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The Wireless Bluetooth and that patent lawsuit
Patent Law | 2007/01/06 13:02


A Washington State research group claims three of the world's largest electronics makers are infringing on Bluetooth technology patents developed at the University of Washington.

In a lawsuit filed last month in the U.S. District Court in Seattle, the Washington Research Foundation (WRF), which licenses and manages patents developed by Washington State universities, claims Japan's Matsushita, Finland's Nokia and South Korea's Samsung are using unlicensed Bluetooth chipsets in their computers, cell phones and headsets.

The wireless Bluetooth technology was developed by Ericsson in the mid-1990s and made available at no cost to other companies to establish a wireless standard. But WRF claims in the lawsuit that University of Washington student Edwin Suominen developed technology for a "simplified high-frequency broadband tuner and tuning method" at the same time.

WRF holds four patents on the technology developed by Suominen. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages but asks the court to issue an injunction to stop Matsushita, Nokia and Samsung from selling their Bluetooth products.

The three companies buy their Bluetooth chipsets from CSR, a British chipmaker not named in the lawsuit. Nevertheless, CSR issued a statement that the lawsuit "is without merit in relation to CSR's Bluetooth chips and CSR will defend its products vigorously."

Nokia said it only recently received the complaint and is still evaluating WRF's claims. "Nokia intends to respond in the very near future," a company spokesman said.

Steven Lisa, the lawyer representing WRF, was unavailable for comment. Matsushita and Samsung did not return calls seeking comment on the lawsuit.

According to the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG), there are approximately 852 products from 358 different companies that use Bluetooth technology. The group claims more than 9.5 million Bluetooth products are shipping every week.

Bluetooth emerged in 1998 with the formation of the Bluetooth SIG and release of an initial specification the following year. Adoption of the technology was slow at first, but quickly picked up, as more vendors incorporated the low-power, short-range technology into small devices.



Supreme Court to hear capital, labor cases
Law Center | 2007/01/06 13:00

The US Supreme Court Friday granted certiorari in seven cases, including a capital case, an endangered species case, and two labor-related cases among others. In the Texas death row case Panetti v. Quarterman (06-6407), the Court will determine whether it is unconstitutional to execute an mentally ill individual who has a delusion about the actual reason he faces execution despite being factually aware of the reason. Scott Louis Panetti knew he was being executed after killing his wife's parents, but he believed that it was actually because he was "preaching the gospel." The endangered species case stems from two consolidated cases, National Association of Home Builders v. Defenders of Wildlife (06-340) and EPA v. Defenders of Wildlife (05-549), and allows the Court to examine whether the Endangered Species Act permits the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to transfer permitting authority for the discharge of pollutants to the state of Arizona.

In one labor-related case, BCI Coca-Cola Co. of Los Angeles v. EEOC (06-341), the Court will determine whether an employer may be held liable for a subordinate worker's alleged bias where the worker did not make the employment decision at issue. In a second labor-related case, Long Island Care at Home v. Coke (06-593), the Court will decide whether home care workers employed by outside agencies, not directly by families, should receive overtime pay. In other cases, the Court will examine federal law liability for lost or damaged freight, whether private prep schools can talk to prospective student athletes despite their voluntary agreement to obey a no-recruiting rule, and whether courts may consider inferences of innocence when deciding whether someone sued for federal securities violations has a guilty state of mind.



Maupin Taylor law firm to merge
Law Firm News | 2007/01/06 12:59



North Carolina's oldest law firm, Raleigh-based Maupin Taylor, announced Friday that it plans to merge with a Richmond, Va., firm, Williams Mullen.

The combined company would be one of the largest in the Southeast with 300 lawyers, 700 employees and about a dozen offices in North Carolina; Virginia; Washington, D.C.; and London.

The name of the combined firm will be Williams Mullen, although North Carolina offices will operate under the name Williams Mullen Maupin Taylor for a transitional period. The firm's headquarters will be in Richmond.

"This will be good for North Carolina because it adds more depth in service that we can provide here," said Keith Kapp, Maupin Taylor's managing partner.

Although Raleigh will lose the cachet of having the firm's headquarters, Kapp said there will be no layoffs, closed offices or cutbacks as a result of the merger.

