[SK] ]]> IP as a Joke 2010-02-07T17:22:04-08:00 John Bennetthttp://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=593056000000002534 GRETCHEN MORGENSON and LOUISE STORY write in the New York Times today a long story about how Goldman Sachs raped AIG and in the process, got us tax payers, all of the unemployed in America, and all of the savers who received low interest rates because of the need to stimulate the economy %26lt;a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/07/business/07goldman.html?ref=business%26pagewanted=print"%26gt;link here%26lt;/a%26gt;. It didn't cause all of the problem, but it lit the match that started the conflagration, forced the bailout of AIG, and then made out in the wreckage. Building on its connections and the boldness of its gunslingers, it flourished and now it seems to be in a position to hold off even the most minor reforms that have been put forth by the administration. Read it. The story is too long to repeat here to get the flavor of what went on. There are lots of details that will emerge in the future, but this reporting tells us how bad it was and hints at what is to come. I want to end with this Dilbert which is a kind of visual epitaph on where we are today. %26lt;img src=" http://www.dilbert.com/dyn/str_strip/000000000/00000000/0000000/000000/80000/0000/200/80276/80276.strip.gif"%26gt; 593056000000002534board4@http://www.dklevine.com/ link here. It didn't cause all of the problem, but it lit the match that started the conflagration, forced the bailout of AIG, and then made out in the wreckage. Building on its connections and the boldness of its gunslingers, it flourished and now it seems to be in a position to hold off even the most minor reforms that have been put forth by the administration.

Read it. The story is too long to repeat here to get the flavor of what went on. There are lots of details that will emerge in the future, but this reporting tells us how bad it was and hints at what is to come.

I want to end with this Dilbert which is a kind of visual epitaph on where we are today.

]]> Financial Crisis 2010-02-07T16:22:34-08:00 David K. Levinehttp://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=593056000000002527 %26lt;em%26gt;The mainstream blogs occasionally cover intellectual property. %26lt;a href="http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/02/copyright-and-incentives-ctd.html"%26gt;Andrew Sullivan%26lt;/a%26gt;, for example reproduced a few letters from his readers criticizing commentary on Yglesias's blog. I suppose he picked these letters because he thought they were the most sensible? I thought just for fun I would fisk one of them, mostly because it is the kind of nonsense I hear at seminars all the time:%26lt;/em%26gt; %26lt;blockquote%26gt;I just wanted to weigh in on the budding IP debate to say that anyone who takes a firm stand on the specific meaning of IP law doesn't really understand IP law. %26lt;em%26gt;David: No clue what that means%26lt;/em%26gt;. Copyright, patent, and trademark law all serve different purposes, and have different statutory regimes precisely because the issue is multifaceted, complex, and must meet various and sometimes opposing interests. %26lt;em%26gt;David: Wow, it is complicated? Who'd have thunk it?%26lt;/em%26gt; Conflating three separate legal regimes as "IP law" can make arguing about it's purpose inherently impossible. %26lt;em%26gt;David: You mean the way that the U.S. Constitution conflates copyright and patent? I suppose this letter writer is merely dishonest. Few if any people conflate trademark with copyright and patent law, and in the United States the legal purpose of copyright and patent as established by the Constitution are indeed the same%26lt;/em%26gt;. For instance, Yglesias points to the Constitutional requirement that the protection be for a "limited time." Well, over the last 200 years as IP laws have evolved, we've decided that "limited time" means something very different in patent law and copyright law. Patents generally last for 25 years, copyrights last for the life of the author plus 75 years (this is a gross simplification, but good enough for our purposes). %26lt;em%26gt;David: A very gross simplification unless they recently increase the length of patent protection from 20 to 25 years. I know they keep changing the length of copyright protection at a dizzying rate, but it appears to still be life of the author plus 70 years. I guess this stuff is multifaceted and complex.%26lt;/em%26gt; Patents cover inventions that increase our standard of living and move society forward. %26lt;em%26gt;David: You mean like the swinging on a swing patent?%26lt;/em%26gt; The inventors of those things should be protected, but only for a short time; after that society as a whole should be allowed to benefit from the increased utility of the technology's wide dissemination. %26lt;em%26gt;David: Why is it exactly that they "should" be protected?%26lt;/em%26gt; More to the point, copyright law protects expression -- the words or notes an artist uses in creating his work. %26lt;em%26gt;David: I hear this repeatedly at seminars. How does protecting "expression" give the author the unique right to write a sequel? What does "expression" have to do with %26lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wind_Done_Gone"%26gt;Suntrust v. Houghton Mifflin lawsuit%26lt;/a%26gt; over %26lt;em%26gt;The Wind Done Gone%26lt;/em%26gt;? With the lawsuit over the %26lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Harry_Potter_Lexicon"%26gt;Harry Potter lexicon%26lt;/a%26gt;? Copyright protects ideas not merely the expression of ideas. Where on earth did this myth that copyright only protects the expression of ideas start?%26lt;/em%26gt; Though I agree with him on many things, Yglesias is wrong here. Copyright law is very much in the business of protecting the rights of the author. That's why a copyright term lasts so long (copyright terms have been increasing steadily over time, indicating that we are becoming more and more concerned with protecting authors as time goes forward). That's also why copyright protects such a wide range of expressions and has so few formal requirements for securing one. Our copyright scheme is actually quite expansive in its protection of producers' interests. One could say, as Yglesias does, that copyright protects consumers, but only with very roundabout logic: copyright incents producers to produce copyrightable works, and that allows consumers to consume those works, thus protecting their interest in listening to music, etc. It's much more logically satisfying to accept the basic truth and say "copyright law protects an author's interest in his copyrightable works," and then derive whatever ancillary benefits you want from there. %26lt;em%26gt;David: There is a telling difference between what copyright does protect - the interests of the intermediaries involved in distributing copyrightable works - and what copyright is intended to protect - the rights of the public at large. As it happens it does not and is not meant to protect either authors or consumers.%26lt;/em%26gt; %26lt;/blockquote%26gt; 593056000000002527board4@http://www.dklevine.com/ The mainstream blogs occasionally cover intellectual property. Andrew Sullivan, for example reproduced a few letters from his readers criticizing commentary on Yglesias's blog. I suppose he picked these letters because he thought they were the most sensible? I thought just for fun I would fisk one of them, mostly because it is the kind of nonsense I hear at seminars all the time:

I just wanted to weigh in on the budding IP debate to say that anyone who takes a firm stand on the specific meaning of IP law doesn't really understand IP law.

David: No clue what that means.

Copyright, patent, and trademark law all serve different purposes, and have different statutory regimes precisely because the issue is multifaceted, complex, and must meet various and sometimes opposing interests.

David: Wow, it is complicated? Who'd have thunk it?

Conflating three separate legal regimes as "IP law" can make arguing about it's purpose inherently impossible.

David: You mean the way that the U.S. Constitution conflates copyright and patent? I suppose this letter writer is merely dishonest. Few if any people conflate trademark with copyright and patent law, and in the United States the legal purpose of copyright and patent as established by the Constitution are indeed the same.

For instance, Yglesias points to the Constitutional requirement that the protection be for a "limited time." Well, over the last 200 years as IP laws have evolved, we've decided that "limited time" means something very different in patent law and copyright law. Patents generally last for 25 years, copyrights last for the life of the author plus 75 years (this is a gross simplification, but good enough for our purposes).

David: A very gross simplification unless they recently increase the length of patent protection from 20 to 25 years. I know they keep changing the length of copyright protection at a dizzying rate, but it appears to still be life of the author plus 70 years. I guess this stuff is multifaceted and complex.

Patents cover inventions that increase our standard of living and move society forward.

David: You mean like the swinging on a swing patent?

The inventors of those things should be protected, but only for a short time; after that society as a whole should be allowed to benefit from the increased utility of the technology's wide dissemination.

David: Why is it exactly that they "should" be protected?

More to the point, copyright law protects expression -- the words or notes an artist uses in creating his work.

