Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-5_15-cv-01720/USCOURTS-cand-5_15-cv-01720-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 840
Nature of Suit: Trademark
Cause of Action: 15:1121 Trademark Infringement

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF DELAWARE 

SEBASTIAN BROWN 

PRODUCTIONS, LLC, 

Plaintiff, 

v. 

MUZOOKA INC., SHAWN WILSON, 

CHESTER ALDRIDGE, and IVORY 

OCTAVES, LLC, 

Defendants. 

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) Civ. No. 14-009-SLR 

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MEMORANDUM 

At Wilmington this 30th day of March, 2015, having reviewed defendants' motion 

to dismiss or, alternatively, to transfer, and the papers filed in connection therewith; the 

court will grant the motion to transfer (D.I. 13)1 for the reasons that follow: 

1. Generally speaking, the parties to this dispute are litigating the right to use the 

trademark MUZOOKA. Plaintiff Sebastian Brown Productions, LLC brought suit to 

enforce its alleged right to use the MUZOOKA trademark based on its Application Serial 

No. 85/420,834 filed on September 12, 2011 in connection with providing collaboration 

and telecommunication access services. Defendants assert that the mark was 

registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office by defendant Ivory 

Octaves, LLC on December 10, 2013, Registration No. 4,448,314, which mark has 

1

Based on this conclusion, the remaining grounds for relief identified in 

defendants' motion (D.I. 13) will not be addressed and will be deemed moot. 

Case 5:15-cv-01720-LHK Document 26 Filed 03/30/15 Page 1 of 7
been used by defendant Muzooka, Inc. since at least December 2011 .. Rather than file 

an answer to the complaint, defendants filed the instant motion, contesting (inter a/ia) 

personal jurisdiction and venue. The court has subject matter jurisdiction pursuant to 

28 U.S.C. § 1338. 

2. Plaintiff is a California limited liability company with a principal plac13 of 

business in Livermore, California. Plaintiff's principal, J. Michael Miller, also is a 

resident of Livermore, California. Defendant Muzooka, Inc. is incorporated in the State 

of Delaware2 and, as of January 6, 2014 (the date suit was filed), headquartered in 

Walnut Creek, California. On January 6, 2014, defendant Shawn Wilson resided in 

Calgary, Alberta, Canada, while defendant Chester Aldridge resided in San Hafael, 

California. 

3. Plaintiff contends that the court can exert personal jurisdiction over the 

individual defendants because they conduct business in Delaware, that is, 

the users of muzooka.com continuously stream music content over thE~ 

Internet. Muzooka.com is not a passive website where users go simply 

to get information; users go there to obtain a product. ... The Defendants 

are advertising products (music and artists) on their website and 

encouraging users to stream those products. . . . Further, users can 

create an account on muzooka.com enabling them to further interact with 

the Defendants. 

(D.I. 22 at 9; D.I. 23 at mJ 3-5) Plaintiff further contends that the individual deifendants, 

the founders and managers of Muzooka, Inc., "are primary participants in the alleged 

wrongdoing, which they intentionally target to occur in Delaware, as a jurisdiction into 

2

According to defendants, "[o]n June 4, 2010, Muzooka was organized in 

Delaware as Ivory Octaves, LLC. . . . Ivory Octaves was converted to Muzooka on 

January 1, 2013 through filing of a certificate of conversion in Delaware." (D.I. 14 at 2) 

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which their Internet-only business extends," citing Toys "R" Us, Inc. v. Step Two, SA, 

318 F.3d 446 (3d Cir. 2003). (D.I. 22at10) 

4. To establish personal jurisdiction, a plaintiff must produce facts sufficient to 

satisfy two requirements by a preponderance of the evidence, one statutory and one 

constitutional. See Time Share Vacation Club v. Atlantic Resorts, Ltd., 735 F.2d 61, 66 

(3d Cir. 1984). With respect to the statutory requirement, the court must determine 

whether there is a statutory basis for jurisdiction under the forum state's long-arm 

statute. The constitutional basis requires the court to determine whether thei exercise of 

jurisdiction comports with the defendant's right to due process. See Int'/ Shoe Co. v. 

