by Patent law is a complicated area of law governed by a confusing set of statutes and regulations that are interpreted by Patent and Trademark Office examiners and federal courts. Patents themselves are often almost unintelligible and, if intelligible, require many hours of reading and comparing drawings in order to understand. It is no wonder that clients (and non-patent attorneys) have a lot of misconceptions about patents. Here are a few of the most common ones.
Updating California’s Discovery Rules with the Electronic Discovery Act
by Dale Campbell and Emily Hirsekorn
State rules concerning electronic discovery just got clearer. On June 29, 2009, Governor Schwarzenegger signed the Electronic Discovery Act (the “Act”), which became effective immediately. Just last year, the Governor vetoed an almost identical version of the Act in order to focus more attention on the budget crisis. Of course, we see how well that plan worked. The Act is modeled after the 2006 amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The new rules govern the discovery procedure for electronically stored information (“ESI”) in California civil actions.
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Copyrighter in the Rye – J.D. Salinger Stops Publication of Alleged Sequel To Famous Work
by J.D. Salinger, author of the seminal teen angst novel “The Catcher in the Rye,” recently filed a lawsuit in United States District Court in Manhattan for copyright infringement against the author of a purported “sequel” to Salinger’s classic work entitled “60 Years Later: Coming Through the Rye.” Salinger’s lawsuit sought a permanent injunction against publication of the new work in the United States.
Ninth Circuit Ruling on Texting Provides Guidelines For The Marketing Industry
by Scott Hervey
A ruling earlier this month by the Ninth Circuit provided three guidelines all marketing experts and their counsel should take note of. These guidelines address the extent to which the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (“TCPA”) (and most likely other Federal regulations on telemarketing) impacts texting as part of a marketing campaign.
In the case at issue, Simon & Schuster hired a third party to manage the promotional campaign for a new Stephen King book, including securing a list of 100,000 cell phone numbers from the licensing agent for Nextones. Nextones offers consumers free cell phone ring tones in exchange for the consumer providing various information, including a cell phone number, and agreeing to receive promotions from Nextone, its “affiliates and brands.”
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Bad Faith Trade Secret Claims and Attorney Fee Awards
On June 15, 2009, the Court of Appeal for the Second District issued its ruling in FLIR Systems, Inc. v. Parrish and affirmed an award of attorneys fees and costs in the amount of $1.6 million to a defendant in a trade secrets misappropriation case. The FLIR Systems ruling demonstrates that a trial court has wide discretion to award sanctions against a plaintiff who brings a trade secrets misappropriation claim in bad faith.
Plaintiffs manufactured and sold microbolometers, which is a device used in connection with infrared cameras, night vision and thermal imaging. The defendants were former employees of plaintiffs and at least one defendant was responsible for creating a significant portion of plaintiff’s technology.
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