Maupin Taylor has about 130 employees and 30 partners, all of whom will become partners in Williams Mullen. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"This is a combination of two firms where nobody is buying or selling anything," Kapp said.

Maupin Taylor will gain Williams Mullen's Washington strategies group, which will be useful for clients with ties to federal government agencies, Kapp said. Williams Mullen gets a significant North Carolina client base.

In environmental law, Williams Mullen complements Maupin Taylor's strength in water quality issues with an expertise in air quality.

Joey Smith, chairman and CEO of Williams Mullen, Virginia's third-largest law firm, will become chairman and CEO of the merged company.

Such unions are common among law, accounting and medical practices, said Bill Wagner, an investment banker in Raleigh who helps execute mergers. "It comes down to being able to provide a fuller range of services as a combined firm rather than have to send business away," Wagner said.

Maupin Taylor has offices in Raleigh, Research Triangle Park and Wilmington. Williams Mullen has offices in Charlottesville, McLean, Newport News, Norfolk, Richmond, Tysons Corner, Virginia Beach and Portsmouth, Va.; Washington, D.C.; and London.

Maupin Taylor's Raleigh office will be the second-largest in the combined firm, with about 100 employees. The merger is expected to close March 1.

Maupin Taylor has had several names since its founding in 1870.

It was known as Maupin Taylor Ellis from the 1960s until 2003. That was when Thomas F. Ellis, a well-known supporter of former U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms and the Republican Party, left the firm.

Ellis earned some fame for helping elect various high-level Republicans. He was credited with salvaging Ronald Reagan's political career by helping him win the 1976 presidential primary in North Carolina.

Today, Maupin Taylor concentrates on corporate law, litigation, and employment and labor law.

http://www.maupintaylor.com



Industry denies huge domain name loss
World Business News | 2007/01/06 12:59

China's domain name managers and Internet service providers refuted on Friday recent media reports about the loss of domestic domain names following the Taiwan earthquake that severed undersea cables last month.

The quake, which measured 7.2 on the Richter scale, off the southern tip of Taiwan on December 26 damaged fiber-optic cables that cross the ocean floor south of Taiwan, affecting telecommunications traffic between the mainland and Taiwan, Hong Kong, the United States, Southeast Asia and Europe.

Media reports said since the quake, the domain names of thousands of individuals and companies have become invalid or been looted because of access problems to domain name servers located abroad. The lack of access means the individuals and companies were unable to keep up with the domain leasing fees.

Chinese Internet users lost about 10,000 dotcom (.com) domain names due to disruption caused by the quake, the Beijing News reported on Friday, quoting sources from the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), the country's authorized domain name registration manager and administrator.

But the CNNIC denied it made the remarks when contacted by China Daily on Friday.

Liu Ningbo from HiChina Web Solutions Ltd (www.net.cn), China's largest domain registration service provider, said the losses are only possible in "theory" but not in "reality".

Internet users are reminded at least a month before their leased domain expires and the domain names are frozen and kept for one or two months after the expiry date, he said.

Liu said the company suspended its registration service for international domains for two days after the quake, but by December 28 it had resumed.




Oprah's Studio Sued over Fall
Breaking Legal News | 2007/01/06 12:58

A woman is suing Oprah Winfrey's studio, claiming she was injured in a rush for seats before a taping in Chicago.

The Chicago Tribune's Web site reports Tayna Milner is seeking more than 50-thousand dollars in damages.

Her lawsuit alleges Milner was pushed down the stairs between a waiting area and audience seating at Harpo Studios, causing her to fall and suffer unspecified injuries. Milner accuses the studio of failing to properly control the crowd.

No comment yet from Milner's lawyer or Harpo Studios.



Woman settles condoms arrest lawsuit
Court Watch | 2007/01/06 09:56

A US college student imprisoned for three weeks for trying to take flour-filled condoms onto an airplane has settled her lawsuit against Philadelphia for $US180,000, a city spokesman said today.

Janet Lee, 21, a student at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania, was arrested at Philadelphia International Airport in 2003 after police and security officials thought the flour was an illegal drug.

She was held in Philadelphia on drug-trafficking charges and released only when tests proved the substance in the three condoms was flour.

The condoms, which are sometimes used to smuggle drugs, were a joke among the students, and Lee was taking them home to Los Angeles.

