October, 2021

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The Cinemassacre Monster Plagiarism Scandal

Plagiarism Today

Disclosure: Though I have no relationship or connection with this story, I am a long-time fan of James Rolfe and his work. James Rolfe is one of the most famous YouTubers working today. Best known for his character the Angry Video Game Nerd (AVGN) Rolfe has enjoyed over 17 years of success on YouTube spread across multiple shows. One of those series, Monster Madness, has been a long-running October tradition in our house.

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Dune Piracy Spiked After HBO Release, Due to Quality or PR?

TorrentFreak

After a long wait, the 2021 installment of the sci-fi classic Dune finally premiered in the United States last week. The film had already come out in other parts of the world a month earlier, which caused quite a bit of frustration among eager fans. Their patience was further tested when a relatively high-quality copy of the film leaked on pirate sites days before the premiere on HBO Max and in theaters.

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Swiss Supreme Court invalidates the Nespresso Capsule 3D Mark

The IPKat

Former Guest Kat Peter Ling, together with his associate, Joana Gurtner , report on the recent Swiss Supreme Court decision on the Nespresso Capsule 3D mark. Coffee capsules have turned out to be a revolution for how coffee is served in millions of homes … and also for case law on 3D trade marks. In a decision that has just been published (available here in French), the Swiss Federal Supreme Court invalidated the 3D mark of Nestlé's related to the shape of the capsules.

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US Court Rules Artificial Intelligence Systems Are Not 'Inventors'

JD Supra Law

On September 2, 2021, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia granted the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO’s) motion for summary judgement, finding that an artificial intelligence (AI) system cannot be named as an inventor on a patent.

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Software Composition Analysis: The New Armor for Your Cybersecurity

Speaker: Blackberry, OSS Consultants, & Revenera

Software is complex, which makes threats to the software supply chain more real every day. 64% of organizations have been impacted by a software supply chain attack and 60% of data breaches are due to unpatched software vulnerabilities. In the U.S. alone, cyber losses totaled $10.3 billion in 2022. All of these stats beg the question, “Do you know what’s in your software?

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Government Jawboning Doesn’t Turn Internet Services into State Actors–Doe v. Google

Technology & Marketing Law Blog

The plaintiffs are “conservative content creators” (i.e., QAnon enthusiasts) who posted videos to YouTube. YouTube suspended their accounts. The plaintiffs sued for First Amendment violations (presumably a 1983 claim). The court previously denied a TRO. YouTube now gets the case dismissed with prejudice. It’s not a close call. To show YouTube is a state actor, the plaintiffs tried four different unsuccessful arguments: Public Function.

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13 Spooky Copyright Cases, Just in Time for Halloween

Copyright Lately

The only thing scarier than a slasher flick is a lawsuit. Here are some of the greatest copyright horror stories, featuring such classics as “Nightmare on Elm Street,” “Halloween,” “Dracula,” “Ghostbusters” and … a creepy McDonalds character? It’s Halloween time again! The good news is after the holiday was effectively ruined last year, we’re more or less back in business in 2021.

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More Trending

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Dune Leaked on Pirate Sites Before US Theatrical & HBO Max Release

TorrentFreak

Dune (also known as Dune: Part One) is the first installment of a planned two-part adaption of the 1965 sci-fi book written by Frank Herbert. The movie has been in the planning for years, with filming eventually taking place between March and July 2019. Dune had its world premiere at the 78th Venice International Film Festival on September 3, 2021, and Warner Bros. released the movie internationally on September 15, which did not include key markets such as the US and UK.

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Federal Circuit Further Eases Path for Obtaining Design Patents

Patently-O

by Dennis crouch. In re Surgisil, LLP , — 4th — ( Fed. Cir. 2021 ). This is an important design patent decision that substantially narrows the scope of prior art available for anticipation rejections in design patent cases. The result is that it should become easier to obtain design patent protection. The decision is only about 600 words long — fewer than may writeup about the case. .

