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Archive for December 2006

Dec 21st
2006

Gone skiin’

Ellis is 18 months old today, so guess what he’s getting — and where he’s going — for Christmas?  See you next year!

Dec 20th
2006

Link to Webcast declared Copyright Infringement

A federal trial court judge in Texas recently ruled that one website owner’s link to a webcast posted on another website infringes the second website owner’s copyright in the webcast.  You can read the case, Live Nation Motor Sports v. Davis, here.
This case offers lessons both small and large:

One small lesson is that the statutory formalities for obtaining […]

Dec 11th
2006

It may be big and useful, but, I’m sorry, it’s just not very creative

A producer of rubber – er, you know what — can’t rely on copyright law to prevent a competitor from using its designs, says Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong of the U.S. District Court for northern California in her November 17th opinion in ConWest Resources Inc. v. Playtime Novelties Inc.
ConWest, which sells sex toys, holds 12 copyright registrations on the designs for rubber ”sculptures” of […]

Dec 6th
2006

Compare and contrast: law firm v. start-up

I’ve been cataloging my early impressions of Law Firm Life (Take 2) and comparing them to my experiences at a start-up.  Sorta random, but here’s the list so far:

Dec 4th
2006

Caveat investor

A lawsuit accusing Napster investors Hummer Winblad and Bertelsmann of contributory copyright infringement should proceed to trial, says Judge Patel, who presided over the original suit against Napster.  Napster-the-corporation is long bankrupt and defunct, of course, so the record companies, music publishers and composers that sued the company have been seeking compensation from its investors.  They claim the investors […]

Dec 3rd
2006

Tech Law 4.0? (Part 1)

In typical tech industry fashion, Web 2.0 is last eon’s news, and Web 3.0, the arrival of which was declared by some over a year ago, will soon be yesterday’s news.  Search for Web 4.0, and you’ll already find people staking their claims (and others driving stakes through them).  All this, despite the fact that […]

Dec 1st
2006

Stallman on the Microsoft-Novell deal

Richard Stallman says the Microsoft-Novell deal does not violate the GPL v2.