David: I hear this repeatedly at seminars. How does protecting "expression" give the author the unique right to write a sequel? What does "expression" have to do with Suntrust v. Houghton Mifflin lawsuit over The Wind Done Gone? With the lawsuit over the Harry Potter lexicon? Copyright protects ideas not merely the expression of ideas. Where on earth did this myth that copyright only protects the expression of ideas start?

Though I agree with him on many things, Yglesias is wrong here. Copyright law is very much in the business of protecting the rights of the author. That's why a copyright term lasts so long (copyright terms have been increasing steadily over time, indicating that we are becoming more and more concerned with protecting authors as time goes forward). That's also why copyright protects such a wide range of expressions and has so few formal requirements for securing one. Our copyright scheme is actually quite expansive in its protection of producers' interests.

One could say, as Yglesias does, that copyright protects consumers, but only with very roundabout logic: copyright incents producers to produce copyrightable works, and that allows consumers to consume those works, thus protecting their interest in listening to music, etc. It's much more logically satisfying to accept the basic truth and say "copyright law protects an author's interest in his copyrightable works," and then derive whatever ancillary benefits you want from there.

David: There is a telling difference between what copyright does protect - the interests of the intermediaries involved in distributing copyrightable works - and what copyright is intended to protect - the rights of the public at large. As it happens it does not and is not meant to protect either authors or consumers.

The easiest way to parse Lessig's current thinking is the four-minute video. He picks up on his disappointment with Obama who vowed to change the way business is done in Washington--and then seemed to forget his promise. Larry thinks along with many of us that Congress is broken and that the only way to change that is to limit campaign contributions. He proposes that they be funded by individuals and that they be limited to less than $100.

The most complete and eloquent account of Lessig's views is The Nation piece. Here he picks up on the recent Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. FEC, which would make any limit on campaign contributions unconstitutional. "... the clear signal of the Roberts Court is that any reform designed to muck about with whatever wealth wants is constitutionally suspect." He despairs of getting the Congress, (that he calls the Fundraising Congress) to do anything. He proposes instead a Convention to amend the Constitution as the only possible avenue.

Here are two paragraphs from The Nation piece:

"Here a second and completely damning response walks onto the field: if money really doesn't affect results in Washington, then what could possibly explain the fundamental policy failures--relative to every comparable democracy across the world, whether liberal or conservative--of our government over the past decades? The choice (made by Democrats and Republicans alike) to leave unchecked a huge and crucially vulnerable segment of our economy, which threw the economy over a cliff when it tanked (as independent analysts again and again predicted it would). Or the choice to leave unchecked the spread of greenhouse gases. Or to leave unregulated the exploding use of antibiotics in our food supply--producing deadly strains of E. coli. Or the inability of the twenty years of "small government" Republican presidents in the past twenty-nine to reduce the size of government at all. Or... you fill in the blank. From the perspective of what the People want, or even the perspective of what the political parties say they want, the Fundraising Congress is misfiring in every dimension. That is either because Congress is filled with idiots or because Congress has a dependency on something other than principle or public policy sense. In my view, Congress is not filled with idiots."

And:

"But it is this part of the current crisis that the dark soul in me admires most. There is a brilliance to how the current fraud is sustained. Everyone inside this game recognizes that if the public saw too clearly that the driving force in Washington is campaign cash, the public might actually do something to change that. So every issue gets reframed as if it were really a question touching some deep (or not so deep) ideological question. Drug companies fund members, for example, to stop reforms that might actually test whether "me too" drugs are worth the money they cost. But the reforms get stopped by being framed as debates about "death panels" or "denying doctor choice" rather than the simple argument of cost-effectiveness that motivates the original reform. A very effective campaign succeeds in obscuring the source of conflict over major issues of reform with the pretense that it is ideology rather than campaign cash that divides us."

For those of us who want to see intellectual property law changed or eliminated, here is the reality we face: nothing will change until something sharply limits campaign contributions. ]]> Intellectual Property 2010-02-06T07:31:51-08:00 Sheldon Richmanhttp://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=593056000000002522 From the %26lt;a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8499973.stm"%26gt;BBC%26lt;/a%26gt;: %26lt;blockquote%26gt;Earlier this week, a federal court in Sydney ruled that Men at Work had plagiarised Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree in its 1983 hit, Down Under. "It's all about money, make no mistake," said Down Under author Hay. But Norm Lurie, owner of Larrikin Music who filed the case, said it highlighted "the importance of checking before using other people's copyrights." %26lt;/blockquote%26gt; This is beside the point, but I can't hear the similarity in the two patterns of notes. (One cannot actually own a pattern of notes. But one can get the government to stop others from using a pattern one claims to own.) You can listen to both at the BBC site. 593056000000002522board4@http://www.dklevine.com/ BBC:

Earlier this week, a federal court in Sydney ruled that Men at Work had plagiarised Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree in its 1983 hit, Down Under.

"It's all about money, make no mistake," said Down Under author Hay.

But Norm Lurie, owner of Larrikin Music who filed the case, said it highlighted "the importance of checking before using other people's copyrights."

This is beside the point, but I can't hear the similarity in the two patterns of notes. (One cannot actually own a pattern of notes. But one can get the government to stop others from using a pattern one claims to own.) You can listen to both at the BBC site. ]]> Copyright 2010-02-05T07:27:13-08:00 Justin Levinehttp://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=593056000000002507 Andrew Sullivan takes note of the copyright debate between Matthew Yglesias and Sonny Bunch (is that his real name?) here: %26lt;a href="http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/02/copyright-and-incentives.html#more"%26gt;http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/02/copyright-and-incentives.html#more%26lt;/a%26gt; 593056000000002507board4@http://www.dklevine.com/ http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/02/copyright-and-incentives.html#more

