North Carolina Federal Court Dismisses Suit by Sellers Against Lawyers for Music Company Purchaser<br>Sixth Circuit Has Jurisdiction over Declaratory Claim for Song Authorship
Prince, the flamboyant pop star with 10 platinum albums, should pay nearly $4 million in damages for welshing on his promise to promote a perfume named after his latest CD, a special referee in Manhattan concluded after conducting a four-day inquest on damages.
Arbitrators' Findings Upheld in Legal Malpractice Dispute over Talent Agencies Act Controversy<br>Contingency Fee Agreement Applies to Potter Guide Post-Trial Settlement
As part of day-to-day operations, companies regularly enter into intellectual property assignments or "work-for-hire" arrangements with employees and contractors, often pursuant to form agreements that are not tailored to the particular engagement. However, decisions such as the recent opinion by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in <i>Marvel Worldwide v. Kirby</i>, highlight the importance of carefully drafting provisions governing the transfer of rights in new works of authorship.
In the context of alleged unauthorized uses of an individual's personal indicia, inconsistency ' in how different courts determine whether there are viable claims under state right of publicity laws or for false endorsement or association under the federal Lanham Act ' makes it difficult for attorneys who view content through a First Amendment lens when counseling entertainment production companies.
This second installment of a two-part series discusses in detail those provisions of Dodd-Frank, among many others, which may have the most immediate and greatest impact on U.S. equipment leasing and finance companies.
If you are the owner of a property that is being licensed into a potential motion picture franchise, how do you contractually protect the rights to your existing character or property so that the movies and related items being created do not damage your preexisting property? This article examines the approaches customarily utilized.
At the Oscars in March, Best Actress winner Frances McDormand made “inclusion rider” go viral. But Kalpana Kotagal, a partner at Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll had already worked for months to write the language for such provisions. Kotagal was developing legal language for contract provisions that Hollywood's elite could use to require studios and other partners to employ diverse workers on set.
With 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.
The legal implications of branding generally arise initially for companies during the process of selecting a company name and any initial product or service names. For drug development companies, however, careful consideration should also be paid to the implications of branding a clinical trial.
'Disconnect Between In-House and Outside Counsel is a continuation of the discussion of client expectations and the disconnect that often occurs. And although the outside attorneys should be pursuing how inside-counsel actually think, inside counsel should make an effort to impart this information without waiting to be asked.
