Thirteenth century English barons travelling treacherous distances to serve legal papers on horseback scarcely envisioned the day their successors would be able to do so via a swipe on a magic screen.
But a Texas district court judge allowed just that, when Sony Music was unable to physically track down the defendant, rapper TREFUEGO, in a copyright infringement lawsuit. Upon proving that, in spite of the rapper’s physical absence and lack of response on email, he was active on his social media accounts, the court allowed Sony to serve him via direct message (DM) on TikTok, Twitter and SoundCloud.