]]> Copyright 2010-02-04T07:55:12-08:00 Stephan Kinsellahttp://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=593056000000002502 As noted %26lt;a href="http://www.silobreaker.com/ayn-rand-11_990819"%26gt;here%26lt;/a%26gt;, "Ayn Rand's newsletters used to end with a "Horror File" of monstrous but true quotations." Along those lines, it's time to collect some choice trademark horror stories in one place. The main post will be here, on the Mises Blog, but I'll cross-post the initial post here too. But look there for updates (or to add suggestions in the comments). (%26lt;strong%26gt;Update%26lt;/strong%26gt;: I have modified this post to also include outrageous examples from patent, copyright, and trade secret law. See below.) %26lt;h3%26gt;Trademark%26lt;/h3%26gt; As noted in %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/009424.asp"%26gt;Trademark versus Copyright and Patent, or: Is All IP Evil?%26lt;/a%26gt;, it's not only patent and copyright that are unlibertarian and unjust. Modern trademark law is as well. I deal with tradmark rights on pp. 58-59 of %26lt;a href="http://www.stephankinsella.com/publications/#againstip"%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;Against Intellectual Property%26lt;/em%26gt;%26lt;/a%26gt;, and also in some detail in %26lt;a href="http://mises.org/journals/jls/18_2/18_2_3.pdf"%26gt;Reply to Van Dun: Non-Aggression and Title Transfer%26lt;/a%26gt; (esp. pp. 59-63). In my view, extensions of trademark law--rights against "trademark dilution" and cybersquatting, etc.--are obviously invalid. Further, federal trademark law is problematic since it is not authorized in the Constitution. But even if federal trademark law were abolished, as well as modern extensions such as rights against trademark dilution, even common law trademark is problematic, for three primary reasons. First, it is enforced by the state, which gets everything wrong. Second (see First), the test of "consumer confusion" is usually applied ridiculously, treating consumers like indiscriminating idiots. Third, and worst of all, the right at issue is the right of the %26lt;em%26gt;defrauded consumer%26lt;/em%26gt;, not the competitor. Trademark law ought to be reformed by abolishing the right of trademark "owners" to sue "infringers" (except perhaps as proxy for customers, when consent can be presumed or proved--as I discuss in this interview: %26lt;a title="Permanent link to Kinsella Free Talk Live Interview on Reducing IP Costs" rel="bookmark" href="http://www.stephankinsella.com/2010/01/21/kinsella-free-talk-live-interview-on-reducing-ip-costs/"%26gt;Free Talk Live Interview on Reducing IP Costs%26lt;/a%26gt; (Jan. 20, 2010)), and treating this as a case of the customer's right to sue a vendor who defrauds him as to the nature of the good purchased. Some might argue that this is only a minor change, but it is not: such a change would make it clear that "knockoffs" are usually not a violation of anyone's rights: the buyer of a $10 "Rolex" is almost never defrauded--he knows what he's getting. Yet by giving an enforceable trademark right to the user of a mark, he can sue knockoff companies even though their customers are not defrauded and in fact are perfectly happy to buy the knockoff products. The other fallacy is the view at work here that there is no such thing as reputation, or even identity, absent trademark law. But this is incorrect. Of course people and firms can have reputations even if trademark law is nonexistent. All that is required is that people be able to %26lt;em%26gt;identify%26lt;/em%26gt; other people and firms, and %26lt;em%26gt;communicate%26lt;/em%26gt;. Pro-trademark arguments often implicitly assume that this is not possible, absent state-enforced trademark law, which is ridiculous. In any event, on to a collection of trademark outrages for the horror files (some of these are also listed in %26lt;a href="http://mises.org/story/4018#note46"%26gt;Reducing the Cost of IP Law%26lt;/a%26gt;): %26lt;ul%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://techdirt.com/articles/20100124/1914237887.shtml"%26gt;Court Says U Of Southern California Only One Who Can Use USC; Sorry U Of South Carolina%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/more_sport/us_sport/article7012708.ece"%26gt;Who Dat? America's National Football League causes outrage over catchphrase ban%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a title="Permalink to "What's Next--Trademarking Language? Don't be *Ridiculous*!"" href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/009859.asp"%26gt;What's Next--Trademarking Language? Don't be *Ridiculous*!%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/011542.asp"%26gt;South Butt David versus North Face Goliath%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Lou Carlozo, %26lt;a href="http://www.walletpop.com/blog/2010/01/17/teens-charity-name-draws-the-mcire-of-mcdonalds/?icid=ma"%26gt;Teen's charity name draws the McIre of McDonald's%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Wallet Pop%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 17, 2010) (McDonadl's claims Lauren McClusky's use of "McFest" for the name of a series of charity concerts she puts on infringes its "McFamily" brand)%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budweiser_trademark_dispute"%26gt;Budweiser trademark dispute%26lt;/a%26gt; (see also Chip Wood, A Bully-Boy Beer Brewer, %26lt;em%26gt;Straight Talk%26lt;/em%26gt; (Oct. 16, 2007))%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=233"%26gt;9th Circuit Appeals Court Says Its Ok To Criticize Trademarks After All%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Against Monopoly%26lt;/em%26gt; (Sept. 26, 2007)%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Kinsella, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/006957.asp"%26gt;Trademarks and Free Speech%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Aug. 8, 2007)%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/006398.asp"%26gt;Beemer must be next… (BMW, Trademarks, and the letter "M")%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Mar. 20, 2007)%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/006131.asp"%26gt;Hypocritical Apple (Trademark)%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 11, 2007)%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://ip-updates.blogspot.com/2008/02/ecj-parmesian-infringes-pdo-for.html"%26gt;ECJ: "Parmesian" Infringes PDO for "Parmigiano Reggiano,"%26lt;/a%26gt; %26lt;em%26gt;I/P Updates%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 27, 2008)%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Mike Masnick, %26lt;a href="http://techdirt.com/articles/20080331/134624706.shtml"%26gt;Engadget Mobile Threatened For Using T-Mobile's Trademarked Magenta%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Techdirt%26lt;/em%26gt; (Mar. 31, 2008)%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;/ul%26gt; %26lt;h3%26gt;Patent%26lt;/h3%26gt; %26lt;p id="examples"%26gt;Taken (in part) from my article %26lt;a href="http://mises.org/story/3702"%26gt;Radical Patent Reform Is %26lt;em%26gt;Not%26lt;/em%26gt; on the Way%26lt;/a%26gt;, Appendix: Examples of Outrageous Patents and Judgments: %26gt; Examples of (at least apparently) ridiculous patents and patent applications abound (more at %26lt;a href="http://patentlawpractice.wikispaces.com/#obscure"%26gt;PatentLawPractice%26lt;/a%26gt;): %26lt;ul%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/industry/03/08/amazon.bn.dispute.idg/"%26gt;Amazon's "one-click" patent%26lt;/a%26gt;, asserted against rival Barnes %26 Noble;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Cendant's assertion that Amazon violated %26lt;a href="http://directmag.com/news/Cendant-Sues/"%26gt;Cendant's patent monopoly%26lt;/a%26gt; on recommending books to customers (%26lt;a href="http://www.patenthawk.com/blog/2006/10/amazon_bows.html"%26gt;since settled%26lt;/a%26gt;);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;The attempt of Dustin Stamper, %26lt;a href="http://www.taxanalysts.com/www/features.nsf/Articles/26FF0F3BD676A87285257355004B7FFE?OpenDocument"%26gt;Bush's Top Economist,%26lt;/a%26gt; to secure a patent regarding an application for a %26lt;a href="http://www.freepatentsonline.com/y2007/0198390.html"%26gt;System And Method For Multi-State Tax Analysis%26lt;/a%26gt;, which claims "a method, comprising: creating one or more alternate entity structures based on a base entity structure, the base entity structure comprising one or more entities; determining a tax liability for each alternate entity structure and the base entity structure; and generating a result based on comparing each of the determined tax liabilities";%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Apple's %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/006885.asp"%26gt;patent application for%26lt;/a%26gt; digital Karaoke;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;the %26lt;a href="http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/08/07/more-lawsuit-fun-for-facebook/"%26gt;suit against Facebook%26lt;/a%26gt; by the holder of a patent for a "system for creating a community for users with common interests to interact in";%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;the "absurdly broad patent [%26lt;a href="http://www.academiccommons.org/commons/announcement/us-patent-office-strikes-again-awards-broad-patent-to-blackboard"%26gt;issued to Blackboard%26lt;/a%26gt;] for common uses of technology if that technology is employed in the context of education" (see also %26lt;a href="http://techdirt.com/articles/20080331/001531701.shtml"%26gt;Patent Office Rejects Blackboard E-Learning Patent One Month After It Wins Lawsuit%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Techdirt%26lt;/em%26gt; (Mar. 31, 2008);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Compton's (now Encyclopedia Britannica's) %26lt;a href="http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1%26Sect2=HITOFF%26d=PALL%26p=1%26u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm%26r=1%26f=G%26l=50%26s1=5,241,671.PN.%26OS=PN/5,241,671%26RS=PN/5,241,671"%26gt;patent%26lt;/a%26gt; that "%26lt;a href="http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.07/patents_pr.html"%26gt;broadly cover[s]%26lt;/a%26gt; any multimedia database allowing users to simultaneously search for text, graphics, and sounds basic features found in virtually every multimedia product on the market";%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/005300.php"%26gt;Carfax's patent%26lt;/a%26gt; on a "method for perusing selected vehicles having a clean title history";%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.acaciatechnologies.com/"%26gt;Acacia's%26lt;/a%26gt; %26lt;a href="http://www.google.com/patents?id=J1MyAAAAEBAJ%26dq=patent:4707592%26as_drrb_ap=q%26as_minm_ap=1%26as_miny_ap=2007%26as_maxm_ap=1%26as_maxy_ap=2007%26as_drrb_is=q%26as_minm_is=1%26as_miny_is=2007%26as_maxm_is=1%26as_maxy_is=2007"%26gt;patent%26lt;/a%26gt; for putting a unique transaction number on a receipt;%26lt;a name="ref26" href="http://mises.org/story/3702#note26"%26gt;[26]%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.google.com/patents?id=T2QKAAAAEBAJ%26dq=patent:6368227"%26gt;Pat. No. 6,368,227%26lt;/a%26gt;, covering swinging sideways on a swing;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;/ul%26gt; The Supreme Court, in the 1882 case %26lt;em%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://supreme.justia.com/us/107/192/case.html#200"%26gt;Atlantic Works v. Brady%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/em%26gt;, 107 US 192, itself lists %26lt;a href="http://progfree.org/Links/prep.ai.mit.edu/supreme-court.patents"%26gt;examples of patents%26lt;/a%26gt; issued to "gadgets that obviously have had no place in the constitutional scheme of advancing scientific knowledge … the simplest of devices." These included %26lt;ul%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;a particular doorknob made of clay rather than metal or wood, where differently shaped doorknobs had previously been made of clay;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;making collars of parchment paper where linen paper and linen had previously been used;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;a method for preserving fish by freezing them in a container that operates in the same manner as an ice-cream freezer.