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[Guest Post] The wisdom of Dune and copyright litigation

The IPKat

Kat friend Hans Eriksson discusses an interesting decision (only available in Swedish) concerning copyright protection and originality, namely whether the sequence of twenty words in an instruction manual may be regarded as being enough for copyright to arise. Here's what Hans writes: The author was recently reminded of the opening lines of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi epic Dune: “ A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. ” This Dune tells us, every memb

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Federal Circuit Review - September 2021

JD Supra Law

Arguments to the Patent Office That Contradict Information Submitted to the FDA Support an Inference of Deceptive Intent In Belcher Pharmaceuticals v. Hospira, Inc., Appeal No. 20-1799, the Federal Circuit held that a patentee committed inequitable conduct by advancing an argument during patent prosecution that contradicted the patentee’s prior arguments and evidence submitted to the….

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IPO Diversity in Innovation Toolkit

Women and diverse employees have the technical skill and knowledge, yet their contributions are not patented at the same rate as those of their male counterparts.This toolkit can help organizations move the needle on achieving gender parity in innovation.

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How Technology is Reshaping the IP Management Industry

IP Watchdog

There’s hardly any area in entrepreneurship today that deals with innovation more than intellectual property rights protection – in fact, cutting edge technology and inventions are at the core of the IP industry. However, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the real-life practices, processes and management in the industry are as technologically advanced –it’s actually quite the contrary, or, at least, has been until recently.

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Peloton Can’t Bind All Family Members To Its Arbitration Provision–SS v. Peloton

Technology & Marketing Law Blog

This case involves the Peloton treadmill (“Tread+”). The treadmill has caused numerous personal injuries, and Peloton has recalled it. In this case, a 3 year old boy suffered personal injuries due to a Tread+ his dad bought. The dad, mom, and child sued Peloton for negligence and misrepresentation. Peloton invoked the arbitration clause in its TOS.

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Anti-Piracy Outfits Still Target Pirate Sites That Shut Down Years Ago

TorrentFreak

Over the past decades, hundreds of popular ‘pirate’ sites have come and gone. This includes the likes of isoHunt, ExtraTorrent, and KickassTorrents. These shutdowns have a serious impact but, as time passes, estranged users eventually move on. The same can’t be said for all anti-piracy organizations. Hunting Pirate Ghosts. As it turns out, sites that have long disappeared are still seen as a ‘threat’ That is, judging from the takedown notices they send to Google.

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Trademark: Uggs are generic in Australia, Can I import them without a license from UGG®?

Patently-O

by Dennis Crouch. In Australia, the term “ugg boots” refers to a general style of sheepskin shoe with the fleece turned in for warmth. It is a generic term, and not a trademark – in Australia. And, there are dozens of companies that make and sell ugg boots in that country, including Australian Leather Pty. Ltd. The original name “ugh” came from 1970s surfer Shane Stedman who has been quoted as saying “We called them Ughs because they were ugly.” UGG i

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[Guest post] Anderson.Paak got a new tattoo- and we might have an idea why

The IPKat

I have the pleasure of hosting the following guest contribution by Despoina Dimitrakopoulou and Simon J. Fritsch, both talented and enthusiastic former students of mine, which - while reviewing Anderson.Paak 's latest tattoo - discusses post-mortem moral rights protection and the value of a tattoo as an. advance (IP) directive. Despoina and Simon also recommend some music background by Anderson.Paak to accompany the reading of the article.

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What’s in the Box? Counterfeits and Online Marketplaces

The Illusion of More

In March, Senators Durbin and Cassidy introduced the INFORM Consumers Act, legislation meant to provide us with greater transparency when shopping through large online marketplaces, which is to say Amazon. In a co-authored editorial in Roll Call, the senators state: It is well documented that third parties are selling massive amounts of counterfeit, stolen and […].

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Decoded: Technology Law Insights, Volume 2, Issue 21

JD Supra Law

Nature of Patents and Patent Rights - When a patent is issued under the seal of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, it is signed by the Director of the USPTO or an Office official. The patent contains a grant to the patentee, and a printed copy of the specification and drawing is annexed to the patent and forms a part of it. The granted patent confers “the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling the invention throughout the United States or.

