Do You Love Music? Silicon Valley Doesn’t; New York Times, 5/20/16

Jonathan Taplin, New York Times; Do You Love Music? Silicon Valley Doesn’t:

"Unfortunately, there is a sad history of undervaluing musicians in the United States. Terrestrial radio, a $17 billion industry, pays publishing rights (payments to songwriters) but has never paid artists or record companies for music. In addition, the satellite radio company, SiriusXM, pays below-market royalties, thanks to a giveaway it first wrested from Congress 20 years ago. Conglomerates like iHeartMedia (formerly Clear Channel Communications) and other online services like Pandora, which are required to pay artists for digital streams, have exploited federal copyright law to deny payments for work recorded before 1972 (songwriters are paid; performers are not). This means artists like Aretha Franklin, Ella Fitzgerald, Chuck Berry and John Coltrane never received a dime from AM/FM radio and or from many digital services for some of their greatest music.

The last meaningful legislation in this area was the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in 1998, which was based on the idea that creators should monitor the Internet for illegal copies of their works and give “notice” to websites and services to take pirated material down. Under the act’s “safe harbor” provisions, any service or site that makes a minimal effort to address these notices is immune from liability for piracy or theft."

Google patents 'sticky' layer to protect pedestrians in self-driving car accidents; Guardian, 5/18/16

Nicky Woolf, Guardian; Google patents 'sticky' layer to protect pedestrians in self-driving car accidents:

"Google has patented a new “sticky” technology to protect pedestrians if – or when – they get struck by the company’s self-driving cars.

The patent, which was granted on 17 May, is for a sticky adhesive layer on the front end of a vehicle, which would aim to reduce the damage caused when a pedestrian hit by a car is flung into other vehicles or scenery...

It is not known whether Google has active plans to install the new technology on their self-driving cars in the future. The company did not respond immediately to a request from the Guardian for comment, but a spokesperson told the San Jose Mercury News, who first reported the story, that “we hold patents on a variety of ideas. Some of those ideas later mature into real products and services, some don’t.”"

Colleges Shouldn’t Have to Deal With Copyright Monitoring; Chronicle of Higher Education, 5/17/16

Pamela Samuelson, Chronicle of Higher Education; Colleges Shouldn’t Have to Deal With Copyright Monitoring:

"Colleges have a big stake in the outcome of the lawsuit that three publishers, Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, and Sage Publications, brought against Georgia State University officials for copyright infringement. The lawsuit, now in its eighth year, challenged GSU’s policy that allowed faculty members to upload excerpts (mainly chapters) of in-copyright books for students to read and download from online course repositories.

Four years ago, a trial court held that 70 of the 75 challenged uses were fair uses. Two years ago, an appellate court sent the case back for a reassessment under a revised fair-use standard. The trial court has just recently ruled that of the 48 claims remaining in the case, only four uses, each involving multiple chapters, infringed. The question now is, What should be the remedy for those four infringements?...

Appellate courts generally defer to lower-­court fact-finding, especially when the findings are as extensive as in the GSU case. As an author of book chapters (for which I have never been paid, but which I would like students to read) and as a faculty member who posts some in-copyright materials on course websites, I’m rooting for GSU on the coming appeal. If the overwhelming majority of the university’s uses were fair, it doesn’t make sense to impose substantial and costly compliance measures on it. Colleges, students, faculty members, and academic-book-­chapter authors will win if the publishers lose once again."

USPTO Regional Offices Forge Ahead in 2016; USPTO Director' Forum Blog, 5/17/16

Michelle K. Lee, USPTO Director' Forum Blog; USPTO Regional Offices Forge Ahead in 2016:

"Blog by Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the USPTO Michelle K. Lee

USPTO regional offices support our core mission of fostering American innovation and competitiveness by offering services to entrepreneurs, inventors, and small businesses, while effectively engaging communities and local industries. All four of our regional offices now have directors, making us well-positioned to fully advance this mission. The establishment of four USPTO regional offices fulfills a commitment dating to September 16, 2011, when President Obama signed the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (AIA) into law. All the regional offices have been busy these last few months, including holding events for World IP Day and enabling local innovators to participate virtually in the Patent Quality Community Symposium...

The USPTO regional offices play an important role in supporting the overall mission of our agency, including ensuring easier access by innovators and entrepreneurs to resources and intellectual property protections they need to compete in today’s global economy. To find out more about events in any of our regional offices, visit the events page of the USPTO website, and for employment opportunities, visit USAjobs.gov for openings. I will continue to keep you informed about new updates on our regional offices throughout the year on this blog."

GSU e-Reserves Decision; Library Journal, 5/12/16

Kyle K. Courtney, Library Journal; GSU e-Reserves Decision:

"The infamous Georgia State University (GSU) e-reserves case (Cambridge University Press v. Patton) emerged last month from its long winter slumber to give us yet another 200+ page decision which librarians, lawyers, and publishers have begun to parse and analyze. And, like me, they are probably asking themselves: What does this decision actually mean?"

