Many retailers rely on reviews by other customers to boost goodwill and rely on good service and a high quality product to encourage customers to post positive reviews. Users of the App Store sometimes rely heavily on those posted comments before making a purchase. As I’ve written about in a previous blog post, App Store […]
Did KTLA Infringe on Kurt Knutsson’s Cyberguy Identity?
Kurt Knutsson, better known as Kurt the Cyberguy to long time followers of KTLA Tribune television, filed a lawsuit against KTLA for breach of contract, age discrimination, and misuse of name and likeness. Kurt Knutsson established himself as the technology expert, reporting on the latest innovations and gadgets for KTLA in exchange for exposure and payment. His “Kurt the Cyberguy” reports were syndicated to more than 20 stations…..
The Do’s and Don’ts of Internet Copyright
If an article online is copyrighted can I use part of their work? What are the rules? Bloggers as a rule of thumb research for interesting topics by surfing the web. Information is gathered and quotes borrowed, by what if there is a copyright notice displayed at the bottom of the page? To many newcomer bloggers this copyright notice is the equivalent of a “do not trespass sign” and in many ways it is….
It is important for a patent application to list the proper inventors. An inventor is not just someone that you want to put on a patent application, but must be someone that contributed in some way to at least one claim in the patent application.
Doctrine of Patent Exhaustion Examined in Bowman v. Monsanto Company
Monsanto, a Missouri headquartered company which manufactures a genetically modified soybean seed called the Roundup Ready Seed sued farmer Vernon Bowman for infringing on their seed patent. Monsanto claimed Bowman reproduced their patented seeds for planting and harvesting without their permission. Can a farmer reproduce patented seeds?
Each state has its own unique set of marital property laws in place to govern divorce settlements. A state will either follow separate property or community property laws. In separate property states such as Florida, property acquired during the marriage by one spouse remains that spouse’s property upon divorce, whereas in community property states all […]
By: Mark R. Malek This concludes the series of articles that I have been writing on entity status in the United States Patent Office. The first article introduced the new micro-entity status. The next article gave some background information on what would happen if you claimed the wrong entity status before the USPTO, and the latest […]
The short answer is Yes. An inventor is granted a one year grace period where their disclosure is not considered prior art for their invention. However, posting an App without first obtaining any patent protection is a risky proposition. Previously, the law followed a first to invent system. This means that if an inventor could […]
By: Mark R. Malek In my last article, I outlined the new filing status in the Patent Office that can save inventors even more money in the patent process – that of the micro-entity. As you may recall from that article, when filing a patent application (and throughout the patent prosecution process), you must pay […]
