Artists’ Rights and Theft Prevention Act–New Criminal Copyright Infringement Standards
As part of the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act, Congress enacted the “Artists’ Rights and Theft Prevention Act of 2005” or the “ART Act.” The ART Act adds two new major criminal standards: (1) using a camcorder to record a…
My Take on Google v. American Blinds
Google v. American Blinds & Wallpaper Factory, 2005 WL 832398 (N.D. Cal. March 30, 2005). I’m a little late blogging the case, but I finally had a chance to read the opinion. On one level, the opinion isn’t all that…
New Case on Indexable Uses of Trademarks on Web Pages
Independent Living Aids, Inc. v. Maxi-Aids, Inc., 2005 WL 756676 (2d Cir. April 4, 2005) (unpublished/uncitable decision). This opinion is the latest in a string of rulings involving a trademark infringement claim between two manufacturers of equipment for physically challenged…
Howes’ Recap on Spyware/Adware
Eric L. Howes gives a one-year retrospective of the state of spyware/adware. I was surprised that he was able to find any good news from his perspective, but he did! Of course, I would probably reverse some of his labels…
Google v. Froogles
Google has sued discount shopping site Froogles for trademark infringement. This is not the first time the parties have met; Google lost a UDRP against Froogles already. Most interesting line from the complaint: “As between the parties, Google is the…
NPR on Whois and Privacy
Larry Abramson of NPR ran a story entitled “New Laws on Domain Names Aim to Stem Online Fraud” (specifically referring to the Fraudulent Online Identity Sanctions Act, passed as part of the Intellectual Property Protection in Courts Administration Act). My…
“Attention Deficit Trait”
CNET ran an interesting interview a couple of weeks ago with Dr. Edward Hallowell about “attention deficit trait,” described as a type of ADD developed in response to information overload, except that it can be cured by reducing the attention…
Flash and Cookies
AP reports that there’s a hole in Flash that allows websites to access personal information stored on a user’s hard drive even if the user has wiped the hard drive of the website’s cookies.
Boalt Spyware Talk
My notes from my presentation at Boalt on spyware. See my earlier post summarizing the conference. UPDATE: Sunbeltblog has some pointed commentary about my remarks.
New AdWords Trademark Lawsuit–JTH Tax v. Google
JTH Tax, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 2:05CV200 (E.D. Va. complaint filed April 4, 2005). JTH runs “Liberty Tax Service.” A company, “freeadvicecenter.com” runs an AdWords ad (the complaint does not specify what keywords triggered it) that has the title “Liberty…