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Welcome to the weblog for Intellectual Property Law. Wed Nov 16, 2005
Famous Domain Name Thief to Remain in Jail Pending DisclosureIn the latest step in a case that seems like it's been around forever, the original domain name thief that made registrars nervous about their own liability for wrongly transferred domain names, Stephen Michael Cohen, remains in a U.S. jail pending full disclosure of the alleged millions of dollars he gained from stealing the infamous sex.com domain name from Gary Kremen, its rightful owner and later founder of match.comhttp://news.lp.findlaw.com/court_tv/s/20051115/15nov2005174427.html Mon Oct 24, 2005
RIM on the PrecipiceThe Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has denied RIM's motion for a stay pending its appeal of the appellate court's infringement findings to the US Supreme Court, prompting the beleagured company to seek the stay directly from the Supreme Court itself.Should the stay not be granted, the case will be remanded to the lower court, which will have its hands full. While seemingly ready for the penalty phase of the case, the lower court will be asked to reevaluate its ruling based upon flaws found by the appellate court, despite its overall findings against RIM. The lower court will also be asked to consider whether a tentative settlement, allegedly reached between the parties previously, should be enforced, with RIM arguing that the deal was done and should be followed, so as to allow it to stay in business in the US, while the patent holder, NTP, argues that final details were never agreed to between the parties. Still, according to reports, NTP is prepared to make a license offer to RIM in order to forestall the need for further litigation. http://tinyurl.com/ba7ra See RIM's press release here http://rim.com/news/press/2005/pr-21_10_2005-01.shtml The offer http://www.managingip.com/default.asp?page=9&PubID=198&SID=593355&ISS=20643&LS=EMS54706 Mon Oct 10, 2005
Can You Email Me Now?RIM, the maker of the ubiquitous Blackberry line of communicators failed in its efforts to have a lower court ruling against it reviewed by the entire 12 judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals' federal circuit, an effort to revisit its unsuccessful trip before a 3 judge panel of the same Court.This past Friday, RIM announced that it would seek U.S. Supreme Court review and an interim stay, in an effort to forestall injunctive relief, held in abeyance by the lower court pending appeal, which would have prohibited the messaging giant from selling its devices and software in the U.S. A plain English summary of the current happenings can be found at http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,122941,00.asp Tue Jan 25, 2005
5 Tech Groups Ask Supreme Court to Uphold GroksterFive organizations who represent the technology industry filed two amicus briefs in the Grokster case, set to be heard by they Supreme Court in March. Unlike the broad alliance of entertainment companies urging the court to overturn the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling, which held that Grokster was not responsible for customers' copyright infringement when they download music and movie files, the five tech groups are standing on the other side.They are asking the court to uphold the lower court and protect technological innovation from copyright lawsuits and to affirm its 1984 Sony Betamax ruling, which said that video recorders were not copyright infringing products, because they had significant noninfringing uses. The Grokster decision in August found that P2P services like Grokster are also used for noninfringing uses. The groups are: the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA), NetCoalition, Digital Media Association (DiMA), and the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT). ITAA is a trade group representing more than 300 technology companies; NetCoalition is a trade group representing Yahoo, Google, and other Web-based businesses; DiMA represents 20 companies that create or distribute digital media; and CDT is a technology-focused civil liberties advocate. They asked the court to send the case back to the lower court to judge the issue by a different standard, by determining to what extent the file-sharing companies are encouraging infringement and whether they are able to control it. However, point out that the Internet itself is a file-sharing system. http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,119396,tk,dn012505X,00.asp http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,119370,00.asp http://www.thestandard.com/internetnews/000875.php http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/MGM_v_Grokster/ Mon Jan 24, 2005
HP Settles Patent Infringement Lawsuit with IntergraphHewlett-Packard, on the eve of trial, decided to settle with plaintiff Intergraph Corp. the patent infringement lawsuit it filed against HP. Actually, the two companies had about 10 lawsuits against each other. An HP claim against Intergraph was dismissed two weeks ago, which may help explain the motivation to settle rather than fight on. HP will be paying $141 million and the two companies have signed a cross-licensing agreement.Intergraph sued Intel, HP, and Gateway in 2002, claiming infringement of patents related to cache memory in computers with Pentium processors. It has already settled with Intel and Gateway. Since 2002, when it formed its IP division, the company has realized $860 million in pre-tax income from its IP protection and enforcement efforts. http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1105968952182 Wed Sep 01, 2004