%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;rubber caps put on wood pencils to serve as erasers;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;inserting a piece of rubber in a slot in the end of a wood pencil to serve as an eraser;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;a stamp for impressing initials in the side of a plug of tobacco;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;a hose reel of large diameter so that water may flow through the hose while it is wound on the reel;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;putting rollers on a machine to make it movable;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;using flat cord instead of round cord for the loop at the end of suspenders;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;placing rubber hand grips on bicycle handlebars;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;an oval rather than cylindrical toilet paper roll, to facilitate tearing off strips.%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;/ul%26gt; Below are a few notable or recent examples of large, significant, troubling, or apparently outrageous injunctions, damages awards, and the like: %26lt;ul%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.law.com/jsp/tal/digestTAL.jsp?id=1202441767943%26In_Stent_Patent_War_Boston_Scientific_Caves_Again_Agrees_to_Pay_Johnson__Johnson__Billion_to_Settle_Three_Cases"%26gt;In Stent Patent War, Boston Scientific Caves (Again), Agrees to Pay Johnson %26 Johnson $1.725 Billion to Settle Three Cases%26lt;/a%26gt;;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/23/request-for-stay-on-qualcomm-chip-import-ban-refused/"%26gt;Qualcomm%26lt;/a%26gt; has been enjoined from importing chips that help conserve power in cell phones (%26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/006674.asp"%26gt;discussion%26lt;/a%26gt;; %26lt;a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/technology-media-telco-SP/idUSL1486884720070914"%26gt;latest developments%26lt;/a%26gt;). See also Eric Bangeman, %26lt;a href="http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070607-itc-to-bar-import-of-new-handsets-in-patent-dustup.html"%26gt;ITC to Bar Import of New Handsets in Patent Dustup%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;ars technica%26lt;/em%26gt; (June 7, 2007); %26lt;a href="http://www.engadget.com/2007/11/14/nokias-patent-licensing-case-against-qualcomm-dropped-by-dutch/"%26gt;Nokia's Patent-Licensing Case against Qualcomm Dropped by Dutch Court%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;engadget%26lt;/em%26gt; (Nov. 14, 2007); %26lt;a href="http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/31/broadcom-wins-major-injunction-against-qualcomm/"%26gt;Broadcom Wins Major Injunction against Qualcomm%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;engadget%26lt;/em%26gt; (Dec. 31, 2007); %26lt;a href="http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/29/itc-upholds-ruling-reiterates-that-nokia-didnt-violate-qualcom/"%26gt;ITC Upholds Ruling, Reiterates that Nokia Didn't Violate Qualcomm Patents%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;engadget%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 29, 2008).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.law.com/jsp/PubArticle.jsp?id=900005503870"%26gt;Texas-Sized Patent Win%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Texas Lawyer%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 21, 2008). A New Jersey doctor was awarded $432 Million as a "reasonable royalty" against Boston Scientific for infringing his "Method and Apparatus for Managing Macromolecular Distribution."%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://techdirt.com/articles/20080124/16382062.shtml"%26gt;Smartphones Patented … Just About Everyone Sued 1 Minute After Patent Issued%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Techdirt%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 24, 2008).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a title="Permanent Link to Farmer David Reaps What He Has Sown: A Patent Suit" href="http://www.patentbaristas.com/archives/2008/02/13/farmer-david-reaps-what-he-has-sown-a-patent-suit/"%26gt;Farmer David Reaps What He Has Sown: A Patent Suit%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Patent Baristas%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 13, 2008) Even though "the practice of saving seeds after a harvest to plant the next season is as old as farming itself," patents prevent farmers from saving patented seeds.%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/02/20/apple_starbucks_sued_over_custom_music_gift_cards.html"%26gt;Apple, Starbucks Sued over Custom Music Gift Cards%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;AppleInsider%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 20, 2008) A Utah couple sue Apple and Starbucks over their "'Song of the Day' promotion, which offers Starbucks customers a iTunes gift card for a complimentary, pre-selected song download." The suit is based on a patent on a "retail point of sale for online merchandising" which allows customers to buy a gift card from a brick-and-mortar store and then go home and redeem the card online.%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://techdirt.com/articles/20080227/121101372.shtml"%26gt;Apple Sued Over Caller ID on the iPhone%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Techdirt%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 27, 2008). The patent is on "matching up the phone number of an incoming call with a local contact database to display who is calling."%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;The new %26lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11n"%26gt;802.11n Wi-Fi standard%26lt;/a%26gt; (which promises to significantly increase Wi-Fi speed and range) is in jeopardy due to patent threats. See Bill Ray, %26lt;a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/09/21/802_11n_patent_threat/"%26gt;Next Generation Wi-Fi Mired in Patent Fears%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;The Register%26lt;/em%26gt; (Sept. 21, 2007).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/25/1747204%26from=rss"%26gt;SanDisk Sues 25 Companies for Patent Infringement%26lt;/a%26gt;: "Suits have been filed against 25 companies by the SanDisk corporation this week, as the company looks to stop businesses from shipping products it alleges are infringing on its work. SanDisk has filed suits against everyone from MP3 player manufacturers to USB hard drive creators. The list of defendants is staggering, and MacWorld notes if Sandisk succeeds it could have repercussions outside of the courtroom.… The court … complaints could affect the prices and availability of products made by companies targeted in the suit if SanDisk wins and the companies are barred from importing products into the U.S."%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.engadget.com/2007/11/29/patent-office-upholds-tivos-time-warp-patent-echostar-not-so/"%26gt;Patent Office Upholds Tivo's "Time Warp" Patent, EchoStar Not so Happy%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;engadget%26lt;/em%26gt; (Nov. 29, 2007); see also %26lt;em%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2006/08/injunction_gran.html"%26gt;Tivo Inc. v. EchoStar Communications Corp.%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/em%26gt; (S. D. Tex., Dec. 2, 2006); and %26lt;a title="http://feedblitz.com/r.asp?l=26519542%26f=36137%26u=230201 external link" href="http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2008/01/tivo-wins-on-ap.html"%26gt;TiVo Wins on Appeal: Permanent Injunction against EchoStar to be Reinstated, %26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;Patently-O%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 31, 2008).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Jacqui Cheng, %26lt;a href="http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071113-ur-sued-patent-company-targets-t-mobile-microsoft-129-others-due-to-sms.html"%26gt;U R SUED: Patent Holding Company Targets 131 Companies over SMS patents%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;ars technica%26lt;/em%26gt; (Nov. 13, 2007).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;The International Trade Commission (ITC) may ban imports of many popular hard drives that "are alleged to infringe on patents owned by California residents Steven and Mary Reiber related to a 'Dissipative ceramic bonding tool tip.'" Jacqui Cheng, %26lt;a href="http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071011-hard-times-for-hard-drives-us-may-ban-popular-imports.html"%26gt;Hard Times for Hard Drives: US May Ban Popular Imports%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;ars technica%26lt;/em%26gt; (Oct. 11, 2007).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;The %26lt;a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_over_IP"%26gt;VoIP%26lt;/a%26gt; phone service %26lt;a href="http://www.vonage.com/"%26gt;Vonage%26lt;/a%26gt; may be put out of business by patents. Sprint recently won a patent case against Vonage in which $69.5 million was awarded in damages. Sprint had planned "to ask the court to permanently ban Vonage from using its patented technology," but the case was subsequently settled for $80 million. However, in a separate patent lawsuit between Verizon and Vonage, the jury found that Vonage had violated three Verizon patents, and awarded Verizon $58 million in damages plus ongoing royalties. Vonage claims it has developed workarounds for two of the patents. See Kim Hart, %26lt;a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/25/AR2007092501217.html?hpid=moreheadlines"%26gt;Sprint Wins Patent Case Against Vonage%26lt;/a%26gt;: Reston Firm Awarded $69.5 Million in Second Blow to Internet Phone Company, %26lt;em%26gt;Washington Post%26lt;/em%26gt; (Sept. 26, 2007); Peter Svensson, %26lt;a href="http://www.cellular-news.com/story/26545.php"%26gt;Vonage Settles Patent Suit with Sprint,%26lt;/a%26gt; %26lt;em%26gt;BusinessWeek%26lt;/em%26gt; (Oct. 8, 2007). Latest: %26lt;a href="http://www.engadget.com/2007/10/25/vonage-settles-with-verizon-owes-up-to-117-5-million/"%26gt;Vonage Settles with Verizon, Owes Up to $117.5 Million%26lt;/a%26gt;; %26lt;a href="http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/31/vonage-nortel-call-a-truce-no-cash-changing-hands/"%26gt;Vonage, Nortel Call a Truce No Cash Changing Hands%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;engadget%26lt;/em%26gt; (Dec. 31, 2007).