized re-seller on top of copyright violation am I right?
The title of the article & and the article itself does make it sound like AA were awarded the money directly because of the practice of 'skiplagging'... which doesn't seem to be the case. Though it's probably the reason they were targeted in the first place as ejddhbrbrrnrn said.
Damnit - I should know by now not to use the two interchangeably (especially after using the correct term in the quote!). Thanks for the correction here and below
From the article:
Paul Yetter, an attorney for American with Yetter Coleman in Houston, told jurors during opening statements that Skiplagged is not an authorized agent of the airline yet "dresses up" its website with American's trademarks to look legitimate and fool consumers into thinking they are buying from the airline.