| 5/15/2009 |
Top Ten Patent Issues for the New Director of the Patent and Trademark Office |
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| Imminently, the Obama Administration will be naming
a new Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ("PTO"). The PTO, which used to be a quiet
backwater of a niche area of law, has recently found itself front and center in some high profile debates.
From congressional efforts aimed at fixing a "broken" patent system to Supreme Court cases considering
whether Internet Age innovations deserve the same patent protection as Industrial Age innovations,
the work of the PTO is increasingly important to our society.....more |
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| 5/15/2009 |
The Transfer of Intellectual Property Rights: Can There Be Too Much Freedom in the Marketplace for Ideas? |
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| We Americans take for granted the fact that intellectual
property rights can be transferred from one person to
another. A small "garage" inventor can sell patent rights to
a manufacturing company. Two sparring competitors can
settle their disputes by a cross-license of rights. Franchises
can be built by licensing out trade secrets to local operators....more |
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| 3/27/2009 |
Advanced Copyright Issues on the Internet |
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| During recent years, the Internet has become the basic foundational infrastructure for the global movement on data of all kinds. more |
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| 3/20/2009 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Spring 2009 |
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| A bipartisan quartet of senators and representatives held a press conference on March 3,
2009 announcing yet another push at patent law reform. Hearings commenced the following
week...more |
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| 12/23/2008 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Winter 2008/2009 |
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| Personalized medicine companies should implement new strategies to deal with the challenges associated with protecting their inventions...more |
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| 10/17/2008 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Fall 2008 |
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| In Fisher Tool Co., v. Gillet Outillage, 530 F.3d 1063 (9th Cir. 2008), the Ninth Circuit adopted the Federal Circuit's standard requiring a showing of bad faith in order to maintain Lanham Act and state law claims premised on allegedly false representations of patent infringement made by a patentee, its distributors, agents and/or attorneys to third parties...more |
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| 9/2/2008 |
Copyright Alert: Io v. Veoh—DMCA Covers Video Upload Site Charged With Exposing Skin Flicks |
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| In an important decision with potential implications for the Viacom v. YouTube suit and for every website that hosts user-supplied content, a Magistrate Judge in the Northern District of California has granted summary judgment against a publisher of "adult" films...more |
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| 8/6/2008 |
Copyright Alert: Cartoon Network v. Cablevision—Buffer Reproductions Are Not Infringing Copies, Holds Second Circuit in "Remote" DVR Case |
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| In a long-awaited ruling, the Second Circuit held on Monday that unauthorized reproductions of data, such as digital movie files, in computer buffers are not infringing copies because they were not fixed "for a period of more than transitory duration." ... more |
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| 7/15/2008 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Summer 2008 |
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| Rejecting the authority of a trio of more recent Ninth Circuit cases on the ground that their holdings could not be reconciled with an earlier Ninth Circuit decision, a Washington District Court has held a transfer of computer software to represent a sale, not a license... more |
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| 6/18/2008 |
Think You Are a Co-Owner of a Copyright?—Think Again |
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| Many copyright owners co-own their copyrights with others, or at least they thought so until the decision came down in Sybersound Records, Inc. v. UAV Corp., 517 F.3d 1137 (9th Cir. 2008)... more |
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| 5/19/2008 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Spring 2008 |
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| Just as a semiconductor clean room aims to exclude airborne particles that could contaminate wafer layers, so the legal software clean room has sought to protect computer software developers from contaminating "access" to earlier works they might be charged with copying... more |
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| 3/3/2008 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Winter 2008 |
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| After unanimous approval by the California Assembly and the California Senate, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed S.B. 771 into law on October 10, 2007, amending California Civil Code section 3344.1. more |
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| 10/12/2007 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Fall 2007 |
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| Disclosures to government regulators have always posed risks to trade secrets and other proprietary information. more |
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| 6/26/2007 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Summer 2007 |
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| On May 23, 2007, Coca-Cola employee Joya Williams was sentenced to eight years in prison for trying to sell Coke's trade secrets to rival Pepsi. more |
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| 6/1/2007 |
Playing by the Notice & Takedown Rules: Protection for Online Service Providers |
