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Category Archives: Intellectual Property

HarperCollins Announces Plans to Digitize Books

Press release: “HarperCollins Publishers today announced they will create a digital warehouse for all of its content and will issue a Request for Proposal (RFP) this month as part of an effort to develop the necessary technical infrastructure to broadly exploit its content digitally. The plan is the first step in satisfying the demands of… Continue Reading

Commentary on IP Battle Over Google Print

Leggo My Ego, GooglePrint and the other culture war, by Tim Wu. Related links on Google Print program See also: The Google Print Controversy: A Bibliography: “This bibliography presents selected electronic works about Google Print that are freely available on the Internet. It has a special focus on the legal issues associated with this project.… Continue Reading

Documenting Copyright for Digital Materials

Descriptive metadata for copyright Status, by Karen Coyl: “The need to express the intellectual property rights of digital materials has focused on access and usage permissions which must be granted by the rights holder. A key set of permissions not acknowledged by these rights expressions is inherent in the legal copyright status of the item.… Continue Reading

E-Gov Site Targeted to Small Business IP Protection

Press release: “The Department of Commerce’s United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has launched a Web site dedicated to small businesses and protecting their intellectual property (IP), both in the U.S. and abroad. Specifically designed to answer common questions of small businesses so they can better identify and address their protection needs, the new… Continue Reading

Obstacles to Use of Orphan Works

Whose Work Is It, Anyway? – “The use of ‘orphan works’ of art and literature, whose creators cannot be identified, puts scholars and artists at odds over changes in copyright law.” Related references: Tobe Liebert’s article, The Problem of Orphan Works, published on LLRX.com, May 15, 2005. Solum, Lawrence B., The Future of Copyright, Texas… Continue Reading

Web Archives Provide Sources for Discovery

Today’s Wall Street Journal featured a front page article ($), Lawyers’ Delight: Old Web Material Doesn’t Disappear – Wayback Machine and Google Archive Billions of Pages, Including Deleted Ones, which is worth review. It focuses on how old web pages available from the Internet Archive and cached pages from Google can be of particular value… Continue Reading

Supreme Court Rules Against P2P File Sharing Services

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios v. Grokster, LTD., Argued March 29, 2005, Decided June 27, 200. Opinion author: Souter “Held: One who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, going beyond mere distribution with knowledge of third-party action, is… Continue Reading

Enforcement of U.S. Intellectual Property Rights Abroad Remains Weak

Intellectual Property: U.S. Efforts have Contributed to Strengthened Laws Overseas, but Significant Enforcement Challenges Remain GAO-05-788T, June 14, 2005. Highlights: “U.S. efforts have contributed to strengthened intellectual property legislation overseas, but enforcement in many countries remains weak, and further U.S. efforts face significant challenges. For example, competing U.S. policy objectives such as national security interests… Continue Reading