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Announcing A Major Virtual Event, “Lessons from the First Internet Ages,” on Nov. 2-3, 2021

Technology & Marketing Law Blog

This year, I have been serving as a Knight Foundation visiting scholar along with Prof. Mary Anne Franks of University of Miami. I’m excited to publicly announce our project. Working with the Knight Foundation team, including John Sands, we assembled a remarkable collection of essays and a conference to explore them fully. The essays: we collected over a dozen submissions from some leading figures in Internet history and online communities.

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Adobe Uses DMCA to Nuke Project That Keeps Flash Alive, Secure & Adware Free

TorrentFreak

As far back as 2012, Adobe was planning for the eventual demise of its iconic Flash Player. Gradually superceded by new technologies, the importance Flash diminished over time and as dawn broke on 2021, Adobe ceased to develop and support it. Well, sort of. While Adobe has indeed stopped shipping new global versions of Flash, the technology is still supported in two markets – Enterprise and China via Flash.cn – a site managed by Zhong Cheng Network, the only authorized distributor of

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Timbs: Iconic Enough for Trademark Protection?

Patently-O

by Dennis Crouch. TBL Licensing, LLC v Hirshfeld , Docket No. 1:21-cv-00681 (E.D. Va. Jun 04, 2021). I previously wrote about the TTAB decision denying TBL’s attempt to register the shape of its Timberland Boots as a protectable trade mark. Crouch, Iconic Timberland Boots–Trade Dress Worthy? Now, the company has filed a civil action in the Eastern District of Virginia seeking a court order that TBL is entitled to a registration.

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India Amends Patent Rules and Reduces Fees by 80% for Educational Institutions

IP Watchdog

On September 21, 2021, India's Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) under India’s Ministry of Commerce and Industry published amended Patents Rules, 2021, to amend the 2003 Patents Rules. The amendment now includes a new category, “eligible educational institutions,” which qualifies for the same reduced fees as natural persons, startups, and small entities.

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SpicyIP Weekly Review (September 27 – October 3)

SpicyIP

Zolgensma and the Inadequacies of the Compulsory Licensing Regime. Poster for Zolgensma. In a guest post, Akhil wrote about Zolgensma, Novartis’ gene therapy medication prescribed for treatment of Spinal Muscular Atrophy (‘SMA’). Akhil discusses the compulsory licensing provisions in the TRIPS Agreement, as well as the objectives and principles relating to safeguarding public interest in Articles 7 and 8 and how they find reflection in India’s Patent Act.

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Anchovy News, October 2021

JD Supra Law

This is the October edition of Anchovy News. Here you will find articles concerning ICANN, the domain name industry and the recuperation of domain names across the globe. In this issue we cover: DOMAIN NAME INDUSTRY NEWS.SPA springs to life New.ZUERICH extension CIRA partners with ScamAdviser to combat fraudulent sites.

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Eleventh Circuit Rejects “Material Support for Terrorists” Case–Colon v. Twitter

Technology & Marketing Law Blog

This is one of the many lawsuits against social media services for allegedly providing material support to terrorists. These cases have all failed–with the partial exception of the Ninth Circuit meltdown (3 judges; 3 opinions) in Gonzalez v. Google LLC , 2021 WL 2546675 (9th Cir. June 22, 2021), which I never had the chance to blog because it’s 167 pages and the panel was so deeply split that the whole decision clearly needs en banc review.

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VPN Service will Block BitTorrent and Keep Logs to Settle Piracy Lawsuit

TorrentFreak

A group of movie production outfits, including affiliates of the film studios Millennium Media and Voltage Pictures, filed a lawsuit against VPN.ht in March. The companies accused the VPN provider of promoting the piracy app Popcorn Time to its users, noting that a VPN.ht IP-address was repeatedly used to share pirated films. After filing the original complaint , the copyright holders increased the pressure.

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Attorney fees awarded since patentee knew it had a losing case.

Patently-O

by Dennis Crouch. This decision suggests that the Federal Circuit is acceding to the Supreme Court’s approach giving broad discretion to the district courts in attorney fees cases rather than nit-picking individual elements of the totality-of-the-circumstances test. But, we’ll see. . Energy Heating, LLC v. Heat On-the-Fly, LLC ( Fed. Cir. 2021 ).

