Sat.Dec 18, 2021 - Fri.Dec 24, 2021

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Some Copyright Highlights in 2021-Around the World and in Canada?

Hugh Stephens Blog

It seems as if it was only a few weeks ago that I was writing a similar summary for 2020, the “annus horribilis” when COVID first hit us, but in fact it was 51 weeks ago yet many of the same pandemic and copyright-related issues that I wrote about last year are still with us, … Continue reading "Some Copyright Highlights in 2021-Around the World and in Canada?

Copyright 246
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Sci-Hub Founder: Academic Publishers Are the Real Threat to Science, Not Sci-Hub

TorrentFreak

By offering free access to millions of ‘paywalled’ research papers, Sci-Hub is often described as “The Pirate Bay of Science”. The site is used by researchers from all over the world, to access papers they otherwise have a hard time accessing. For some, the site is essential to do their work. The major academic publishers such as Elsevier, Wiley, and American Chemical Society are not happy with the rogue research library.

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Tips for Brainstorming New Business and Brand Names

Erik K Pelton

Building strong and protected brand names begins with developing creative names. In this episode Erik reveals several tips for brainstorming brand names and trademarks. The post Tips for Brainstorming New Business and Brand Names appeared first on Erik M Pelton & Associates, PLLC. Building strong and protected brand names begins with developing creative names.

Branding 113
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[Guest post] Universal Copyright Convention – RIP

The IPKat

The IPKat has received the following comment from Katfriend Jørgen Blomqvist (Centre for Information and Innovation Law, Faculty of Law, University of Copenhagen) on the recent announcement relating to the accession of Cambodia to the Berne Convention. Here's what Jørgen writes: Universal Copyright Convention – RIP by Jørgen Blomqvist On December 9, 2021, WIPO announced that the Kingdom of Cambodia has joined the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, with effect fro

Copyright 132
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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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Becoming Harder to Justify a One-Size-Fits-All Patent System

IP Watchdog

Meanwhile, all patents— good, bad, revolutionary, and stupid— have eroded to the point where continued use of the U.S. patent system must be questioned. Despite the statute saying that patents are to be treated as property rights, the Supreme Court has ruled that patents are merely government franchises that can be stripped at any point in time during the life of the patent regardless of how much time or money has been invested by the patent owner.

Patent 130
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Fakku Sends DMCA Takedown Request Targeting TorrentFreak

TorrentFreak

When Fakku launched 15 years ago, it was an aggregator for unlicensed scanlations of adult manga, also known as hentai. The site’s founder, Jacob Grady, studied computer science in Massachusetts at the time and used student loans to pay the server bills of a site that was essentially a pirate operation. Fakku never sought trouble with rightsholders though.

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Functional designs in EU law post-Doceram: harmonisation still missing

The IPKat

While awaiting for the new EU Design Directive (expected in 2022 ), this Kat decided to look back at one of the current Directive’s most discussed provisions: functional designs. Is this ribbon functional or aesthetic? Under art. 7 (1) of Directive 98/71/EC (and equivalent art. 8(1) of Regulation 6/2002), “a design right shall not subsist in features of appearance of a product which are solely dictated by its technical function.

Designs 124
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mRNA IP and Competitive Landscape: 2021 in Review – Part I, Update on Moderna, BioNTech, and CureVac

IP Watchdog

In April of this year, we provided a three-part series relating to the IP and Competitive Landscape for the mRNA market. In this post (Part I), we provide a 2021 year in review update on mRNA pioneers Moderna, BioNTech and CureVac, and in Part II, we profile Sanofi and other companies in the mRNA space and offer additional conclusions and outlook for 2022 and beyond.

IP 124
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Hollywood & Netflix Win High Court Order to Block 15 Major Pirate Sites

TorrentFreak

One of the key anti-piracy strategies of the movie and TV show industries is site blocking, whereby internet service providers are compelled via court order to deny subscriber access to specified domains. Due to limited transparency, it is difficult to say exactly how many domains are blocked by ISPs in the UK but they could run into the thousands after more than a decade of legal action.

Copying 144
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Artificial Intelligence as an Inventor on Patents – The Global Divide and the Path Forward

JD Supra Law

DABUS (Device for the Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience) is an artificial intelligence (AI) system created by Dr. Stephen Thaler. It reportedly conceived two separate inventions without any human intervention and therefore, was designated as an inventor on patent applications related to those inventions. The idea of assigning inventorship to an AI-machine not only brought new legal challenges but also left the global intellectual property (IP) community divided regarding whether an.