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| This week the Federal Trade Commission obtained a $250,000 civil penalty against James Dondero, the operator of the Highland Capital hedge fund and a director of Motient Corporation, for making a late Hart-Scott-Rodino Act filing in connection with his 2005 exercise of options to acquire 10,000 Motient shares. more |
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| 5/17/2007 |
Copyright Alert: Perfect 10 v. Google—Key Holdings: Website Framing Does Not Directly Infringe the Public Display Right; Image Search Engine Thumbnails Are Fair Use; and a New Test for Online Contributory Infringement |
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| How fast do things change in "Internet time"? That was in substance one of the questions posed in yesterday's Ninth Circuit decision in Perfect 10 v. Google, which considered inter alia whether a less-than-four-year-old fair use precedent validating an image search engine had been overtaken by subsequent events. more |
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| 4/2/2007 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Spring 2007 |
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| The Supreme Court has ruled that patent licensees do not need to breach their license agreements before seeking a declaratory judgment in federal court that the underlying patent is invalid, unenforceable, or not infringed. more |
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| 3/1/2007 |
Space-Shifting and Copyright: Can't Take it With You? or No, No, They Can't Take That Away From Me |
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| Using Other Folks' (Copyrighted) Stuff on the Move: Issue Array more |
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| 3/1/2007 |
Audio Home Recording Act Does Not Protect Device Distributor Against Copyright Claims Arising From Broadcaster Role |
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| A New York district court held that the Audio Home Recording Act, 17 U.S.C. §§ 1001 et seq. ("AHRA"), does not immunize a distributor of digital audio recording devices from copyright liability ... more |
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| 1/19/2007 |
IP Law in China: Works for Hire |
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| The work made for hire (sometimes abbreviated to work for hire or "WFH") doctrine is an exception to the general copyright rule that the person who actually creates a work is the legally-recognized author of that work. more |
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| 11/28/2006 |
Copyright Alert: New Exemptions from DMCA Anti-Circumvention Rules Primarily Impact Narrowly Circumscribed Uses and Industries |
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| Effective November 27, 2006, the Librarian of Congress announced the adoption of six exemptions to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's ("DMCA") anti-circumvention provision, the exemptions to apply for the next three years. more |
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| 11/28/2006 |
Copyright/DMCA Developments |
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| The years 2005 and 2006 have seen a substantial group of decisions, including some cases of first impression that flesh out the law of primary and secondary liability, fair use, and various other copyright defenses, as well as further defining the application of the anti-circumvention and copyright management information provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. more |
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| 7/31/2006 |
Notable New Cases in Copyright/DMCA Litigation (2005-2006) |
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| The year 2005-06 has seen a substantial group of decisions—including some cases of first impression—that flesh out the law of primary and secondary liability, fair use and various other copyright defenses, as well as further defining the application of the anti-circumvention and copyright management information provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. more |
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| 7/31/2006 |
Beware the Dangers of Arbitrators Morphing Into Mediators |
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| Flexibility and adaptability are hallmarks of alternative dispute resolution, and the ability to fit procedures to the needs of the particular quarrel is often central to realizing the benefits of arbitration and mediation. more |
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| 4/24/2006 |
Patent Rights and Open Source—Can They Co-exist? |
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| A patent gives its owner the right to exclude others from making, using, and selling the claimed invention. Thus, patent rights give a patentee great control over who uses his invention. more |
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| 3/21/2006 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Winter 2005/2006 |
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| In today's global marketplace, patent protection continues to be an important part of a company's overall business and intellectual property strategy. However, protection provided by any one patent is limited to within the country in which it was granted. more |
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| 2/24/2006 |
Perfect 10 v. Google - Analysis of the Preliminary Injunction Decision |
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| Order Granting/Denying Preliminary Injunction (Feb. 21, 2006). Key Holdings—Thumbnail copying for search purposes not fair use, notwithstanding Kelly v. Arriba Soft. No contributory liability. more |
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| 2/24/2006 |
What Now After Grokster? |
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| “We hold that one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression o other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by third parties.”more |
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| 2/22/2006 |
Litigation Alert - Perfect 10's Preliminary Injunction Against Google Exposes New Approaches to Copyright and Fair Use on the Internet |
