Graham v. Prince
- Sidney Stein
- 1:15-cv-10160
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 1
In Graham v. Prince, Judge Stein denied Prince’s motion for partial reconsideration because the court had already considered his Facebook-license argument.
Richard Prince, Donald Graham, and the other parties to the underlying dispute; the ruling directly affected Prince’s request for partial reconsideration.
What happened
Graham v. Prince concerns Prince’s argument that Facebook’s 2010 Terms of Service gave him an express license to use Graham’s photograph posted on Facebook. Prince raised that argument in seeking partial reconsideration of the court’s earlier order denying his motion for summary judgment.
The court said reconsideration is allowed only when a party identifies controlling decisions or important information the court overlooked and that could change the result. The court concluded that it had already considered Prince’s license argument, cited the Facebook provision he relied on, and reviewed the cases he cited.
Judge Sidney H. Stein denied Prince’s motion for partial reconsideration. The opinion does not state the final outcome of the underlying dispute over the photograph.
The detailed version
- Graham v. Prince · No. 1:15-cv-10160
- Sidney Stein
- July 6, 2023
Background
Prince filed a “Limited Motion for Partial Reconsideration” of the court’s earlier opinion and order denying his motion for summary judgment. He argued that the court had failed to consider whether Facebook’s 2010 Terms of Service gave him an express license to use Graham’s photograph posted on Facebook.
Legal standard
The court explained that reconsideration is available only when the moving party identifies controlling decisions or information that the court overlooked and that could reasonably be expected to change the result. The standard is narrowly applied to prevent parties from repeating arguments the court has already fully considered.
Court’s analysis
The court found that it had considered Prince’s express-license argument. It had cited the Facebook Terms of Service provision on which Prince relied and had analyzed the cases Prince cited in support of his position. The court concluded that those cases did not support finding that Prince had been granted an express license.
Disposition
The court denied Prince’s motion for partial reconsideration. This ruling addressed the request to reconsider the earlier summary-judgment decision; the opinion does not state the final disposition of the underlying claims.
Read the full 1-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.