In 1980, Congress amended the patent code to require patent owners to pay periodic maintenance fees in order to keep their patents in force. In response to concerns about the financial impact on individual inventors and small businesses, a 'small entity' category was added to the law to permit certain individuals, nonprofit organizations, and small businesses to pay half of most normal U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ('PTO') fees.

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Recent cases in e-commerce law and in the e-commerce industry.

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As more people live in the virtual world ' sometimes also called the digital or synthetic world ' in one of the many so-called massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMPORGs) available online, the potential for monetary abuse and malfeasance grows.

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The audience of multinational corporations required to comply with SOX and EU data-protection laws ' whether in e-commerce or bricks-and-mortar operations ' can only watch, do their best to implement anonymous whistleblower mechanisms in compliance with both SOX and EU privacy law, and wait until the contest is decided.

Australian, English and Canadian court rulings associated with defamatory Internet communications emanating from the United States may limit American speech, a specter that stands to cast a long, haunting shadow over a range of U.S.-based activities, from publishing to online auctions to discussion and criticism.<br>For jurisdictional purposes, Internet publications may be subject to worldwide legal difficulties. Using common law theory, foreign courts have found American Internet publishers liable for harm to readers located in foreign jurisdictions, and have subjected those publishers to foreign-liability law, even though American law holds the sender immune from liability.

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Today, it seems that anyone involved in e-commerce must be online and available, all the time. You know how it is because you live it: Blackberries and Internet-enabled cell phones provide instant delivery of e-mail, wherever you may be ' whether working, or spending time with family and friends. Online etiquette seems to require that you reply instantly, regardless of your other responsibilities or non-work-related activity in which you may be engaged.<br>For most of us, constant connectedness is no longer just a way of life ' it's a job requirement, and the only way to survive. The quick e-mail reply can become the difference between keeping and losing a client and, ultimately, between sanity and burnout. Everyone in our world scrambles to save time ' even a few minutes here and there ' to satisfy client expectations. Only after those obligations are met, if ever, can we perhaps hoard a few minutes for ourselves.

Recent rulings of interest to you and your practice.

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Congress' one-word change to the ordinary course of business preference defense will make this already common preference defense even more prevalent. The Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act's ('BAPCPA') substitution of an 'and' for an 'or' to the defense's elements should significantly assist the typical unsecured creditor in defending a preference claim, and, in most cases, enable the creditor to defend the claim without an expert witness.