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Is 'No Use' Always a 'Fair Use'?
April 28, 2006
In order to avoid liability for trademark infringement relating to the sale of keywords corresponding to trademarks, search engines, including Google, are attacking the concept that trademark owners should be able to protect the 'commercial magnetism' of their marks. Recently, in <i>Rescue.com v. Google, Inc.</i>, No. 5:04-CV-1056 (N.D.N.Y.), Google argued that the trademark laws 'are not meant to protect consumer good will [sic] created through extensive, skillful, and costly advertising.' Google's Reply Brief at 4 n.4 (2005) (citing <i>Smith v. Chanel, Inc.</i>, 402 F.2d 562, 566 (9th Cir. 1968)).
CA High Court Sides With 'Friends' Writers
April 28, 2006
Script writers for both television sitcoms and dramas have been given the license to be as raunchy as they like during the creative process ' as long as their raw talk doesn't single out specific people as the butt of the jokes. In a case that put the entertainment and publishing industries on edge ' and had some Hollywood honchos speaking out ' the California Supreme Court unanimously ruled that sexually coarse and vulgar language is often a necessary part of the creative process when producing a hit TV show. <i>Lyle v. Warner Brothers Television Productions</i>.
'Da Vinci Code' Case Stretched Legal Thinking On What Can Be Protected By Copyright
April 28, 2006
The common wisdom before, and during, the London copyright infringement trial over Dan Brown's book 'The Da Vinci Code' (DVC) was that the plaintiffs Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh would lose because an idea cannot be copyrighted. And the plaintiffs did lose. <i>Baigent v. Random House Group</i>. Some even suggested the plaintiffs sued only to bolster the sale of their own book, 'Holy Blood, Holy Grail', which is what happened ' though High Court Justice Peter Smith ordered the plaintiffs to pay $1.75 million in legal costs. The number of additional copies the authors will have to sell to earn enough royalties to pay that amount is high. Still, the case was one of those signal attempts to reconsider exactly what authorship is for copyright law purposes.
The Leasing Hotline
April 28, 2006
Recent rulings of interest.
Understanding the Issues in Leasing Office Space for or to Federal Governmental Entities
April 28, 2006
<b><i>Part Two of a Two-Part Series.</i></b> Part One of this article discussed lease forms and standard clauses; federal appropriation of funds; rental payments; and lease language that provides for the award of attorneys' fees to the 'prevailing party' in a law-suit. The conclusion addresses alterations and dispute resolution.
In the Spotlight
April 28, 2006
Once the simplest of lease provisions, common area maintenance ('CAM') expense provisions have grown quite complex. In the past, a CAM provision might simply provide: The tenant shall pay its pro rata share of the expenses of maintaining the common areas of the property. Maybe there was another sentence or two ' even a paragraph ' describing the types of expenses and the method of estimating, paying, and reconciling that share of expenses. Then some wunderkind invented the personal computer and the 60-page lease. Now landlords have multi-page, 'throw in the kitchen sink' CAM provisions and tenants attempt to gut every word of them.
Racial Profiling
April 28, 2006
<b><i>Part One of a Two-Part Series.</i></b> For more than a decade, law enforcement agencies across the country have struggled with allegations of racial profiling. Many of the country's large law enforcement agencies have been sued for alleged racial profiling. These agencies include the California Highway Patrol, the Ohio Highway patrol and the Illinois State Police. The results of these lawsuits have been mixed. Some agencies, such as the Illinois State Police, prevailed, and many other agencies reached settlements. These suits were extremely expensive to litigate, and the settlements were, at times, just as expensive. Regardless of the outcome of the litigation, however, the damage caused by these allegations was massive. The citizens' trust and confidence instilled in these departments, if it existed at all in recent times, was breached. The damage occurred, in large part, because perception is often as important as ' or more important than ' reality. Although the phenomenon of racial profiling undoubtedly exists, all agencies and their personnel become tainted, whether fairly or not, with the stigma resulting from the actions of a few.
e-Commerce Docket Sheet
April 28, 2006
Recent cases in e-commerce law and in the e-commerce industry.
You Own, Store And Manage Data
April 28, 2006
Today, the volume of such laws is staggering. As perhaps fits the regional, and often local, level of business in the United States ' and how business is regulated here ' many states have stepped into the breach and enacted legislation requiring data security, as well as notice to consumers, when security breaches occur. And although there is no federal law that generally requires information security, recent Federal Trade Commission actions indicate that the FTC is, for the first time, imposing a general duty to establish information security under the Federal Trade Commission Act. <br>Compliance with these laws isn't only a legal reality, but a business one, as the frequent and well-publicized data-security incidents of recent years demonstrate. New notice laws require companies to advise customers of the high-profile data-security incidents that frequently make headlines. Now, companies must deal with increasingly complex requirements that are not consistent from state to state. The price of failure can be high ' including significant penalties, as well as unfavorable press coverage.
FTC Chimes In With Chorus Calling For Cooperation On Spam
April 28, 2006
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) last month joined the call by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) for government and industry worldwide to battle spam.

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