Yearly Archives: 2015

Reverse payment settlements exist at the intersection among antitrust, patent and healthcare laws. Also known as pay-for-delay agreements, these occur when a patent holder agrees to pay a potential patent infringer to settle litigation and delay its entrance to the market. The payment is called a reverse one because, in the ...

The 2004 decision in Center for Democracy and Technology v. Pappert sheds light on the complications surrounding the use of technology to reduce the consumption of child pornography today. Government filtering as a mechanism to combat child pornography In 2003, the plaintiffs in Pappert – the Center for Democracy and ...

By: Jaideep Reddy “These days a developer will do a Google search, find five open-source products that fit his[/her] need and the next thing you know one of them is in a product.” – Phil Robb. Because open source code presents such a valuable resource for programmers, for-profit companies regularly ...

On October 16, the Second Circuit issued its decision in Authors Guild v. Google, affirming Google’s fair use defense against Authors Guild’s claim of copyright infringement of the Google Books search engine. Background This is the latest chapter in a longstanding legal battle between the authors’ advocacy organization, Authors Guild, and ...

In eDekka LLC v. 3Balls.com Inc., Eastern District of Texas Judge Rodney Gilstrap ruled against plaintiff eDekka’s patent infringement claims and invalidated the patent in question. This jurisdiction has been considered friendly toward so-called patent trolls, and Judge Rodney’s opinion may indicate tougher scrutiny going forward for overly broad patents. ...

IS COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT A STRICT LIABILITY TORT? By: Patrick R. Goold ABSTRACT Scholars and lawmakers routinely refer to copyright infringement as a strict liability tort. The strictness of copyright liability has long been criticized as immoral, inefficient, and inconsistent with usual tort doctrine. However, this Article questions whether copyright infringement ...

SOVEREIGNTY UNDER SIEGE: CORPORATE CHALLENGES TO DOMESTIC INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY DECISIONS By: Cynthia M. Ho ABSTRACT Countries face a new threat that strikes at their ability to balance protection of intellectual property rights against other priorities, such as public health. They may have to pay substantial compensation to companies that dislike ...

SOFTWARE COPYRIGHT’S ORACLE FROM THE CLOUD By: Lothar Determann & David Nimmer ABSTRACT Clouds are on the horizon for software copyrights. The open source movement is actively trying to turn copyright into “copyleft.” Courts around the world are reshaping the first sale doctrine, notably the European Court of Justice in ...

UNDERSTANDING THE FEDERAL CIRCUIT: AN EXPERT COMMUNITY APPROACH By: Laura G. Pedraza-Fariña ABSTRACT The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“CAFC”)—the appeals court in charge of virtually all patent cases—has been fraught with controversy since its creation in 1982. To its critics, the Federal Circuit engages in puzzling behaviors, ...

DISAGREEABLE PRIVACY POLICIES: MISMATCHES BETWEEN MEANING AND USERS’ UNDERSTANDING By: Joel R. Reidenberg, Travis Breaux, Lorrie Faith Cranor, Brian French, Amanda Grannis, James T. Graves, Fei Liu, Aleecia McDonald, Thomas B. Norton, Rohan Ramanath, N. Cameron Russell, Norman Sadeh and Florian Schaub ABSTRACT Privacy policies are verbose, difficult to understand, ...