Category North America

Year Ahead: In US, 2014 Promises Bad News For Patent Trolls And Trademark Owners

2013 was an awkward year in the United States for so-called “patent trolls.” These companies, whose primary business is monetising their patents through licensing and litigation, faced growing criticism from academics, business executives, and US government officials. 2014 could prove even worse for trolls: America’s Congress, courts and executive branch are now considering various measures that would make patent trolling more difficult. And those are just some of the major changes that are likely to roil the US IP system this year.

Event: The 6th Annual Corporate IP Counsel Forum

March 19-20, 2014 – Affinia Manhattan – New York City – www.worldcongress.com/corporateIP

Optimize your IP portfolio. In this cross-industry event, the most timely and critical issues will be discussed and analyzed by senior counsel from Bank of America, General Mills, Honeywell, IBM, MLB Advanced Media, MasterCard, S.C. Johnson, and more; providing insight and strategies to help you tackle the latest challenges in IP.

IP-Watch Reader Discount: when reserving your seat, use promo code IPW200 to take $200.00 off the current registration fee.

Top IP-Watch Stories Of 2013: India, Marrakesh Treaty, Seed/Gene Patents, WIPO Election

Looking back on 2013, the list of the most-viewed stories on the Intellectual Property Watch website shows that reporting on activities in India, especially related to patents and public health, continued to draw the most attention. Other top stories were the Marrakesh Treaty on copyright exceptions for blind readers, legal cases involving patents on seeds and on plant and human genes, the election for World Intellectual Property Organization director general, free-trade agreements (including the Wikileaks leak of the IP chapter of the Trans-Atlantic Partnership agreement), Russian copyrights, and 3D printing.

Academics, Authors Worldwide Start 2014 Strongly Against Surveillance

More than 250 academics from around the world have signed a declaration strongly calling for a stop to surveillance of citizens' communications online by US and European authorities. And in December, more than 500 top authors joined a coalition called Writers against Mass Surveillance calling for international rules to curb wholesale surveillance.

Once More, US Supreme Court Will Review Software Patents

When it comes to software-related inventions, US patent law is a confused mess. So it was no surprise that, in early December, the United States Supreme Court announced it would weigh in on the matter. The court granted certiorari in Alice Corporation v. CLS Bank in order to decide when software-related inventions are patentable subject matter. But given the complicated technology and the high court’s confusing precedents in this area, many experts fear that the ruling in Alice will bring little clarity to this area of the law.

Another Look At Patents And Standards

The new National Academies report on patents and standards is a landmark effort to shed light on the tensions between patents and standards in information and communications technology. Brian Kahin critiques the report and examines underlying problems that the report sidesteps.