Circuit Court keeps the door locked on Garage-Door Opener DMCA PlaintiffThe Federal Circuit today upheld the district court judgment in favor of the defendant in Chamberlain v. Skylink, the garage door opener DMCA case.It's a victory for critics of the lawsuit, who viewed it as an attempt to control the aftermarket in consumer goods, and an abuse of an already controversial law intended to protect digital music and movies, not garage doors. A universal garage door opener is not a violation of the DMCA, the court ruled, using a common-sense approach: "We conclude that 17 U.S.C. § 1201 prohibits only forms of access that bear a reasonable relationship to the protections that the Copyright Act otherwise affords copyright owners. While such a rule of reason may create some uncertainty and consume some judicial resources, it is the only meaningful reading of the statute." Skylink makes universal remotes that can open Chamberlain-made doors. Chamberlain lost its attempt to obtain a summary judgment, then filed the appeal, on the grounds that such a universal remote violated the anti-circumvention provisions of the law because the remote bypasses a technology-protection measure built into the Chamberlain device's software. "Under Chamberlain's theory, any customer who loses his or her Chamberlain transmitter, but manages to operate the opener either with a non-Chamberlain transmitter or by some other means of circumventing the rolling code, has violated the DMCA," reads the opinion from Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer of the Northern District of Illinois U.S. District Court. "In this court's view, the statute does not require such a conclusion." http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,61232,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_3 http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,60383,00.html Decision [PDF]: http://tinyurl.com/4jya2 DMCA: http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/1201.html Fri Aug 20, 2004
Grokster Upheld on Appeal - Not Responsible for Users' Copyright InfringementIn a decision sure to bring gloom to Hollywood and the music industry, the federal 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a lower court's ruling that Grokster, Musiccity.com and Morpheus are not responsible for users who use their P2P systems to illegally copy and share music and other copyrighted works.Distinguishing their systems from Napster's, which had a centralized server, the court ruled unanimously that they are not not liable for contributory and vicarious copyright infringement, but rather that the new technology is neutral, capable of being used for infringing and nonfringing purposes, much like your VCR. The Court felt bound by the 1984 Sony Betamax ruling, which they characterized as binding precedent, and said only Congress can make such technology against the law. Of course, that is exactly what some in Congress are currently trying to do with the INDUCE Act. Judge Sidney R. Thomas, writing for the three-judge panel, concluded: "The technology has numerous other uses, significantly reducing the distribution costs of public domain and permissively shared art and speech, as well as reducing the centralized control of that distribution." It is not yet known if there will be an appeal to the Supreme Court. Experts view the decision as a decided shift in the way courts view P2P technology. http://www.itworld.com/Man/2683/040820grokster/ Decision: http://www.eff.org/IP/P2P/MGM_v_Grokster/20040819_mgm_v_grokster_decision.pdf Fri Aug 13, 2004
EU Judge Asks for More Information from MicrosoftThe European trial judge who is responsible to decide whether or not to suspend the sanctions ordered against Microsoft during the appeal process has issued a ruling: Microsoft, which claimed that complying with the sanctions would cause it irreparable harm, must provide additional information to prove that claim. The company had previously been ordered to provide certain technical information to competitors, but it had argued that doing so would result in irreparable harm, as it could not take back trade secret copyrighted code from their rivals, even if successful on appeal, if the code had to provided in th because should they provide their rivals copyright-protected software ce mean time.The court has scheduled oral arguments in Microsoft's request for stay for Sept. 30 and Oct. 1. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/aptech_story.asp?category=6420&slug=EU%20Microsoft Tue Aug 03, 2004
Symantec Sued for Calling "Spyware Nuker" AdwareThe makers of the product Spyware Nuker, which advertises it as a tool for removing spyware on your computer, are suing Symantec for putting its product on a list of adware. TrekEight, also calling itself Trek8, TrekData and TrekBlue, says their product is not adware, is not capable of "performing the functions typically associated with spyware and adware", and that they've lost distributors and that their distributors can no longer advertise on Google.It's a complex story, not only because of new legislation regarding spyware in California, but because there is more than one SpywareNuker version and because a sister company of TrekEight is reportedly in the adware business. http://news.com.com/2100-1023_3-5293992.html http://www.spywarewarrior.com/rogue_anti-spyware.htm#swn_note Sun Nov 23, 2003
Steps to deal with cybersmearingIn an article posted to the ABA Journal E-Report, Elizabeth Millard chronicles a recent problem with cybersmearing involving H & R Block. She points to several proactive steps companies can take to help prevent the rate of incidence of cybersmearing, the smearing of the good name of an individual or company on websites, message boards and the like. The article, found at http://www.abanet.org/journal/ereport/nov21rep.html , relates how Block has brought suit without knowing who the anonymous poster is, trying to uncover that identity by sending a subpoena to Yahoo!. For more information on how to unmask such posters, you can read an article I've written on the subject at http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/2001/hollander-2001-03.html .Disclaimer. The material provided on this site is for information purposes only and its availability to you does not establish an attorney-client relationship nor constitute legal advice. If you are interested in becoming a client of Hollander and Company LLC, please contact Jay Hollander, Esq. at jh@hollanderco.com. |
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