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Kinsella, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/006696.asp"%26gt;Revolutionary Television Design Killed by Patents%26lt;/a%26gt; (2007).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;BlackBerry's manufacturer, RIM, was %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/005857.asp"%26gt;forced to cough up%26lt;/a%26gt; $612.5 million after NTP used patent law to threaten to shut RIM down.%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Microsoft was on the receiving end of a $1.5 %26lt;em%26gt;billion%26lt;/em%26gt; jury verdict for infringing an MP3 patent held by Alcatel-Lucent (which was recently %26lt;a href="http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9755745-7.html"%26gt;overturned%26lt;/a%26gt;).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;After Kodak sought more than $1 billion in damages from Sun Microsystems for patent infringement, Kodak finally %26lt;a href="http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1668324,00.asp"%26gt;settled%26lt;/a%26gt; for $92 million. (And according to one colleague, the verdict resulted "in the immediate shutdown of Kodak's entire instant photography division, with the immediate loss of 800 jobs. And, some say, the eventual failure of Polaroid due to lack of any real competition to keep them on their toes!")%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;In another %26lt;a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_2006_July_21/ai_n16546668"%26gt;recent case%26lt;/a%26gt;, Freedom Wireless obtained a $150 million damages award against %26lt;a href="http://www.xius-bcgi.com/"%26gt;Boston Communications Group, Inc.%26lt;/a%26gt;, which at the time had revenues of only about $100 million. In this case, the judge also refused to stay the injunction issues against BCGI (and by extension, its customers) pending appeal.%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.answers.com/topic/smith-international-inc?cat=biz-fin"%26gt;Smith International%26lt;/a%26gt; was %26lt;a href="http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=technology%26res=9A0DE1DE163AF93BA35750C0A960948260%26n=Top%2fNews%2fBusiness%2fCompanies%2fSmith%20International%2c%20Inc%2e"%26gt;forced%26lt;/a%26gt; to pay Hughes Tool Company $204.8 million for infringement upon Hughes's patent for an "O-ring seal" rock bit, which led to Smith filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection (this was in 1986, when $200 million was considered a large patent verdict).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;As of March 2003, the top 5 patent infringement damage awards ranged from $873 million (%26lt;em%26gt;Polaroid v. Kodak%26lt;/em%26gt;, 1991) to $204.8 million (%26lt;em%26gt;Hughes Tool v. Smith International%26lt;/em%26gt;, 1986). The top 5 patent settlements ranged from $1 billion to $300 million. Damage Awards and Settlements, %26lt;em%26gt;IP Today%26lt;/em%26gt; (March 2003)%26lt;a href="http://www.mhmlaw.com/media_coverage/IP%20Today%20Top%20Patent%20Award%20%20%E2%80%94%20%20Edits%20%26%20Highlights%20%20%E2%80%94%20%206-27-03.pdf"%26gt;%26lt;img src="http://mises.org/images/icons/pdf.png" border="0" alt="Download PDF" /%26gt;%26lt;/a%26gt;; see also Gregory Aharonian, %26lt;a href="http://www.patenting-art.com/economic/awards.htm"%26gt;Patent/Copyright Infringement Lawsuits/Licensing Awards%26lt;/a%26gt;. Sadly, a $200 million verdict seems normal nowadays. The recent $156 million %26lt;a href="http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2007/09/156-million-ver.html"%26gt;patent-infringement verdict against AT%26T%26lt;/a%26gt;, for example which could possibly be trebled by the judge now looks like small potatoes.%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Other recent cases include a %26lt;a href="http://www.law.com/jsp/tal/digestTAL.jsp?id=1202431891751"%26gt;$1.67 billion patent infringement verdict%26lt;/a%26gt; in favor of Johnson %26 Johnson against Abbott; a %26lt;a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2009/07/28/stenting-down-device-makers-reach-400-million-patent-settlement/"%26gt;$400 million settlement%26lt;/a%26gt; paid to Abbot, by Medtronic, %26lt;a href="http://www.law.com/jsp/tal/digestTAL.jsp?id=1202432566276%26In_Stent_Wars_Medtronic_Buys_Global_Peace_with_Abbott_for__Million_What_Will_the_IP_Bar_Do_Now"%26gt;regarding%26lt;/a%26gt; stent devices; and a %26lt;a href="http://www.law.com/jsp/tal/digestTAL.jsp?id=1202434196486%26Boston_Scientific_Agrees_to_Pay_JJ__Million_in_Stent_Settlement_IP_Bar_Kisses_Billable_Hours_Goodbye"%26gt;$716 million settlement%26lt;/a%26gt; paid to Johnson %26 Johnson by Boston Scientific (cardiac stents again).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;/ul%26gt; %26lt;h3%26gt;Copyright%26lt;/h3%26gt; Some of these are also listed in %26lt;a href="http://mises.org/story/4018#note45"%26gt;Reducing the Cost of IP Law%26lt;/a%26gt;: %26lt;ul%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/08/01/30/2053230.shtml"%26gt;RIAA Wants $1.5 Million Per CD Copied%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Slashdot%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 30, 2008);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.adrants.com/2008/01/ford-slaps-brand-enthusiasts-returns.php"%26gt;Ford Slaps Brand Enthusiasts, Returns Love With Legal Punch%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;AdRants%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 14, 2008) (Ford Motor Company claims that they hold the rights to any image of a Ford vehicle, even if it's a picture you took of your own car);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Jacqueline L. Salmon, %26lt;a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/31/AR2008013103958_pf.html"%26gt;NFL Pulls Plug On Big-Screen Church Parties For Super Bowl%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Washington Post%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 1, 2008) (NFL prohibits churches from having Super Bowl gatherings on TV sets or screens larger than 55 inches);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/12/npiracy212.xml"%26gt;Internet pirates could be banned from web%26lt;/a%26gt;, Telegraph (Feb. 12, 2008) (British proposal to punish individuals who illegally download music by banning them from the Internet); John Tehranian, Infringement Nation: Copyright Reform and the Law/Norm Gap, %26lt;em%26gt;Utah L. Rev%26lt;/em%26gt;. (forthcoming; SSRN);%26lt;a href="http://www.turnergreen.com/publications/Tehranian_Infringement_Nation.pdf"%26gt;%26lt;img src="http://mises.org/images/icons/pdf.png" border="0" alt="Download PDF" /%26gt;%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Cory Doctorow, %26lt;a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2007/11/17/infringement-nation.html"%26gt;Infringement Nation: we are all mega-crooks%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Boing Boing%26lt;/em%26gt; (Nov. 17, 2007);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://techdirt.com/articles/20080125/18070575.shtml"%26gt;Court Says You Can Copyright A Cease-And-Desist Letter%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Techdirt%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 25, 2008);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Kinsella, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/005198.asp"%26gt;Battling the Copyright Monster%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (June 19, 2006);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;dem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/007606.asp"%26gt;Copyright Kills Amazing Music Project%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 2, 2008);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/007001.asp"%26gt;"Fair Use" and Copyright%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Aug. 17, 2007);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/006283.asp"%26gt;Copyrights and Dancing%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Feb. 20, 2007);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/005818.asp"%26gt;The "tolerated use" of copyrighted works%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Oct. 27, 2006);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/003727.asp"%26gt;Copyright and Birthday Cakes%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (June 16, 2005);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/003660.asp"%26gt;Heroic Google Fighting Copyright Morass%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (June 2, 2005);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/003476.asp"%26gt;Copyright Gone Mad%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Apr. 14, 2005);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;idem%26lt;/em%26gt;, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/002708.asp"%26gt;Copyright and Freedom of Speech%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Nov. 8, 2004).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;/ul%26gt; See also: %26lt;ul%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt; Joost Smiers %26 Marieke van Schijndel, %26lt;a href="http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/10/07/opinion/edsmiers.php"%26gt;Imagine a World Without Copyright%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;International Herald Tribune%26lt;/em%26gt; (Sat. Oct. 8, 2005);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Jessica Litman, %26lt;a href="http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Ejdlitman/papers/revising.htm"%26gt;Revising Copyright Law for the Information Age%26lt;/a%26gt;, 75 %26lt;em%26gt;Oreg. L. Rev.%26lt;/em%26gt; 19 (1996);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Kinsella, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/005685.asp"%26gt;Copyrights in Fashion Designs?%26lt;/a%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;, Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Sep. 27, 2006);%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;Kinsella, %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/005841.asp"%26gt;Britain's Copyright Laws, Based on a 300-Year-Old Statute, Desperately Need Reshaping for the Digital Age%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Mises Blog%26lt;/em%26gt; (Nov. 2, 2006).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;For a humorous parody of copyright abuses by the RIAA, see %26lt;a href="http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/riaa-liner-notes.php?source=010408"%26gt;CD Liner Notes of the Distant Present%26lt;/a%26gt;, %26lt;em%26gt;Something Awful%26lt;/em%26gt; (Jan. 3, 2008).%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;/ul%26gt; %26lt;h3%26gt;Trade Secret%26lt;/h3%26gt; Even trade secret law, the least objectionable of the four main types of IP, has been corrupted by the state. %26lt;ul%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;%26lt;a href="http://www.macrumors.com/2010/01/14/apple-lawyers-strike-back-at-valleywag-over-tablet-bounty/"%26gt;Apple Lawyers Strike Back at Valleywag Over Tablet Bounty%26lt;/a%26gt;;%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;li%26gt;[more to come]%26lt;/li%26gt; %26lt;/ul%26gt; [%26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/011600.asp"%26gt;Mises%26lt;/a%26gt;; %26lt;a href="http://www.stephankinsella.com/2010/02/03/the-trademark-horror-file/"%26gt;SK%26lt;/a%26gt;] 593056000000002502board4@http://www.dklevine.com/ here, "Ayn Rand's newsletters used to end with a "Horror File" of monstrous but true quotations."

