Facebook Inc won a legal fight on Wednesday over claims its hugely popular social networking website infringed a patent owned by Leader Technologies, but the little-known company said it would ask the judge to set aside the verdict. The eight-member jury ruled that Leader’s patent was invalid. Leader Technologies of Columbus, Ohio, brought the case in 2008, saying that Facebook infringed a 2006 patent that protects an online collaborative tool that was developed by the company’s founder, Michael McKibben.
For more information visit:
http://in.reuters.com/article/idINIndia-50472020100728
Copyright law exempts professors – July 28, 2010
On July 26, the Librarian of Congress announced exemptions from laws barring access to copyrighted works, outlined in the DMCA. The decision will now allow all professors to bypass the copy protection on clips of DVDs for use in class as well as media students for coursework. Six other classes of works including video games, some computer programs and eBook will no longer be subject to the prohibition against circumventing access controls until the next ruling in 2012, according to the United States Copyright Office website.
For more information visit:
http://thedp.com/article/copyright-law-exempts-professors
Exemption allows ‘jailbreak’ of iPhones – July 26, 2010
The U.S. Copyright Office has declared it legal for users to jailbreak their iPhones. The specific text of the exemption permits users to modify computer programs that enable wireless telephone handsets to execute software applications, where circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of enabling interoperability of such applications, when they have been lawfully obtained, with computer programs on the telephone handset.In its comments on the case, the copyright office held that jailbreaking is consistent with the principles of fair use, because it is accomplished for non-commercial purposes and primarily with the intention of extending the capabilities of a device that the user owns.
For more information visit:
http://www.betanews.com/article/Discovery-sues-Amazon-again-for-patent-infringement-over-Kindle/1279224874
Discovery sues Amazon again for patent infringement over Kindle – July 15, 2010
Discovery Communications intellectual property subsidiary Discovery Patent Holdings filed a suit against Amazon, claiming Amazon’s line of Kindle e-book readers infringe on two patents held by the company. The suit is the second between the two companies over such technologies. Amazon was originally sued by Discovery Communications in March of last year, accusing the company of violation of a comprehensive patent on e-book readers titled “Electronic Book Security and Copyright Protection System” (#7,298,851). This covered the Kindle and Kindle 2 models.
For more information visit:
http://www.betanews.com/article/Discovery-sues-Amazon-again-for-patent-infringement-over-Kindle/1279224874
Patent Holding Company XPRT Hits eBay With $3.2 Billion Infringement and Trade Secrets Suit – July 15, 2010
XPRT owns six patents related to systems and methods for processing online payments for e-commerce transactions, for which it began filing patent applications back in 2001. At which time eBay was processing payments through a cumbersome system called Billpoint. According to XPRT’s complaint, an XPRT inventor named George Likourezos contacted eBay to point out Billpoint’s deficiencies and suggest improvements based on his patent applications. an eBay patent lawyer asked to see the patent applications, which Likourezos sent, along with a description of how to incorporate his concepts into eBay’s systems–at great benefit, he said, to eBay. Several months later, without getting much of a response to his overtures, Likourezos was distressed to learn that eBay was acquiring PayPal. He alleges in the XPRT complaint that eBay made the acquisition to effect precisely the concepts he outlined in the correspondence and patent materials he sent to eBay’s lawyers.
For more information visit:
http://www.law.com/jsp/cc/PubArticleCC.jsp?id=1202463558368&Patent_Holding_Company_XPRT_Hits_eBay_With__Billion_Infringement_and_Trade_Secrets_Suit
A copyright ruling no one can like – July 13, 2010
A year ago, a jury found college student Joel Tenenbaum liable for willful copyright infringement for sharing 30 songs, and later set a damages award of $675,000. On Friday, U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner dramatically reduced the award to $67,500. Gertner wrote in her decision that the original amount was too high and “unconstitutional.” Her decision is believed by some legal experts to be unprecedented with regard to statutory damages in a copyright case. Not only are copyright owners attacking Gertner’s reasoning, but so are some well-known lawyers from the pro-technology side.
For more information visit:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-20010428-261.html?tag=mncol;title
Taiwan flat-panel maker sues Sony for patent infringement – July 8, 2010
Taiwan’s leading supplier of flat-panel TV screens, Chimei Innolux Corp, filed a lawsuit at an Arkansas district court against Sony, accusing the Japanese company of patent infringement. The lawsuit seeks to “halt the sale and demand compensatory damages over a wide range of Sony products that infringe CMI’s patented inventions,” the company said. Among the products are Sony’s Bravia LCD televisions, Cybershot digital cameras and digital photo frames. The company has also filed a similar lawsuit against Sony in China, with the Beijing Intermediate People’s Court.
For more information visit:
http://news.brisbanetimes.com.au/breaking-news-technology/taiwan-flatpanel-maker-sues-sony-for-patent-infringement-20100708-100vk.html
Pirate Bay offline briefly after security breach – July 8, 2010
An Argentinian hacker called Ch Russo penetrated The Pirate Bay, one of the world’s leading BitTorrent search engines, and snatched user names, e-mail and Internet addresses of more than 4 million of the site’s users. Russo acknowledged that he and an associate who helped get into The Pirate Bay considered selling the data to the big music labels or Hollywood studios, but instead went public about the site’s vulnerabilities.
For more information visit:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-20009955-261.html?tag=mncol;title
Smartphone Patent Suits Challenge Big Makers – July 8, 2010
NTP, a patent-holding company best known for prying a settlement of more than $600 million from the maker of the BlackBerry, is now suing the other big names in the smartphone industry: Apple, Google, Microsoft, HTC, LG and Motorola. The suits, filed late Thursday afternoon in federal district court in Richmond, Va., charge that the cellphone e-mail systems of those companies are illegally using NTP’s patented technology.
For more information visit:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/09/technology/09patent.html?src=busln