Inventor 124
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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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Competitive Keyword Advertising Claim Fails–Reflex Media v. Luxy

Technology & Marketing Law Blog

The plaintiff runs Seeking Arrangements. The defense runs Luxy, a competitor. Earlier this year, I blogged a ruling holding that Seeking Arrangements’ trademark infringement claim against Luxy could proceed because Luxy included Seeking Arrangements’ purported trademarks in its keyword metatags. Yes, this was a 2021 decision. The ruling I’m blogging today involves Luxy’s counterclaims against Seeking Arrangements for buying the Luxy keyword as the trigger for search engin

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New IP Monetization Models Will Rely Less on Litigation in 2022

IP Watchdog

From the perspective of the Intangible Investor, 2022 will be a year of new opportunities and transitional growth. IP business models will evolve, and risk and return calculations will become more reliable. In the decade since the America Invents Act (AIA) was enacted, patent licensing challenges have increased for many technology companies and independent inventors.

IP 121
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Nintendo Wins High Court Injunction to Block Access to Pirated Switch ROMs

TorrentFreak

Over the past several years Nintendo has been pouring resources into its fight against those who help to bypass security measures in its Switch console. Earlier this month Nintendo celebrated a win in a civil case against former Team-Xecuter member Gary Bowser, who agreed to pay the gaming giant $10m in damages. Nintendo also obtained a UK High Court injunction to block four Team-Xecuter-related websites back in 2019 but that did little to stop pirated game ROMs from being shared online.

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The Allure of Lawsuit Guitars

IPilogue

Photo by Thomas Kelley ( Unsplash ). Emily Chow is an IPilogue Writer and a 1L JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School. . What does it mean to be a rockstar? A metalhead? A good-for-nothing punk? A rebel without a cause? One can easily conjure up the image of a “rockstar” identity or lifestyle that appears inseparable from the genre itself. Just as communities coalesce around particular musicians, artists, or genres of music, so too do instruments, music labels, and brands.

Music 105
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Position Marks

Kashishipr

Some marks that label a product become distinctive just because of how they are positioned in a product. Today, we as consumers can easily identify the products of popular brands due to the positioning of some specific elements on the products, for instance, the three stripes of Adidas, Louboutin’s red sole shoes, or the red label on the back pocket of Levi’s jeans.

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The Most (Potentially) Consequential ITC Decisions of 2021

IP Watchdog

This has been a year full of ups and downs, including at the International Trade Commisison (ITC). The ITC has stayed open for business, instituting a near-record number of investigations and holding hearings, albeit virtually. There have been a number of ITC decisions with interesting holdings, all of which have been covered well here and in other blogs.

Blogging 115
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Aussie Federal Court Orders ISPs to Block 101 Pirate Movie & TV Show Domains

TorrentFreak

In December 2016 and after substantial work to amend the law, an Australian court ordered the blocking of several pirate sites headed up by the infamous The Pirate Bay. Over the five years since, movie companies including Roadshow Films, Disney, Paramount, Columbia, Universal, Warner, and more recently Netflix have returned to court time and again to have hundreds more sites blocked.

Branding 144
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Most Cited Supreme Court Patent Cases Since 1952

Patently-O

by Dennis Crouch. Lots of the new learning in patent law over the past decade has focused on patent eligibility. But, none of the eligibility cases (new or old) show up in my list of the most cited Supreme Court cases. Markman v. Westview Instruments, Inc., 517 U.S. 370 (1996) (claim construction); Christianson v. Colt Industries Operating Corp., 486 U.S. 800 (1988) (arising under jurisdiction); eBay Inc. v.

Patent 111
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Expired Patents Can Be Challenged

JD Supra Law

Although it may seem counterintuitive, the PTAB has jurisdiction over expired patents, and patent owners may need to defend their expired patents in inter partes review. The PTAB recently reiterated this in Apple, Inc. v. Gesture Tech.

Patent 106
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Antitrust Law Doesn’t Prevent Apple From Rejecting Apps From Its App Store–Coronavirus Reporter v. Apple

Technology & Marketing Law Blog

This case involves two apps that Apple rejected from its app store. The Coronavirus Reporter app “sought to collect ‘bioinformatics data’ from users about COVID-19 symptoms that it would then share with ‘other users and [unidentified] epidemiology researchers.'” Sounds sketchy as hell. Apple rejected it based on its policy that any COVID-19 apps had to come from the government or medical institutions.

Reporting 114
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Pirate Party Fills Three Ministerial Positions in New Czech Government

TorrentFreak

When the Swedish Pirate Party was founded in early 2006, the majority of the mainstream press was skeptical, with some simply laughing it away. But they were wrong to dismiss this political movement right off the bat. Following their victory at the local elections, the Swedish Pirate Party secured a seat at the European Parliament in 2009, with another one being added a year later.

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The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 113: The Year in Canadian Digital Law and Policy

Michael Geist

The past year has been an incredibly active one for Canadian digital law and policy with legislative battles over Bill C-10, controversial consultations on online harms and copyright, important Supreme Court decisions, new digital taxes, and an emerging trade battle with the United States. For this final Law Bytes podcast of 2021 , I go solo without a guest to talk about the most significant trends and developments in Canadian digital policy from the past year and to think a bit about what may l

Law 108
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Anchovy News, November / December 2021

JD Supra Law

This is the November/December 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.EU domain names set to drop A brand new.DAY Is coming SWITCH introduces deferred delegation for.CH and.LI.