Along those lines, it's time to collect some choice trademark horror stories in one place. The main post will be here, on the Mises Blog, but I'll cross-post the initial post here too. But look there for updates (or to add suggestions in the comments). (Update: I have modified this post to also include outrageous examples from patent, copyright, and trade secret law. See below.)

Trademark

But even if federal trademark law were abolished, as well as modern extensions such as rights against trademark dilution, even common law trademark is problematic, for three primary reasons. First, it is enforced by the state, which gets everything wrong. Second (see First), the test of "consumer confusion" is usually applied ridiculously, treating consumers like indiscriminating idiots. Third, and worst of all, the right at issue is the right of the defrauded consumer, not the competitor. Trademark law ought to be reformed by abolishing the right of trademark "owners" to sue "infringers" (except perhaps as proxy for customers, when consent can be presumed or proved--as I discuss in this interview: Free Talk Live Interview on Reducing IP Costs (Jan. 20, 2010)), and treating this as a case of the customer's right to sue a vendor who defrauds him as to the nature of the good purchased. Some might argue that this is only a minor change, but it is not: such a change would make it clear that "knockoffs" are usually not a violation of anyone's rights: the buyer of a $10 "Rolex" is almost never defrauded--he knows what he's getting. Yet by giving an enforceable trademark right to the user of a mark, he can sue knockoff companies even though their customers are not defrauded and in fact are perfectly happy to buy the knockoff products.

The other fallacy is the view at work here that there is no such thing as reputation, or even identity, absent trademark law. But this is incorrect. Of course people and firms can have reputations even if trademark law is nonexistent. All that is required is that people be able to identify other people and firms, and communicate. Pro-trademark arguments often implicitly assume that this is not possible, absent state-enforced trademark law, which is ridiculous.

In any event, on to a collection of trademark outrages for the horror files (some of these are also listed in Reducing the Cost of IP Law):

• Court Says U Of Southern California Only One Who Can Use USC; Sorry U Of South Carolina
• Who Dat? America's National Football League causes outrage over catchphrase ban
• What's Next--Trademarking Language? Don't be *Ridiculous*!
• South Butt David versus North Face Goliath
• Lou Carlozo, Teen's charity name draws the McIre of McDonald's, Wallet Pop (Jan. 17, 2010) (McDonadl's claims Lauren McClusky's use of "McFest" for the name of a series of charity concerts she puts on infringes its "McFamily" brand)
• Budweiser trademark dispute (see also Chip Wood, A Bully-Boy Beer Brewer, Straight Talk (Oct. 16, 2007))
• 9th Circuit Appeals Court Says Its Ok To Criticize Trademarks After All, Against Monopoly (Sept. 26, 2007)
• Kinsella, Trademarks and Free Speech, Mises Blog (Aug. 8, 2007)
• idem, Beemer must be next… (BMW, Trademarks, and the letter "M"), Mises Blog (Mar. 20, 2007)
• idem, Hypocritical Apple (Trademark), Mises Blog (Jan. 11, 2007)
• ECJ: "Parmesian" Infringes PDO for "Parmigiano Reggiano," I/P Updates (Feb. 27, 2008)
• Mike Masnick, Engadget Mobile Threatened For Using T-Mobile's Trademarked Magenta, Techdirt (Mar. 31, 2008)

Patent

Taken (in part) from my article Radical Patent Reform Is Not on the Way, Appendix: Examples of Outrageous Patents and Judgments:

Examples of (at least apparently) ridiculous patents and patent applications abound (more at PatentLawPractice):

• Amazon's "one-click" patent, asserted against rival Barnes and Noble;
• Cendant's assertion that Amazon violated Cendant's patent monopoly on recommending books to customers (since settled);
• The attempt of Dustin Stamper, Bush's Top Economist, to secure a patent regarding an application for a System And Method For Multi-State Tax Analysis, which claims "a method, comprising: creating one or more alternate entity structures based on a base entity structure, the base entity structure comprising one or more entities; determining a tax liability for each alternate entity structure and the base entity structure; and generating a result based on comparing each of the determined tax liabilities";
• Apple's patent application for digital Karaoke;
• the suit against Facebook by the holder of a patent for a "system for creating a community for users with common interests to interact in";
• the "absurdly broad patent [issued to Blackboard] for common uses of technology if that technology is employed in the context of education" (see also Patent Office Rejects Blackboard E-Learning Patent One Month After It Wins Lawsuit, Techdirt (Mar. 31, 2008);
• Compton's (now Encyclopedia Britannica's) patent that "broadly cover[s] any multimedia database allowing users to simultaneously search for text, graphics, and sounds basic features found in virtually every multimedia product on the market";
• Carfax's patent on a "method for perusing selected vehicles having a clean title history";
• Acacia's patent for putting a unique transaction number on a receipt;[26]
• Pat. No. 6,368,227, covering swinging sideways on a swing;

• a particular doorknob made of clay rather than metal or wood, where differently shaped doorknobs had previously been made of clay;
• making collars of parchment paper where linen paper and linen had previously been used;
• a method for preserving fish by freezing them in a container that operates in the same manner as an ice-cream freezer.
• rubber caps put on wood pencils to serve as erasers;
• inserting a piece of rubber in a slot in the end of a wood pencil to serve as an eraser;
• a stamp for impressing initials in the side of a plug of tobacco;
• a hose reel of large diameter so that water may flow through the hose while it is wound on the reel;
• putting rollers on a machine to make it movable;
• using flat cord instead of round cord for the loop at the end of suspenders;
• placing rubber hand grips on bicycle handlebars;
• an oval rather than cylindrical toilet paper roll, to facilitate tearing off strips.

