IP & Technology Law Trends
All Articles
Portland Band The Slants Singing a Happy Tune After the Supreme Court Unanimously Holds That the Disparagement Clause Violates the First Amendment
Background
Yesterday, six months after hearing oral argument (and nearly six years after Simon Tam filed his trademark application for "THE SLANTS"), the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's en b...
Continue Reading >
USPTO Switches Gears on Registration of Disparaging Marks, but Not on Scandalous Marks
On June 26, 2017, a week after the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously held that the "disparagement clause" in Section 2(a) of the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1052(a), violates the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment in Matal v. Tam, the U.S. Patent and...
Continue Reading >
We Built This City on...False Advertising?
Fifty years ago, it was the “Summer of Love” in San Francisco, with Jefferson Airplane’s 1967 album “Surrealistic Pillow” providing the soundtrack. My how times have changed!
Earlier this week, the United States District Court for the Northern Dis...
Continue Reading >
Copyright Office Requiring New DMCA Agent Designation by Year’s End
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) provides limited immunity from copyright infringement claims to certain types of websites and other online service providers. To qualify for such safe-harbor immunity, such providers must designate an agent...
Continue Reading >
The Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016—A Solution in Search of a Problem?
The Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016 became the law of the land on May 11, 2016. It was greeted with broad fanfare. Much was written about it, mostly by lawyers, with predictions of how this could change trade-secret litigation. But with nearly a yea...
Continue Reading >
The Supremes Have Spoken: The Defense of Laches Does Not Apply to Patent Infringement Suits...
...but can only collect damages for six years prior to filing suit.
In a stunning upset of years of jurisprudence (Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, prior patent act), the U.S. Supreme Court determined that laches (an equitable remedy) cannot be appl...
Continue Reading >