Her civil rights case against Philadelphia, which had been set to go to trial on Thursday before it was settled, said Ted Qualli, spokesman for Philadelphia Mayor John Street.



Web Hosting and Emerging Internet Law
Practice Focuses | 2007/01/06 07:18

Providers of web site hosting and other Internet-related services offer customers the means to acquire and disseminate a plethora of public, private, commercial, and non-commercial information. While the Internet provides a forum for free and open discussion and dissemination of information, there are competing interests at issue, in terms of a web hosting company's Terms of Service (''TOS'') and the various laws that govern such services.

With Internet-based intellectual property lawsuits on the rise, the question has become: how will Internet law keep up with the freedom of speech issues - and, to what degree will these laws affect the web hosting industry as a whole? The ramifications of some recent Internet litigation, and its impact on the web hosting industry are presented and examined below.


Patent Litigation

Recently, a Canadian firm has claimed infringement upon a patent it owns, with regard to Resource Description Framework (RDF), a software based upon Extensible Markup Language (XML). Using this technology, programmers can write software to access web resources, such as web page content, music files and digital photos. Vancouver-based UFIL Unified Data Technologies, holds U.S. patent 5,684,985, a '''method and apparatus utilizing bond identifiers executed upon accessing of an endo-dynamic information node,'' awarded in November 1997. According to the Patent Enforcement and Royalties Ltd. (PEARL)'s web site, as many as 45 companies may be infringing upon the patents. It is believed that the patent may also infringe on the RDF Site Summary standard (web content that's written in something other than HTML). For example, RSS (originally developed by Netscape Communications, now owned by AOL Time Warner), allows web sites to exchange information and content.

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), which evaluates and recommends standards for web technologies, has endorsed the RDF standard. PEARL has been engaged to work with UFIL, to enforce the claims, since 1999. According to information released by the W3C, Daniel Weitzner, Technology and Society Domain Leader, indicated that the Consortium had not been approached directly regarding the patent issue. Mr. Weitzner stated, ''We consider it to be quite important that fundamental technology specifications such as RDF should be able to be implemented on a royalty-free basis. If anything comes to our attention that suggests that's not possible, we'll pay attention to legitimate property rights out there, but at the same time, RDF was developed in the open by a very broad range of the web community.''


Freedom of Speech Issues

An amicus brief was recently filed by Yahoo!, Inc., in its lawsuit against LaLigue contre le Racisme et l' Antisemitisme, Case No. 01-17424 (9th Cir.). Later this year, a federal appellate court will decide whether or not French anti-discrimination law can restrict freedom of speech on U.S.-based web sites that are accessible in France.

In 2000, a Paris court ruled that the Yahoo! web site violated French law, due to the fact that its users offered certain Nazi artifacts for sale. In order to force compliance with the order, French plaintiffs must seek enforcement from a U.S. court. In response, Yahoo! sought a declaratory ruling and a federal district court held that enforcing the French order would violate the First Amendment. The matter is now on appeal. The Yahoo! case presents the question of whether the Internet should be governed by myriad local censorship laws from around the world. U.S. courts have held uniformly that the Internet should receive the highest degree of First Amendment protection.


Web.com's Patent and Intellectual Property with Web Hosting Company, Hostopia

In July, 2006, Atlanta-based web hosting, managed email, ecommerce, and online business applications giant, Web.com, entered into a non-exclusive license agreement with web hosting firm, Hostopia.com Inc., granting Hostopia the rights to two of Web.com's patents over five years, on a non-transferable basis. Web.com's portfolio of 19 registered, and numerous pending, U.S. patents relates to several core technologies that are vital to the web hosting industry.

The licensed patents broadly cover methods for website building and web hosting control panels. According to the agreement, Hostopia will pay Web.com a royalty equal to 10% of their gross U.S. retail revenues for five years. In addition, the companies have entered a cross-license agreement in which Web.com was granted rights to thousands of HTML and FLASH website templates and a license to additional intellectual property in the future at no additional cost. The companies have also agreed to a mutual covenant not to sue for patent infringement.