Editing 102
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$550M Springsteen Catalogue Sale is Biggest Ever; Capital Gains Taxes and Low Interest Rates May Have Played a Role

IP Close Up

With the backing of leading private equity funds and record labels, celebrity singer-song writers such as Bob Dylan, Prince and Neil Young, are cashing in on strong long-term demand Continue reading.

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Judge Recommends $83 Million ‘Piracy’ Damages Award Against YouTube Rippers

TorrentFreak

The major record labels believe that YouTube rippers are the most significant piracy threat on the Internet. These sites, which can be used for a variety of purposes, are used by some to convert free YouTube videos into MP3s. The RIAA and several of its members have taken legal action to curb this threat. They previously sued YouTube-MP3, the world’s largest ripping site at the time, which resulted in the site shutting down in 2017.

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Judge Awards $13M In Moving Co. TM, Cybersquatting Fight

IP Law 360

A Florida federal judge has awarded NorthStar Moving $13 million after finding that an operator of King David Van Lines willfully infringed NorthStar's trademark by deceiving consumers into believing they were hiring NorthStar.

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Federal Circuit Patent Watch - December 2021 #2

JD Supra Law

Precedential Federal Circuit Opinions - TEVA PHARMACEUTICALS USA v. CORCEPT THERAPEUTICS, INC. [OPINION] (2021-1360, 12/07/2021) (MOORE, NEWMAN, and REYNA) - Moore, C.J. The Court affirmed the PTAB’s IPR decision that claims directed to a specific dosage of mifepristone were not invalid as obvious.

Patent 102
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WIPO Launches New Global Awards Program

Intepat

The pandemic has impacted everyone, but one group, particularly small and micro enterprises, has been particularly badly struck. Most small businesses had to close their doors due to a lack of digital infrastructure and finance. Some, on the other hand, reacted to the circumstance by becoming stronger than before, setting new standards, and seizing chances.

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Malaysia Passes Bill to Imprison Illegal Streaming Pirates For Up To 20 Years

TorrentFreak

Laws that forbid the illegal uploading and downloading of copyrighted content are common around the world but the rise of streaming has sometimes exposed gaps in legislation. Piracy-equipped Kodi devices, illegal streaming apps, and similar tools have led legal specialists to attempt to apply laws that didn’t envision the technology. In Malaysia, for example, it took a decision by the High Court last May to determine that the sale and distribution of streaming devices configured for piracy

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The Most-Read Legal Industry Guest Articles Of 2021

IP Law 360

Popular legal industry guest articles this year included commentary on the admissibility of video depositions, an unusual U.S. Supreme Court citation, the perils of lawyer perfectionism, and more.

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MarkIt to Market® - December 2021

JD Supra Law

The December 2021 issue of Sterne Kessler's MarkIt to Market® newsletter discusses new enforcement tools courtesy of the Trademark Modernization Act; Pfizer's acquisition of Arena Pharmaceuticals; the latest developments in Canopy Growth's patent infringement suit against GW Pharmaceuticals; and the open gTLD Sunrise period. This year, Sterne Kessler's Trademark & Brand Protection team continued its support of Stockings from Karen, an organization that provides toiletries and gifts for teena

Marketing 102
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Can QR Codes Be Trademarked?

Intepat

A QR code is a machine-readable matrix barcode (short for “Quick Response”). QR codes were first utilised in the automotive business, but they are now widely used in advertising, payments, product tracing, and counterfeit detection, among other things. A QR code leads people to a website or other targeted online content using a camera-equipped mobile device (and a free code reader programme).

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Kim Dotcom Suffers Setback in His U.S. Extradition Battle

TorrentFreak

Next month, a full decade will have passed since the file-storage empire of Kim Dotcom collapsed after Megaupload became the prime target in a high profile law enforcement operation. Despite all the time that since passed, the New Zealand-based entrepreneur and his former colleagues are still waiting to hear whether they will be extradited to the US where a criminal prosecution is pending.

Privacy 138
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43(a)? It’s not for me to say

Likelihood of Confusion

I’m kind of tired of In re Tam also. But I have been a bit surprised that there has not been a more discussion, or as far as I can. The post 43(a)? It’s not for me to say appeared first on LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION™.

Law 98
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When and Where to File Patent Applications

JD Supra Law

Excerpt: "In general, a patent is only valid in the country (or, in some cases, countries) where the patent office that issued it has responsibility. With so many patent offices around the world, how does one decide in which offices to file a patent application for any given invention and select the correct timing for the patent filings?" Originally published on the Maple Business Council website.