"We are very encouraged by the Supreme Court's decision," Jeffrey Citron, chairman of Holmdel, New Jersey-based Vonage, said in a statement. The ruling "should have positive implications for Vonage and our pending patent litigation with Verizon," he said.

The high court devised a new test for determining when an invention is too obvious to warrant patent protection. The ruling makes it harder for those applying for patents, as well as patent holders seeking to win infringement lawsuits, to show they have developed a genuine innovation.

"There is no merit" to the Vonage request, John Thorne, New York-based Verizon's deputy general counsel, said in a telephone interview. "It's a delaying tactic to avoid final resolution of the appeal."

Yesterday's Supreme Court ruling concerning patent validity overturned a decades-old test used by the Federal Circuit. The case centered on the requirement that an invention be "non- obvious" and not simply combine prior inventions.

Vonage was ordered by U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton in Alexandria, Virginia, to stop adding customers after losing the patent ruling. On April 24, the company won its request in the appeals court to continue business as usual while it appeals.

The appeals court, which specializes in patent law, has set a June 25 hearing to consider Vonage's bid to reverse the jury verdict.

The journal would give credibility to a new business news channel that Murdoch's company, News Corp, plans to put on cable television later this year.

News Corp's bid is worth about 65 percent more than Dow Jones' recent market share. Many U.S. newspapers are losing readers and advertisers to online news sources.

The most recent study shows U.S. newspaper circulation falling more than two percent over the past six months.

Continuing its steady growth, Bingham McCutchen LLP has acquired Alschuler Grossman LLP, a 40-lawyer Los Angeles firm, bringing Bingham's head count to nearly 1,000 lawyers.

The Boston-based firm is merging with Alschuler Grossman LLP, a 40-lawyer outfit known for litigation. It will be Bingham's eighth acquisition since 1997 and its third in California since 2002. Bingham McCutchen now has 350 lawyers in California and nearly 1,000 worldwide.

Alschuler Grossman, which also handles real estate, real estate finance, mergers and acquisitions, and intellectual property work, successfully represented Arthur Andersen LLP in a $1.3 billion class action securities lawsuit filed in Arizona state court. It currently represents Grupo Televisa S.A. in its battles with Univision Communications Inc. and is defending Blockbuster Inc. from a patent infringement lawsuit filed by Netflix Inc.

Bingham's clients include Oracle Corp., Bank of America N.A., Boston Scientific Corp.
http://www.bingham.com

An early version of the March order had authorized the officials to act without even having to consult the Attorney General, but the wording of the instrument was later revised at the urging of the DOJ Office of Legal Counsel, which was concerned about the constitutionality of such broad-brush delegation of power. An unnamed "senior executive branch official" quoted by the National Journal said of the order that it was "an attempt to make the department more responsive to the political side of the White House and to do it in such a way that people would not know it was going on." Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) expressed similar concern over the root strategy apparently reflected in the order, saying in a statement Monday:

This development is highly troubling in what it seems to reveal about White House politicization of key appointees in the Department of Justice. The mass firing of U.S. attorneys appeared to be part of a systematic scheme to inject political influence into the hiring and firing decisions of key justice employees. This secret order would seem to be evidence of an effort to hardwire control over law enforcement by White House political operatives.

Leahy called for the order and its supporting materials to be formally turned over to the Senate and House Judiciary committees looking into the US Attorney firings.

Mr. McDonald faces a maximum of 18 months in prison as part of his plea deal; Mr. Cole faces up to 2 years of probation. Both face penalties from the Internal Revenue Service. They will be sentenced Aug. 15.

Dell's decision to ship Linux is a blow to Microsoft, the world's largest software maker, which makes the lion's share of its profits from Windows. Opensource projects make the computer code behind their software freely available, but can charge for support services. In contrast, groups such as Microsoft charge a license fee to use the computer code itself.

The best-known opensource product, Mozilla's Firefox internet browser, has been steadily chipping away at the lead of Microsoft's Internet Explorer and now accounts for as much as 25 per cent of the market in some territories.

However, Dell's move to Linux also signals a switch in tactics from the embattled computer maker as it strives to regain market share lost to Hewlett Packard, which has also offered Linux-powered computers.

In February, Michael Dell, the group's founder, resumed his position as chief executive of the company, replacing his protege Kevin Rollins. The move came amid criticism that Dell had concentrated too much on its famously efficient supply chain at the expense of customer service and listening to what consumers want.

The decision to return to Linux in response to consumer demand marks a u-turn for Dell, which first offered the opensource system in 1999 but withdrew it two years later, citing insufficient demand.

Dell has not given any pricing details on its Linux products, or how they would compare to Windows PCs.

Consumers who buy Linux machines from Dell will have the option to buy support services from Canonical, a company that has sponsored Ubuntu.