• In Stent Patent War, Boston Scientific Caves (Again), Agrees to Pay Johnson and Johnson $1.725 Billion to Settle Three Cases;
• Qualcomm has been enjoined from importing chips that help conserve power in cell phones (discussion; latest developments). See also Eric Bangeman, ITC to Bar Import of New Handsets in Patent Dustup, ars technica (June 7, 2007); Nokia's Patent-Licensing Case against Qualcomm Dropped by Dutch Court, engadget (Nov. 14, 2007); Broadcom Wins Major Injunction against Qualcomm, engadget (Dec. 31, 2007); ITC Upholds Ruling, Reiterates that Nokia Didn't Violate Qualcomm Patents, engadget (Feb. 29, 2008).
• Texas-Sized Patent Win, Texas Lawyer (Feb. 21, 2008). A New Jersey doctor was awarded $432 Million as a "reasonable royalty" against Boston Scientific for infringing his "Method and Apparatus for Managing Macromolecular Distribution."
• Smartphones Patented … Just About Everyone Sued 1 Minute After Patent Issued, Techdirt (Jan. 24, 2008).
• Farmer David Reaps What He Has Sown: A Patent Suit, Patent Baristas (Feb. 13, 2008) Even though "the practice of saving seeds after a harvest to plant the next season is as old as farming itself," patents prevent farmers from saving patented seeds.
• Apple, Starbucks Sued over Custom Music Gift Cards, AppleInsider (Feb. 20, 2008) A Utah couple sue Apple and Starbucks over their "'Song of the Day' promotion, which offers Starbucks customers a iTunes gift card for a complimentary, pre-selected song download." The suit is based on a patent on a "retail point of sale for online merchandising" which allows customers to buy a gift card from a brick-and-mortar store and then go home and redeem the card online.
• Apple Sued Over Caller ID on the iPhone, Techdirt (Feb. 27, 2008). The patent is on "matching up the phone number of an incoming call with a local contact database to display who is calling."
• The new 802.11n Wi-Fi standard (which promises to significantly increase Wi-Fi speed and range) is in jeopardy due to patent threats. See Bill Ray, Next Generation Wi-Fi Mired in Patent Fears, The Register (Sept. 21, 2007).
• SanDisk Sues 25 Companies for Patent Infringement: "Suits have been filed against 25 companies by the SanDisk corporation this week, as the company looks to stop businesses from shipping products it alleges are infringing on its work. SanDisk has filed suits against everyone from MP3 player manufacturers to USB hard drive creators. The list of defendants is staggering, and MacWorld notes if Sandisk succeeds it could have repercussions outside of the courtroom.… The court … complaints could affect the prices and availability of products made by companies targeted in the suit if SanDisk wins and the companies are barred from importing products into the U.S."
• Patent Office Upholds Tivo's "Time Warp" Patent, EchoStar Not so Happy, engadget (Nov. 29, 2007); see also Tivo Inc. v. EchoStar Communications Corp. (S. D. Tex., Dec. 2, 2006); and TiVo Wins on Appeal: Permanent Injunction against EchoStar to be Reinstated, Patently-O (Jan. 31, 2008).
• Jacqui Cheng, U R SUED: Patent Holding Company Targets 131 Companies over SMS patents, ars technica (Nov. 13, 2007).
• The International Trade Commission (ITC) may ban imports of many popular hard drives that "are alleged to infringe on patents owned by California residents Steven and Mary Reiber related to a 'Dissipative ceramic bonding tool tip.'" Jacqui Cheng, Hard Times for Hard Drives: US May Ban Popular Imports, ars technica (Oct. 11, 2007).
• The VoIP phone service Vonage may be put out of business by patents. Sprint recently won a patent case against Vonage in which $69.5 million was awarded in damages. Sprint had planned "to ask the court to permanently ban Vonage from using its patented technology," but the case was subsequently settled for $80 million. However, in a separate patent lawsuit between Verizon and Vonage, the jury found that Vonage had violated three Verizon patents, and awarded Verizon $58 million in damages plus ongoing royalties. Vonage claims it has developed workarounds for two of the patents. See Kim Hart, Sprint Wins Patent Case Against Vonage: Reston Firm Awarded $69.5 Million in Second Blow to Internet Phone Company, Washington Post (Sept. 26, 2007); Peter Svensson, Vonage Settles Patent Suit with Sprint, BusinessWeek (Oct. 8, 2007). Latest: Vonage Settles with Verizon, Owes Up to $117.5 Million; Vonage, Nortel Call a Truce No Cash Changing Hands, engadget (Dec. 31, 2007).
• Kinsella, Revolutionary Television Design Killed by Patents (2007).
• BlackBerry's manufacturer, RIM, was forced to cough up $612.5 million after NTP used patent law to threaten to shut RIM down.
• Microsoft was on the receiving end of a $1.5 billion jury verdict for infringing an MP3 patent held by Alcatel-Lucent (which was recently overturned).
• After Kodak sought more than $1 billion in damages from Sun Microsystems for patent infringement, Kodak finally settled for $92 million. (And according to one colleague, the verdict resulted "in the immediate shutdown of Kodak's entire instant photography division, with the immediate loss of 800 jobs. And, some say, the eventual failure of Polaroid due to lack of any real competition to keep them on their toes!")
• In another recent case, Freedom Wireless obtained a $150 million damages award against Boston Communications Group, Inc., which at the time had revenues of only about $100 million. In this case, the judge also refused to stay the injunction issues against BCGI (and by extension, its customers) pending appeal.
• Smith International was forced to pay Hughes Tool Company $204.8 million for infringement upon Hughes's patent for an "O-ring seal" rock bit, which led to Smith filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection (this was in 1986, when $200 million was considered a large patent verdict).
• As of March 2003, the top 5 patent infringement damage awards ranged from $873 million (Polaroid v. Kodak, 1991) to $204.8 million (Hughes Tool v. Smith International, 1986). The top 5 patent settlements ranged from $1 billion to $300 million. Damage Awards and Settlements, IP Today (March 2003); see also Gregory Aharonian, Patent/Copyright Infringement Lawsuits/Licensing Awards. Sadly, a $200 million verdict seems normal nowadays. The recent $156 million patent-infringement verdict against AT and T, for example which could possibly be trebled by the judge now looks like small potatoes.
• Other recent cases include a $1.67 billion patent infringement verdict in favor of Johnson and Johnson against Abbott; a $400 million settlement paid to Abbot, by Medtronic, regarding stent devices; and a $716 million settlement paid to Johnson and Johnson by Boston Scientific (cardiac stents again).