Printed book sales rise for first time in four years as ebooks decline; Guardian, 5/13/16

Mark Sweney, Guardian; Printed book sales rise for first time in four years as ebooks decline:

"Sales of printed books have grown for the first time in four years, lifted by the adult colouring book craze and 150th anniversary of Alice in Wonderland, as ebooks suffered their first ever decline.

Ebook sales fell by 1.6% to to £554m in 2015, the first drop recorded in the seven years industry body the Publishers Association has been monitoring the digital book market. Meanwhile, sales of printed books grew by 0.4% to £2.76bn."

A World Without Patents; Forbes, 5/12/16

David Pridham, Forbes; A World Without Patents:

"On the surface, Cuozzo Speed Technologies v. Lee is about whether the Patent Office (PTO) can use a different standard in hearing challenges to a patent’s validity after it’s been granted than the standard used by the federal courts. It’s also about whether the taking of a legal property right (a patent) ought to happen via an administrative hearing, without judicial review.

During oral arguments, Chief Justice John Roberts seemed shocked by the PTO’s system for challenging patents, known as Inter Partes Reviews (IPRs), calling it a “bizarre way … to decide a legal question” and a “very extraordinary animal in legal culture to have two different proceedings addressing the same question that lead to different results.” He was referring to the fact that a patent upheld as valid and infringed by the federal courts can then be taken by the infringing defendant to the PTO’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) and declared invalid!...

Even if you stipulate that there are bad patents that shouldn’t have been issued, is it really believable that 90% of all patents granted are invalid — despite being issued only after careful review by PTO examiners in a process that takes over two years and results in the rejection of half of all patent applications?

If we really believe that 90% of Patent Office output is garbage, then we should just shut the agency down and save everyone all the trouble.

There would be consequences, of course. Without patents and the competitive protections they afford, individuals and companies will not invest the money it takes to develop new cures for disease or create new technological wonders. That’s because they know others will simply copy their inventions with impunity and then sell them at a much lower cost, since it didn’t cost them a dime to develop these in the first place. This is a terrific way to drive the innovators out of any industry."

California's Legislature Wants to Copyright All Government Works; Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), 5/13/16

Ernesto Falcon, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF); California's Legislature Wants to Copyright All Government Works:

"AB 2880 will give state and local governments dramatic powers to chill speech, stifle open government, and harm the public domain.

The California Assembly Committee on Judiciary recently approved a bill (AB 2880) to grant local and state governments' copyright authority along with other intellectual property rights. At its core, the bill grants state and local government the authority to create, hold, and exert copyrights, including in materials created by the government. For background, the federal Copyright Act prohibits the federal government from claiming copyright in the materials it creates, but is silent on state governments. As a result, states have taken various approaches to copyright law with some granting themselves vast powers and others (such as California) forgoing virtually all copyright authority at least until now.

EFF strongly opposes the bill. Such a broad grant of copyright authority to state and local governments will chill speech, stifle open government, and harm the public domain. It is our hope that the state legislature will scuttle this approach and refrain from covering all taxpayer funded works under a government copyright."

PA DCNR's open data portal

Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources' open data portal:

"Welcome to PA DCNR's open data portal. This site provides access to all of our published GIS data, which includes over 130 datasets relative to state parks, state forests, geology, recreational opportunities and more! Select a category below by clicking on an icon, or use the search tool above to discover our data, which you can map, style and chart right on the site. You can also connect directly to the data, download it or share it!"

Pennsylvania DCNR Offering Open Data Website; Affords Users Detailed, Easily Accessible Information; PR Newswire, 5/13/16

PR Newswire, Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources; Pennsylvania DCNR Offering Open Data Website; Affords Users Detailed, Easily Accessible Information:

"Speaking Thursday night before an annual, statewide gathering of environmental professionals, Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Secretary Cindy Adams Dunn unveiled her department's innovative move to offer detailed, easily accessible information to all.

"In line with Gov. Tom Wolf's call for transparent, easily accessible government, DCNR is offering an Open Data site that should prove invaluable to this audience of science-based, data-driven environmental professionals," Dunn told more than 100 members of the Pa. Association of Environmental Professionals. "I urge you all to take advantage of this new service."

"Governor Wolf's recent announcement that Pennsylvania is joining the open data movement -- and that DCNR is at the forefront -- will lead to exciting opportunities -- not only for environmental professionals, but for the media, students, academia, taxpayers, businesses. The list is endless.""

