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For lawyers, litigation is our bread and butter. For almost any business executive, however, a lawsuit is a costly, time-consuming and frustrating distraction. It is hardly surprising that litigation has been compared to trench warfare, with each side digging in and lobbing legal documents at each other for months or years, while the billable hours steadily rise.

In California, parties who agree to private binding arbitration usually receive little sympathy from the courts when they seek to litigate their disputes. But that does not always hold true.

Do online review sites like Yelp.com have to comply with court orders directed at people who post false and defamatory reviews about others? An appellate court in Los Angeles has said yes.

Every artist or entertainer wants an audience. Foreign artists and entertainers visiting the United States can be sure that at least one group of Americans is watching the success of their performances: agents of the Internal Revenue Service.

In rentals that are governed by rent control, courts will not look favorably at a notice and later attempt to evict if the notice appears to be pretext to conceal the true purpose of the eviction.

To avoid the hefty corporate and shareholder federal tax on distributions, many corporations decide to switch from C to S corporation status. However, if a C corporation elects to switch to S status, the S corporation will be subject to the built-in capital gains (“BIG”) tax at the highest corporate rate (presently 35%) on all appreciation on its assets at the date of conversion if there is a triggering event—usually a sale—during the "recognition period." Good news: the recognition period has been cut in half—from ten to five years.