Anderson

An extra-terrestrial alien visiting Earth in 2007 and returning, now, one decade later, might, at first glance, notice little difference in smartphones between times. For example, most-recent iPhone models superficially appear very similar to their predecessors including the first iPhone model in 2007. The external designs have remained fundamentally much the same including thin form factors, rounded corners and relatively large displays (with multi-touch operation) in comparison to featurephones.                                                     Spot the difference                             iPhone (2007) iPhone 8 (as rumoured July 2017) However, superficial appearances are very misleading: technological capabilities in mobile phones have improved massively with numerous valuable ...

The Campaign for Accountability (CA) has released a report on Google's "influence" on academic papers.  Notably, The Chronicle for Higher Education states that "The Campaign for Accountability" is funded by Google's competitors.  The Wall Street Journal has followed up with an article titled, "Paying Professors: Inside Google's Academic Influence Campaign -- company paid $5,000 to $400,000 for research supporting business practices that face regulatory scrutiny; a 'wish list' of topics."   The CA report notes that "the influence" extends to direct funding of work by researchers, or researchers who were affiliated with institutions that were receiving funding.  The CA report then states that 66% of the papers funded did not disclose Google funding and that 25% of the directly funded papers did not disclose Google funding.  The information underlying the CA report was apparently partially obtained through state Freedom of Inform...

In most intellectual property law courses and many property courses in the U.S., the INS v. AP case is taught.   In that case, the U.S. Supreme Court created the INS misappropriation claim which essentially protects the gathering of “hot” or “fresh” news from free riding competitors.   The decision was a close one and has been criticized over the years.   Occasionally, it rears its head in cases dealing with financial information and in one case seemed to cover paparazzi photos.   My impression has always been that the U.S. Supreme Court was attempting to protect the news gathering business because of the importance of having an informed citizenry in a democracy.   Interestingly, at the confluence of fake news and President Trump’s attack on the media, the Washington Post added a slogan to its website: “Democracy Dies in Darkness.”   Prior to the fake news issue and presidential attack on the media, the newspaper business had not done well—arguably becau...

The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) is considering creating a model law concerning intellectual property licensing/transactions.   The Note by the Secretariat outlines the potential need and benefits from such a model law: [T]he panel noted a gap in the law with respect to contractual matters. While some intellectual property laws contain a few provisions addressing contract terms, there is no general commercial law directed specifically to intellectual property licensing. Instead, contracting parties must rely on a general intellectual law merchant based on ad hoc rules and practices that often require specialized knowledge and experience. This causes increased transaction costs and barriers to international trade, and puts small and medium-size enterprises at a disadvantage. . . . The panel referred to studies that show the benefits that States derive from increased intellectual property commerce. These benefits include: (a) superior access to fi...

The law firm of Baker and McKenzie (and Euromoney Institutional Investor Thought Leadership) has released a 22 page report titled, “Protect and Preserve: The Rising Importance of Trade Secrets.”   The authors surveyed 404 senior executives in industries which included Industrials; Financial Services; Consumer Goods/Retails; Information, Communication and Technology; and Chemical, Healthcare, Biotechnology, and Pharmaceuticals.   Over half of those surveyed reported that trade secrets were more valuable than other types of intellectual property for them.   Additionally, 69% of those surveyed believe that trade secrets will be even more important in the future because of the rapid change of technology.   Apparently, short product/service cycles coupled with the time required to obtain some IP rights (patents?) may make them less important.   The key findings of the report, include: [1] In our survey, 82% of respondents said their trade secrets are an import...

The University of Memphis Cecil C. Humphrey’s School of Law law magazine (Spring 2017) has an excellent and concise  five page overview article concerning the JOBs Act and crowdfunding.   The article describes three types of equity crowdfunding under the Act and discusses the related regulations.   The article notes that, “As of this writing, there were over 20 debt and equity crowdfunding platforms, with 186 companies having launched a campaign through them, and with 79 of those companies hitting their minimum funding target.”   Apparently, $19 million was raised for the 186 companies.   Interestingly, the real estate sector is a strong participant in crowdfunding. One success story described in the article concerns Zenefits, a human resources services company for smaller entities which notably raised $300,000 “on Wefunder.com at a $9 million valuation in March 2013; [r]aised $15 million at a $70 million valuation in January 2014; [r]aised $66 million at a $500...