Washington, 326 U.S. 310, 316 (1945). 

5. Delaware's long-arm statute is codified as 1 O Del. C. § 3104(c) and allows a 

court to exercise personal jurisdiction over a nonresident defendant when said 

defendant or its agent: (1) transacts any business or performs any characteff of work or 

service in Delaware; (2) contracts to supply services or things in Delaware; (3) causes 

tortious injury in Delaware by an act or omission in Delaware; or (4) causes tortious 

injury by an act or omission outside Delaware if the defendant regularly doe's or solicits 

business or engages in any other persistent course of conduct in Delaware., or derives 

substantial revenue from services or things used or consumed in Delaware. 10 Del. C. 

§§ (c)(1) - (4). With the exception of§ (c)(4), the long-arm statute requires a showing of 

specific jurisdiction. See Shoemaker v. McConnell, 556 F. Supp. 2d 351, 354 (D. Del. 

2008). Subsection (4) confers general jurisdiction, which requires a greater number of 

contacts, but allows the exercise of personal jurisdiction even when the claim is 

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unrelated to the forum contacts. See Applied Biosystems, Inc. v. Cruachem, Ltd., 772 

F. Supp. 1458, 1466 (D. Del. 1991). 

6. If a defendant is found to be within the reach of the long-arm statute, the 

court must then analyze whether the exercise of personal jurisdiction compmts with due 

process, i.e., whether plaintiff has demonstrated that the defendant "purposefully 

avail[ed] itself of the privilege of conducting activities within the forum State," so that it 

should "reasonably anticipate being haled into court there." World-Wide Vol'<swagen 

Corp. v. Woodson, 444 U.S. 286, 297 (1980) (citations omitted). For the court to 

exercise specific personal jurisdiction consistent with due process, a plaintiff's cause of 

action must have arisen from the defendant's activities in the forum State. See Burger 

King Corp. v. Rudzewicz, 471 U.S. 462, 472 (1985). For the court to oxercise general 

personal jurisdiction consistent with due process, a plaintiff's cause of action can be 

unrelated to the defendant's activities in the forum State, so long as defendant has 

"continuous and systematic contacts with the forum State." Applied Biosystems, Inc. v. 

Cruachem, Ltd., 772 F. Supp. at 1470. 

that 

7. In the context of Internet-based businesses, the Third Circuit has declared 

the mere operation of a commercially interactive website should not 

subject the operator to jurisdiction anywhere in the world. Rather, th•ere 

must be evidence that the defendant "purposefully availed" itself of 

conducting activity in the forum state, by directly targeting its webOsite to 

the state, knowingly interacting with residents of the forum state via its 

webOsite, or through sufficient other related contacts. 

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Toys "R" Us, 318 F.3d at 454. 3 In applying the legal standard to the facts of record, the 

Third Circuit concluded that plaintiff Toys failed to satisfy the purposeful availment 

requirement. The accused websites, "while commercial and interactive, d[id] not 

appear to have been designed or intended to reach customers in New Jersey." Id. 

Further, the two documented sales of record "appear to be the kind of 'fortuitous,' 

'random,' and 'attenuated' contacts that the Supreme Court has held insufficient to 

warrant the exercise of jurisdiction." Id. at 454-455 (citations omitted). 

8. Although plaintiff pays lip service to the Third Circuit's decision in Toys "R" 

Us, it nevertheless argues that the court can exert personal jurisdiction over the 

individual defendants based on the teachings of Zippo Mfg. Co. v. Zippo Dot Com, Inc., 

952 F. Supp. 1119 (W.D. Pa. 1997). In Zippo, the district court noted, again in the 

context of Internet-based businesses, that 

the likelihood that personal jurisdiction can be constitutionally exercis13d 

is directly proportionate to the nature and quality of commercial activity 

that an entity conducts over the Internet. This sliding scale is consist13nt 

with well developed personal jurisdiction principles. At one end of the 

spectrum are situations where a defendant clearly does business ove!r 

the Internet. If the defendant enters into contracts with residents of a 

foreign jurisdiction that involve the knowing and repeated transmission 

of computer files over the Internet, personal jurisdiction is prop13r .... 

