over-the-last
Patent infringement lawsuits raking in the big bucks
It’s a good time to be in the patent litigation business, it seems, as “non-practicing entities” are regularly receiving higher damages in patent cases than companies that are actually selling products and services. That’s according to a new report on patent litigation from PriceWaterhouseCoopers, which examined 1,400 patent cases in order to get a feel for the current landscape. Even though patent reform is a big talking point in government right now, it’s clear that the upper hand currently belongs to those who aren’t making products.
Continue reading »Lawsuits: AT&T collects illegal taxes on Internet access
AT&T’s wireless unit has been hit by numerous federal lawsuits over the last month, each arguing that the mobile telephony giant is illegally collecting nonexistent “taxes” on phone data access plans. The cases have been filed in states as varied as Georgia, Indiana, and Alabama, but all make the same charges against AT&T—and all use the same idiosyncratic spelling of “I-Phone.” That’s because the same lawyers are involved in each one.
Continue reading »Nothing to celebrate on Public Domain Day 2010 in the US
What child has not sat starry-eyed around the fire, dreaming of the goodies to come on January 1—Public Domain Day? The thought of new books and movies and music coming out from copyright is enough to send sugarplums dancing through heads, unless you live in the US in 2010. In which case, you have nothing to celebrate, since nothing is entering the public domain this year.
Continue reading »Microsoft responds to call for Bing boycott over China censorship
With the launch of Bing in June 2009 , Microsoft’s search engine is being scrutinized a lot more than it has in its past incarnations. For example, we noted that at launch, Bing was blocking search queries pertaining to sexual content in about 20 percent of the regions it was officially supporting. Also at launch, The New York Times wrote about how Bing was censoring results in Chinese-language queries, even if they are conducted outside of China.
Continue reading »Shocker: Ars, Hollywood agree on need for ACTA openness
MPAA head Dan Glickman sent a letter yesterday to both Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and to US Trade Representative Ron Kirk in which he called for a serious US push to pass the secretive Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. That’s certainly expected—ACTA contains a host of goodies for Hollywood and the recording industry—but what came as a surprise was Glickman’s irritation at various ACTA “protests” which create “apprehension over the Agreement’s substance.” He’s referring to online outlets that have hoisted the anti-ACTA flag over the last year, accusing the treaty of being a pretext for ramming “three strikes” laws through without Congressional oversight or empowering Customs agents to check the contents of your iPod . Based on our reporting, neither of these items appears to be in the draft text, but the secretive nature of the negotiations and the bland, impenetrable public statements about ACTA have fueled plenty of suspicion.
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