Spokespersons for Web.com had this to say, concerning the licensing agreement with Hostopia:

''Web.com has a portfolio of 19 registered patents with several additional pending patents. Web.com's patents touch on a number of key technologies that are vital to the web hosting and Software-as-a-Services industries. Web.com's first patent license transaction was a milestone for the Company as it validated Web.com's belief in the value of its patents. Hostopia paid Web.com an amount that was roughly equal to 10% of Hostopia's U.S. retail revenues over five years. Web.com intends to use its patent rights as a means of extending its brand and its technology so as to create value for its shareholders and to protect its innovations.''

With regard to the legalities of Internet content, Web.com's representative stated: ''Copyright Website owners and other authors (like bloggers, for example) own the content they create under general principles of copyright law. Copyright law grants the author of any "work" the exclusive right to copy and reproduce that work. Copyright law extends not only to the written word, but also to music, dramatic works (like plays and moves), art, sculpture any other forms of creative expression that are fixed in a tangible medium of expression. Conflicts easily arise on the web because web technology makes it so easy for web users to copy and download content, including music, video, pictures and text. While the author of an article may not object to a web user who links to a copy written article, the author will object if someone copies his article and re-publishes it as if it were a new article. Generally, web hosts are not responsible if one of their clients violates a copyright holder's rights by illegally copying content onto the client's website. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act creates a "safe harbor" from liability for web hosts that follow a specific process in responding to notices from copyright holders alleging copyright infringement from content on a client's website. Among other requirements, the web host must suspend a client's website after the host receives a formal notice that meets the statutory requirement. The host may resurrect the client's site, however, if the client responds with a sworn statement denying any infringement so long as the client's denial also satisfies the statute. So long as the host follows the specific requirements of the statute, the host is not liable even if a court ultimately determines that its client was violating another party's copyright.''

As to content - trademark conflicts, Web.com's spokesperson went on to reiterate: ''Involvement trademark disputes are more difficult for hosts to manage, however. Unlike copyright law — which protects the author of an original work — trademark law protects the brand name of a seller of goods or services. A potential copyright infringement is often easy to see if the infringing site blatantly copies words or images that are protected by copyright. Trademark infringement is trickier to spot, however, as a trademark right in most cases will only extend to the ;scope of use" covered by the holder's goods or services. For example if Company A sells "BrandName" widgets, it may have trademark rights to "BrandName". But, Company A's rights, in most cases, will not prevent Company B from using BrandName to sell goods or services that are different from those sold by Company A. The challenge for web hosts arises when a client website advertises BrandName goods or services but a third party claims trademark rights to "BrandName". How can the host know if the third party's rights are superior? How can the host tell if the client's products are within the third party's "scope of use."

To avoid liability for participating in a client's possible trademark infringement, savvy web hosts will develop processes to follow to respond to allegations of trademark infringement and to ensure that clients resolve those claims. Among other things, a savvy web host will make sure that its client agreement obligates the client to resolve those claims and indemnify the web host for any liability it might have for the client's failure to do so.''

Web.com's representative concluded, commenting on the issue of publication liability, stating that ''Another type of potential content problem for web hosts involves liability for defamation. Defamation is a cause of action (or potential lawsuit) that arises when a party publishes a false statement, knowing that it is false, and that publication injures another person. For example, if a client posted on its website the statement: ''Company X's products cause cancer; and if the client knew that statement were false, the client could be liable for defamation to Company X. If the client honestly believed the statement to be true, however, the client would generally not be liable. Defamation liability would make the web hosting industry impossible if it weren't for the Communications Decency Act passed by Congress in the late 1990s. Under the Communications Decency Act (or ''CDA''), web hosts and other Internet service providers are not liable for the publications (or statements) of their clients so long as they are not contributors to those statements.''


IBM v. Amazon.com

Amazon.com is involved in patent litigation with IBM, in two separate lawsuits. Five patents are alleged to have been violated, as far back as the 1980s, all regarding cataloging and data referencing, including alteration of online content. It has been reported in press releases issued by IBM, that ongoing negotiations since 2002 have failed, that hundreds of other companies have licensed the same patents, and that IBM has attempted to negotiate licensing deals with Amazon. Since Amazon.com is largely based upon web technologies and the ability to quickly process transactions over the Internet, it would seem that if it were a mere matter of licensing, they wouldn't have any problem. It may be that they feel IBM's patents are too broad, and cover technologies they developed themselves in-house.