At the opposite end are situations where a defendant has simply posted 

information on an Internet [website] which is accessible to users in foreign 

3

Accord, inno360, Inc. v. Zakta, LLC, 2014 WL 2796911 (D. De~I. Jun13 19, 2014), 

at *4 ("[D]efendant did not purposefully avail itself of doing business with re8idents of 

Delaware merely because it knew its website could be accessed by residents of any 

state, including those in Delaware."); Sanitec Industries, Inc. v. Sanitec Worldwide, Ltd., 

376 F. Supp. 2d 571, 574 (D. Del. 2005) ("In the Third Circuit, the mere maintenance of 

an interactive website is insufficient to support personal jurisdiction in the absence of 

evidence indicating that the website operator intentionally aims the website at the forum 

state or knowingly conducts business with forum residents via the website."). 

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jurisdictions. A passive [website] that does little more than make information 

available to those who are interested in it is not grounds for the exercise of 

personal jurisdiction .... The middle ground is occupied by interactive 

[websites] where a user can exchange information with the host computer. 

In those cases, the exercise of jurisdiction is determined by examining the 

level of interactivity and commercial nature of the exchange of information 

that occurs on the [website]. 

Id. at 1124 (citations omitted). Ironically, despite crafting the analytical frameiwork 

above, the district court in Zippo did not rely exclusively on its characterization of the 

website at issue, but looked to other non-Internet contacts. 

[Defendant] has done more than create an interactive [website] throu!~h 

which it exchanges information with Pennsylvania residents in hopes of 

using that information for commercial gain later. [And, indeed, w]e are not 

being asked to determine whether [defendant's website] alone constitutes 

the purposeful availment of doing business in Pennsylvania .... We are 

being asked to determine whether [defendant's] conducting of electronic 

commerce with Pennsylvania residents constitutes the purposeful 

availment of doing business in Pennsylvania. We conclude that it does. 

[Defendant] has contracted with approximately 3,000 individuals and seven 

Internet access providers in Pennsylvania. The intended object of these 

transactions has been the downloading of the electronic messages that 

form the basis of this suit in Pennsylvania. 

Id. at 1125-1126. 

9. The Third Circuit, in its Toys "R" Us, opinion, described the Zippo court as 

underscor[ing] the intentional nature of the defendant's conduct vis-a-vis 

the forum state. In Zippo, the defendant had purposefully availed itself of 

doing business in Pennsylvania when it "repeatedly and consciously chose 

to process Pennsylvania residents' applications and to assign them 

passwords," knowing that the contacts would result in business 

relationships with Pennsylvania customers .... 

Id. at 452 (citations omitted). 

10. Plaintiff argues that, because defendants' website falls within Zippo's second 

category of websites - that is, an interactive website where a user can exchange 

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information with the host computer - the exercise of personal jurisdiction is appropriate. 

Absent from the record, however, is any indication that any Delaware residemt has done 

more than interact with the accused website. 4 Consistent with the above case law, 

plaintiff has failed to demonstrate that defendants have purposefully availed themselves 

of the forum State. 

11. Conclusion. For the reasons stated, plaintiff has failed to demonstrate 

sufficient contacts to support the court's exertion of personal jurisdiction over the 

individual defendants. Consequently, venue is more appropriately lodged in the 

Northern District of California, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. 1404(a), where plainti"ff is 

organized and headquartered, defendant Muzooka, Inc. is headquartered, defendant 

Aldridge resides, and the alleged events giving rise to the suit occurred. S,9e Jumara v. 

State Farm Ins. Co., 55 F.3d 873, 879 (3d Cir. 1995). Therefore, defendants' motion to 

transfer is granted. An order shall issue. 

4

The only evidence of record, submitted by affidavit, is based on a sampling of 

50 "followers" of Muzooka, lnc.'s Twitter page, with "one claim to be located in 

Delaware." (D.I. 23, 1J 3) There is no persuasive evidence that defendants have 

targeted Delaware residents, or that any Delaware resident has created an account on 

muzooka.com to enable further, continuous interaction with defendants. 

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