Features

Commentary: What the Music Industry Can Learn from Cable When It Comes to ISPs and Infringement
In the last two decades, the music industry and, more specifically, songwriters, producers and recording artists have been losing the value of their efforts to online piracy. Perhaps a business-to-business solution can be found between the music industry and cable providers.
Columns & Departments
IP News
Federal Circuit: Agreement Between Patent Owner and Third Party Was Not Insulated from The On-Sale Bar
Features

E-Commerce Sellers Should Be Preemptive to Mitigate Effects of Account Suspensions for IP Infringement
E-commerce channel providers' suspension of sellers' accounts associated with alleged intellectual property infringement is fast, and suspension remediation is time-consuming and costly. Consequently, e-commerce sellers should contemplate pre-emptive legal and business arrangements to ameliorate potential e-commerce account suspensions consequences.
Features

Choosing Between Trade Secret and Patent Protection: A Primer for Businesses
When deciding whether to apply for patent protection on an innovation or whether to keep the innovation confidential as a company trade secret, there are many considerations that a business must take into account stemming from the different characteristics of each.
Features

Protecting Clients In the Virtual World
The "metaverse" in conjunction with Web 3.0 can be thought of as an immersive virtual reality world or worlds, where users can play games, socialize,…
Features

Trademark Coexistence May Become a Necessity As Market for Trademarks Grows
Trademark publication can be an anxious part of the application process, with fear of aggressive opposition and costly proceedings looming in the background. But many oppositions, whether they are only threatened or actually filed, afford the applicant a discussion with the opposer that can ultimately be helpful in nonobvious ways.
Columns & Departments
IP News
Federal Circuit Affirms Precedential Opinion Panel Decision Limiting the Circumstances In Which the Board Should Raise Sua Sponte Patentability Issues Against Proposed Substitute Claims Federal Circuit Rejects District Court's Claim Construction As Being Too Narrow Federal Circuit Rejects District Court's Claim Construction Because It Is Not Supported by the Intrinsic Evidence, and Leaves Dependent Claims Without Scope
Features

Attorneys Forecast Legal Challenges In NFTs
As nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, continue to grow in popularity through cryptocurrency purchase, sale and trade online, opportunities for entertainment attorneys in the emerging industry also are booming. For this article, attorneys shared how they're grabbing hold of NFT-related work and the challenges they foresee.
Features

How NCAA Athletes and Brands Can Avoid Big Mistakes In NIL Influencer Agreements
The biggest event of the year in college sports just concluded as national champions were crowned in men's and women's basketball, and hundreds of thousands of college athletes are entering the influencer marketplace for the first time. College athletes now find themselves attractive candidates in the fast growing influencer marketing arena. With the FTC Commissioner taking a closer look at the use of influencers for marketing, student athletes and brands should take care when entering into the influencer marketing arena.
Features

Ninth Circuit Issues Decision on Trade Secret Injunctive Relief
Earlier this year, the Ninth Circuit issued a decision affirming a district court's denial of an injunction following a finding of trade secret misappropriation. While the opinion is designated as unpublished — and therefore not precedential — the panel's reasoning sheds light on an important issue in trade secrets remedies.
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MOST POPULAR STORIES
- Protecting Innovation in the Cyber World from Patent TrollsWith trillions of dollars to keep watch over, the last thing we need is the distraction of costly litigation brought on by patent assertion entities (PAEs or "patent trolls"), companies that don't make any products but instead seek royalties by asserting their patents against those who do make products.Read More ›
- Risks of “Baseball Arbitration” in Resolving Real Estate Disputes“Baseball arbitration” refers to the process used in Major League Baseball in which if an eligible player's representative and the club ownership cannot reach a compensation agreement through negotiation, each party enters a final submission and during a formal hearing each side — player and management — presents its case and then the designated panel of arbitrators chooses one of the salary bids with no other result being allowed. This method has become increasingly popular even beyond the sport of baseball.Read More ›
- Private Equity Valuation: A Significant DecisionInsiders (and others) in the private equity business are accustomed to seeing a good deal of discussion ' academic and trade ' on the question of the appropriate methods of valuing private equity positions and securities which are otherwise illiquid. An interesting recent decision in the Southern District has been brought to our attention. The case is <i>In Re Allied Capital Corp.</i>, CCH Fed. SEC L. Rep. 92411 (US DC, S.D.N.Y., Apr. 25, 2003). Judge Lynch's decision is well written, the Judge reviewing a motion to dismiss by a business development company, Allied Capital, against a strike suit claiming that Allied's method of valuing its portfolio failed adequately to account for i) conditions at the companies themselves and ii) market conditions. The complaint appears to be, as is often the case, slap dash, content to point out that Allied revalued some of its positions, marking them down for a variety of reasons, and the stock price went down - all this, in the view of plaintiff's counsel, amounting to violations of Rule 10b-5.Read More ›
- The DOJ's Corporate Enforcement Policy: One Year LaterThe DOJ's Criminal Division issued three declinations since the issuance of the revised CEP a year ago. Review of these cases gives insight into DOJ's implementation of the new policy in practice.Read More ›
- The DOJ Goes Phishing: The Rise of False Claims Act Cybersecurity LitigationWhile the DOJ Civil Cyber-Fraud Initiative is still in its early stages and cybersecurity regulations are evolving, whistleblower plaintiffs have already begun leveraging the FCA to pursue alleged noncompliance with government cybersecurity requirements.Read More ›