Copyright

• RIAA Wants $1.5 Million Per CD Copied, Slashdot (Jan. 30, 2008);
• Ford Slaps Brand Enthusiasts, Returns Love With Legal Punch, AdRants (Jan. 14, 2008) (Ford Motor Company claims that they hold the rights to any image of a Ford vehicle, even if it's a picture you took of your own car);
• Jacqueline L. Salmon, NFL Pulls Plug On Big-Screen Church Parties For Super Bowl, Washington Post (Feb. 1, 2008) (NFL prohibits churches from having Super Bowl gatherings on TV sets or screens larger than 55 inches);
• Internet pirates could be banned from web, Telegraph (Feb. 12, 2008) (British proposal to punish individuals who illegally download music by banning them from the Internet); John Tehranian, Infringement Nation: Copyright Reform and the Law/Norm Gap, Utah L. Rev. (forthcoming; SSRN);
• Cory Doctorow, Infringement Nation: we are all mega-crooks, Boing Boing (Nov. 17, 2007);
• Court Says You Can Copyright A Cease-And-Desist Letter, Techdirt (Jan. 25, 2008);
• Kinsella, Battling the Copyright Monster, Mises Blog (June 19, 2006);
• dem, Copyright Kills Amazing Music Project, Mises Blog (Jan. 2, 2008);
• idem, "Fair Use" and Copyright, Mises Blog (Aug. 17, 2007);
• idem, Copyrights and Dancing, Mises Blog (Feb. 20, 2007);
• idem, The "tolerated use" of copyrighted works, Mises Blog (Oct. 27, 2006);
• idem, Copyright and Birthday Cakes, Mises Blog (June 16, 2005);
• idem, Heroic Google Fighting Copyright Morass, Mises Blog (June 2, 2005);
• idem, Copyright Gone Mad, Mises Blog (Apr. 14, 2005);
• idem, Copyright and Freedom of Speech, Mises Blog (Nov. 8, 2004).

• Joost Smiers and Marieke van Schijndel, Imagine a World Without Copyright, International Herald Tribune (Sat. Oct. 8, 2005);
• Jessica Litman, Revising Copyright Law for the Information Age, 75 Oreg. L. Rev. 19 (1996);
• Kinsella, Copyrights in Fashion Designs?, Mises Blog (Sep. 27, 2006);
• Kinsella, Britain's Copyright Laws, Based on a 300-Year-Old Statute, Desperately Need Reshaping for the Digital Age, Mises Blog (Nov. 2, 2006).
• For a humorous parody of copyright abuses by the RIAA, see CD Liner Notes of the Distant Present, Something Awful (Jan. 3, 2008).

Trade Secret

• Apple Lawyers Strike Back at Valleywag Over Tablet Bounty;
• [more to come]

[Mises; SK] ]]> IP Outrages 2010-02-03T14:56:13-08:00 Stephan Kinsellahttp://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=593056000000002501 %26lt;a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0691137994/"%26gt;%26lt;img src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51Qmu1mx0zL._SL500_AA240_.jpg" alt="" width="240" height="240" align="right"%26gt;%26lt;/a%26gt;The new book %26lt;a href="http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9221.html"%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;Innovation, Intellectual Property, and Economic Growth%26lt;/em%26gt;%26lt;/a%26gt;, by Christine Greenhalgh %26amp; Mark Rogers, looks interesting: %26lt;blockquote%26gt;What drives innovation? How does it contribute to the growth of firms, industries, and economies? And do intellectual property rights help or hurt innovation and growth? Uniquely combining microeconomics, macroeconomics, and theory with empirical analysis drawn from the United States and Europe, this book introduces graduate students and advanced undergraduates to the complex process of innovation. By addressing all the major dimensions of innovation in a single text, Christine Greenhalgh and Mark Rogers are able to show how outcomes at the microlevel feed through to the macro-outcomes that in turn determine personal incomes and job opportunities.%26lt;/blockquote%26gt; From a quick skim of ch. 1 (available %26lt;a href="http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9221.html"%26gt;here%26lt;/a%26gt;), it appears to adopt a mainstream approach--finding out whether there is market failure or a public goods problem (see Hans-Hermann Hoppe's "Fallacies of the Public Goods Theory and the Production of Security," in %26lt;a href="http://www.hanshoppe.com/publications/#econ-ethics"%26gt;%26lt;em%26gt;The Economics and Ethics of Private Property%26lt;/em%26gt;%26lt;/a%26gt; for criticism of the concept of "public goods"), and then asking whether we can fix it with some kind of state invervention. The same old "the market is not perfect, so let's let the thugs with guns have more power" song and dance. But at least they recognize you have to take costs into account (see my %26lt;a href="http://mises.org/story/4018"%26gt;Reducing the Cost of IP Law%26lt;/a%26gt;; %26lt;a href="http://www.mises.org/story/1763"%26gt;There's No Such Thing as a Free Patent%26lt;/a%26gt;; %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/010217.asp"%26gt;Yet Another Study Finds Patents Do Not Encourage Innovation%26lt;/a%26gt;; and %26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/007223.asp"%26gt;What Are the Costs of the Patent System?%26lt;/a%26gt;): %26lt;blockquote%26gt;In addition, understanding whether these %26lt;strong%26gt;monopoly costs%26lt;/strong%26gt; of IPRs [intellectual property rights] are%26lt;strong%26gt; less than the benefit to society%26lt;/strong%26gt; emanating from the spur that IPRs give to innovation will provide a major theme for parts II and IV of this book.%26lt;/blockquote%26gt; My guess: they'll conclude that some IPRs can help address the market failure/public goods issues and give rise to some kind of net benefit, but not our current IP system; so then we'll have a laundry list of "reforms" that would tweak the current laws to reduce the cost enough so that there is a net benefit. Just a hunch. Unfortunately, at $45 even in e-book format, I don't think I'll read it until it comes out at a more reasonable price. [%26lt;a href="http://blog.mises.org/archives/011599.asp"%26gt;Mises%26lt;/a%26gt;; %26lt;a href="http://www.stephankinsella.com/2010/02/03/new-book-innovation-intellectual-property-and-economic-growth/"%26gt;SK%26lt;/a%26gt;] 593056000000002501board4@http://www.dklevine.com/ The new book Innovation, Intellectual Property, and Economic Growth, by Christine Greenhalgh and amp; Mark Rogers, looks interesting:

What drives innovation? How does it contribute to the growth of firms, industries, and economies? And do intellectual property rights help or hurt innovation and growth? Uniquely combining microeconomics, macroeconomics, and theory with empirical analysis drawn from the United States and Europe, this book introduces graduate students and advanced undergraduates to the complex process of innovation. By addressing all the major dimensions of innovation in a single text, Christine Greenhalgh and Mark Rogers are able to show how outcomes at the microlevel feed through to the macro-outcomes that in turn determine personal incomes and job opportunities.

But at least they recognize you have to take costs into account (see my Reducing the Cost of IP Law; There's No Such Thing as a Free Patent; Yet Another Study Finds Patents Do Not Encourage Innovation; and What Are the Costs of the Patent System?):

In addition, understanding whether these monopoly costs of IPRs [intellectual property rights] are less than the benefit to society emanating from the spur that IPRs give to innovation will provide a major theme for parts II and IV of this book.

[Mises; SK] ]]> Innovation 2010-02-03T10:10:44-08:00 John Bennetthttp://www.againstmonopoly.org/index.php?perm=593056000000002499 Price Waterhouse Cooper has compiled a study of the costs of non-performing entities in patents (otherwise known as trolls) %26lt;a href=" http://www.pwc.com/us/en/forensic-services/publications/assets/2009-patent-litigation-study.pdf"%26gt;link here%26lt;/a%26gt; No surprises: the trolls make more from suing than performing entities (manufacturers) do from suing (shorter time to trial, higher success rate, higher damages). More evidence of a sick system. And the trolls have learned how (jury trial) and where (Eastern Virginia and Eastern Texas federal district courts). 593056000000002499board4@http://www.dklevine.com/ link here

No surprises: the trolls make more from suing than performing entities (manufacturers) do from suing (shorter time to trial, higher success rate, higher damages).

More evidence of a sick system. And the trolls have learned how (jury trial) and where (Eastern Virginia and Eastern Texas federal district courts). ]]> Patents (General) 2010-02-03T04:18:25-08:00