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| On February 21, 2006, the Federal District Court in Los Angeles issued a decision with important new analyses affecting use of copyrighted materials on the Internet. more |
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| 2/21/2006 |
Copyright Basics - Just Enough Copyright Law If You Are Not an Attorney or IP Expert |
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| Copyright refers to the rights of authors in works of authorship — as distinguished from patents (whose subject matter is inventions), trademarks (which concern symbols of an enterprise's reputation and goodwill) and trade secrets (information whose value derives from being kept secret). more |
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| 2/9/2006 |
Copyright Alert: Circuit Court Decisions Weaken, Strengthen Hand of Software Owners Using Technological Protection Measures |
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| Within one late summer week, two federal courts of appeals rendered decisions that will have a significant effect on the rights of copyright holders. In both cases, third parties had overcome password schemes that software owners employed to protect their works from use by unauthorized parties. more |
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| 11/22/2005 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Fall 2005 |
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| On November 7, 2005, the Recording Industry Association of America issued a press release announcing settlement of the longstanding file-sharing dispute with Grokster. more |
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| 8/25/2005 |
Strategic Intellectual Property Planning |
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| The recognition of intellectual property as an intellectual asset, and an asset generally, is paramount to successful strategic intellectual property planning. Intellectual property should be thought of as having the characteristics of an asset, and should be so managed. more |
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| 8/15/2005 |
'Grokster' Seems Unlikely to Prevent File Sharing by Itself |
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| Once the enabling software had proliferated sufficiently, nothing Grokster could do could stop its operation. more |
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| 6/14/2005 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Spring 2005 |
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| CoStar Reopens Settled Fixation Issue/Trademark Infringement and the Fair Use Defense/Changes in Store for "Ailing" Patent System/Family Entertainment and Copyright Act Becomes Law. more |
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| 6/14/2005 |
CoStar Reopens Settled Fixation Issue in Online Digital Environment |
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| [T]he U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit undermined a previously unbroken line of cases holding that electronic copies of digital works are "fixed" within the meaning of the Copyright Act if they exist in the random access memory (RAM) of a computer. more |
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| 2/15/2005 |
Software Escrows as Part of an Intellectual Property Strategy |
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| For many companies, a key aspect of a comprehensive intellectual property strategy is to identify and enforce mechanisms to protect their investment in software purchased from software developers. more |
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| 12/28/2004 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Winter 2004/2005 |
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| Trademarks on a Shoestring for Start-Ups/Circuit Courts Narrow the Reach of the DMCA's Anti-Circumvention Provisions/Quick Updates. more |
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| 9/10/2004 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Fall 2004 |
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| Federal Circuit Whacks the Doctrine of Equivalents Again/The Role of Dictionaries in Patent Claim Construction/ Quick Updates more |
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| 6/15/2004 |
Intellectual Property Bulletin Summer 2004 |
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| Lessons in Patent Prosecution Quality Control from the Federal Circuit/The Complex Legal Implications of Modifying Licensed Software/ Quick Updates more |
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| 3/11/2004 |
Copyright Infringement Litigation: With Some Asides on Software Copyright Litigation |
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| I. Where, What, When, Who and Why more |
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| 3/11/2004 |
2004 Update: International Legal Protection for Software |
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| This report summarizes the legal protection available for computer software in most significant markets around the world as of January 2004. more |
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| 3/11/2004 |
2004 Update: International Legal Protection for Software - CHART |
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| This chart can be used to determine if subject matter protection is currently available in a particular country for either a U.S. or foreign party's software. more |
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| 2/26/2004 |
Software Outsourcing Offshore - Business and Legal Issues Checklist |
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| Outsourcing particular business functions is not something new. more |
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| 2/18/2004 |
Copyright Alert: Ellison v. AOL |
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| In an important ruling handed down February 10, 2004, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit continued the trend, begun in A&M Records v. Napster, 239 F.3d 1004 (9th Cir. 2001), of expanding vicarious liability of online service providers (OSPs) for copyright infringement by users, based on the "draw" of the web site. more |
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