Welcome back for another week of What's Next, where we report on the intersection of law and technology. This week, we gaze into a crack left open by an appellate court ruling ripping up Uber driver's arbitration agreements. And Google has to post even more employee guidelines. Plus, California's privacy law faces amendments and controversy. Let's chat: Email me at [email protected] and follow me on Twitter at @a_lancaster3.

Piecing Together the Scraps of Uber's Shredded Arbitration Agreements

Last week, an appeals court ruled in favor of Uber drivers in an order that could release a kraken of litigation against the ridesharing industry. Well, if not a kraken because of the opinion's limited scope, it could amount to a pile-on of lawsuits that, at the very least, would resemble a heaping plate of calamari.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit last Wednesday overturned a district court judge, who granted Uber's motion to dismiss a New Jersey case over drivers' classification as contractors and routed the suit to arbitration. Instead, the appeals court found Uber's drivers could cruise under an exemption in the Federal Arbitration Act reserved for transportation workers participating in foreign or interstate commerce.

Uber's attorneys from Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher and Littler Mendelson had argued that its drivers do not fall under the Section 1 exemption of the FAA that the U.S. Supreme Court has sectioned off for "contracts of employment of seamen, railroad employees, or any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce" in cases such as New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira. Uber's counsel claimed that case law only applied the exemption to transportation workers dealing with cargo, not passengers.