Net Neutrality

One of the most important freedom of speech aspect of the Internet, is that no one party owns or controls it. However, as telephone and digital companies continue to grow through mergers and acquisitions, Internet and related laws, and the concepts and issues that govern it, have come to the forefront, as a new and legitimate concern for all netizens.

Issues such as network (''net'') neutrality, have become contested areas of law in the United States. Internet giants, such as Google, eBay, and Amazon, fear that network owners will create a biased, two-tier Internet system, unfairly placing telco services first, in addition to the concern that network owners may seek to entirely censor or block content at their own discretion, creating partiality. The terms of the debate place neutralists (such as the Internet's largest content providers), against free-marketeers (including Telcos) who argue against such regulation, deeming it to be counter-productive and even unconstitutional.

The fact remains, that exercising the rights associated with free speech and the Internet, places a high premium on the judgment and responsibility of those who use the it, both in the information they acquire and in the information they disseminate. In order for web hosting companies to survive, it is essential that consumers realize and understand, that when they obtain information through the Internet, web hosting companies cannot monitor, verify, warrant, or vouch for the accuracy and quality of the information that is available.

Therefore, some material posted to the Internet may be subject to patent and/or copyright infringement, deemed inappropriate for certain ages, or otherwise offensive. Because web hosting companies are not in a position to monitor or censor the Internet, they cannot accept any responsibility for the consequences that may result from potentially infringing, inaccurate, offensive, inappropriate, or otherwise illegal Internet communications.

While each user is expected to exercise common sense and good judgment in connection with the services it utilizes on the Internet, web hosting companies do have terms of service rules in place, to govern such things as spamming, and maintaining open SMTP relays. It is ultimately up to the users to exercise the best judgment possible, in relying on information obtained from the Internet. When users and/or consumers disseminate information through the Internet, they also must keep in mind that web hosting companies do not review, edit, censor, or take responsibility for any information its users, clients or subscribers may create. The very same liability as other authors for copyright infringement, defamation, and other harmful speech, apply to users on the Internet.

The outcome of recent Internet patent litigation will most certainly begin to set precedents. In many of the cases, the judge and/or jury is asked to make determinations as to deep issues of technological equivalence as to fast-advancing technology at a particular point in time, which can greatly affect how we continue to do business on the Internet, and the future laws that may result of such litigation.

Many patents, have implications far beyond the alleged infringement specified. A patent found valid by a jury acquires more than the normal status of ''presumption of validity,'' in that it may be used against other parties. All future parties, whether or not they are a party to the lawsuit, are affected. Therefore, patent validity lawsuits have the power to impact much more than just the two parties involved, unlike other business litigation.

Given the fact that Internet law, as a whole, is still largely in unchartered territory, the question of what positive role government can play in a regulatory regime, remains to be seen. Coupled with the fear that new technology laws may allow governments or big business to oppress society, giving them the wherewithal to block freedom of speech rights, such as viewing published materials and other forms of censorship, the spectrum of views on Internet regulation can appear to be endless. The only thing we know for certain, is that the Internet is here to stay. As such, the core issues surrounding the essence and vastness of the Internet, such as of freedom of speech, net neutrality, patent and content infringement, will continue to be at the forefront.

How Congress rules on the bills addressing net neutrality, the Communications, Consumer's Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act in the Senate, and the Internet Freedom and Nondiscrimination Act in the House, will affect the way the public continues to utilize the Internet and ultimately, may determine the success or failure of online businesses and web hosting companies.



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Class action or a representative action is a form of lawsuit in which a large group of people collectively bring a claim to court and/or in which a class of defendants is being sued. This form of collective lawsuit originated in the United States and is still predominantly a U.S. phenomenon, at least the U.S. variant of it. In the United States federal courts, class actions are governed by Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule. Since 1938, many states have adopted rules similar to the FRCP. However, some states like California have civil procedure systems which deviate significantly from the federal rules; the California Codes provide for four separate types of class actions. As a result, there are two separate treatises devoted solely to the complex topic of California class actions. Some states, such as Virginia, do not provide for any class actions, while others, such as New York, limit the types of claims that may be brought as class actions. They can construct your law firm a brand new website, lawyer website templates and help you redesign your existing law firm site to secure your place in the internet.
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