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This Week in Washington IP: Ethics in Artificial Intelligence, Challenges with Carbon Removal and the USPTO Hosts the 2021 Hispanic Innovation and Entrepreneurship Program

IP Watchdog

This week in Washington IP news, Congress is largely quiet except for a hearing of the House Artificial Intelligence Task Force regarding ethical frameworks for developing artificial intelligence (AI) applications in various industries. Elsewhere in D.C., the Center for Data Innovation explores data driven approaches in addressing e-commerce counterfeits, The Brookings Institution hosts a conversation with Susteon’s Shantanu Agarwal on the challenges of carbon removal tech, and the U.S.

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Server Test Showdown? The Conflicting Rulings Over Whether Embedding a Social Media Post Violates the Copyright Act

IP Tech Blog

Last year, I wrote about a ruling in the Southern District of New York, Sinclair v. Ziff Davis, 18-CV-790 (KMW), that refused to dismiss claims against a media company for embedding an Instagram post into one of its articles online. This ruling and others in federal trial courts in the Second Circuit conflict with the Ninth Circuit’s ruling in Perfect 10, Inc. v.

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Can Computer Systems Using Artificial Intelligence Patent their own Inventions?

JD Supra Law

Increasingly, companies are using artificial intelligence to invent new methods and products. But can a named inventor be a non-human machine under the law? .

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The Legal Implications of Datacenter Location (Guest Blog Post)

Technology & Marketing Law Blog

by guest blogger Marketa Trimble. The location of a datacenter matters—the location of third-party datacenters affects companies’ (datacenter customers’) decisions whether to use the datacenters for colocation or other services. Part of any assessment of the suitability of a datacenter location should be the legal implications that may arise from locating servers in a particular jurisdiction, including the possibility that local courts could extend their jurisdiction over the datacenter’s custom

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Megaupload Lawsuits Remain in Limbo After Nearly 10 Years Passed

TorrentFreak

Ten years ago, online streaming hadn’t fully caught on yet and Netflix still had dozens of active DVD-mailing locations throughout the United States. Streaming piracy was relatively new as well with most ‘pirates’ still downloading movies from torrent sites or cyberlockers. While cyberlockers have plenty of legal uses, copyright holders viewed most of these services as pirate portals.

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FRANCE.COM: Trademark Transferred to French Government without Recourse in US Courts

Patently-O

When you visit the website france.com , you’ll be quickly redirected to the French government’s explore-France travel site: france.fr. But, the US-company France.com, Inc. believes that the country stole the.com site. The case is now pending before the Supreme Court on petition for writ of certiorari is France.com v. The French Republic , Docket No. 21-448 (Supreme Court 2021).

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Beware the Shadow Statute: ALI’s Copyright Restatement Project is Quite the Fright

IP Watchdog

American creators know how to celebrate Halloween: Whether they’re writing a mystery novel, shooting a horror movie, or painting a calavera, they’re a huge part of the season. Unfortunately, this year, there’s a monster lurking that creators didn’t manufacture: The American Law Institute’s (ALI’s) Copyright Restatement Project. The ALI is an independent organization that produces and publishes academic papers, including “Restatements of Law”—papers on legal subjects that judges and lawyers can u

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Podcast: David Golumbia Talking Facebook & Fascism

The Illusion of More

In this episode, I speak with David Golumbia, author and associate professor of digital studies, American literature, literary theory, philosophy, and linguistics at Virginia Commonwealth University. I asked Golumbia to join me after reading his blog post published on October 20th in which he asserts that Facebook is not just dropping the ball when it […].

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Transactions in the Age of Artificial Intelligence: Risks and Considerations

JD Supra Law

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a major focus of, and the most valuable asset in, many technology transactions and the competition for top AI companies has never been hotter. According to CB Insights, there have been over 1,000 AI acquisitions since 2010. The COVID pandemic interrupted this trajectory, causing acquisitions to fall from 242 in 2019 to 159 in 2020.