Gene Kelly's Widow Claims Copyright In Interviews Done By Gene Kelly, Sues Over Academic Book; TechDirt, 5/12/16

Mike Masnick, TechDirt; Gene Kelly's Widow Claims Copyright In Interviews Done By Gene Kelly, Sues Over Academic Book:

"Another day, another story of copyright being used for censorship, rather than as an incentive to create. Here's the headline: Gene Kelly's widow is suing to stop an academic book exploring various interviews that were done over the decades with the famed actor/dancer. And here's the lawsuit, in which Kelly's widow, Patricia Ward Kelly, who was married to Gene Kelly for the last seven years of his life, claims that she holds the copyright on every interview that Kelly ever did...

Now, the legal issues here are at least somewhat nuanced. The question of who actually holds the copyright in an interview is actually a hotly debated topic in some copyright circles, and the answer is not as clear or as simple as you might think (or as it probably ought to be). Remember, of course, that the law is pretty explicit that copyright is given to whoever fixes the interview into a tangible medium. So, in most cases, it would seem that whoever is recording/transcribing/publishing the interview likely holds the copyright in it."

President Obama signs trade secrets bill; The Hill, 5/11/16

Vicki Needham, The Hill; President Obama signs trade secrets bill:

"President Obama on Wednesday signed legislation into law that will provide a federal remedy for U.S. companies seeking relief from the theft of trade secrets, which costs companies billions every year.

Flanked by a bipartisan group of seven lawmakers, Obama praised congressional efforts to pass an enforcement bill that allows companies to seek damages through criminal and civil actions against those who steal valuable trade secrets.

"As many of you know, one of the biggest advantages that we've got in this global economy is that we innovate, we come up with new services, new goods, new products, new technologies," Obama said.

"Unfortunately, all too often, some of our competitors, instead of competing with us fairly, are trying to steal these trade secrets from American companies," he said."

Google and Oracle's $9.3 Billion Fair Use Fight Starts Today, Here's a Guide; Fortune, 5/9/16

Jeff John Roberts, Fortune; Google and Oracle's $9.3 Billion Fair Use Fight Starts Today, Here's a Guide:

"Why are Google and Oracle in court?

The case is about intellectual property. It began six years ago when Oracle sued Google for using APIs tied to Java (more on this below) without permission. Google won at an initial trial in 2012 when a jury found the company didn’t infringe Oracle’s patents, and a judge concluded the APIs didn’t qualify for copyright protection.

But in a ruling that shocked the tech community, an appeals court found in 2014 that Oracle’s APIs were indeed covered by copyright. The ruling also kicked the case back to the lower court to determine whether Google’s use of the APIs counted as a “fair use.” Now, at this second trial, a jury will look at the fair use question."

Judge: Star Trek fanfic creators must face CBS, Paramount copyright lawsuit; Ars Technica, 5/10/16

Megan Geuss, Ars Technica; Judge: Star Trek fanfic creators must face CBS, Paramount copyright lawsuit:

"On Monday, a Los Angeles-based US District Court judge ruled that Axanar Productions, a crowd-funded Star Trek fanfiction production company, would have to face a copyright infringement lawsuit (PDF) from CBS and Paramount, which own the rights to the Star Trek TV and film franchise...

"Although the Court declines to address whether Plaintiffs’ Claims will prosper at this time,” the judge wrote, "the Court does find Plaintiffs’ claims will live long enough to survive Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss.”

In another blog post, Peters wrote that Axanar Productions is trying to settle with CBS and Paramount "so we can move forward with telling the story of AXANAR in a way that satisfies both the studios and the over ten thousand fans who financially supported our project.”"

Biden calls for open-data research; Politico, 5/10/16

David Pittman, Politico; Biden calls for open-data research:

"BIDEN GETS TOUGH AT HEALTH DATAPALOOZA:

Vice President Joe Biden issued some of his strongest words yet in support of sharing clinical and research data, in remarks to data scientists Monday at Health Datapalooza. He said science was at an inflection point, with the ease of genomic sequencing, massive increases in computing power and digitization of health records. “You told me that this is the way we can make great progress, by sharing more data, breaking down the silos,” Biden told a standing-room only crowd in the ballroom of the Grand Hyatt. “Imagine what we could, you could do to help in the fight against cancer if you had access to millions of cancer pathologies, genomic sequences, family histories and treatment outcomes.”

Calls for a national research database:

The country needs a way to share and make public underlying data from medical research, Biden said, a one point criticizing the New Journal of Medicine editor for saying such policy would breed “data parasites.”

Flying records cross country:

The Biden family had to literally fly Beau’s medical records to Houston’s MD Anderson Cancer Center because EHR systems couldn’t talk to each out. And this was the vice president’s son. “We spent $35 billion to avoid that kind of thing from happening.”"

Hacker Who Stole IDs and Scripts From Celebrities Pleads Guilty; New York Times, 5/9/16

Benjamin Weiser, New York Times; Hacker Who Stole IDs and Scripts From Celebrities Pleads Guilty:

"Mr. Knowles said that it was difficult to go after “a high profile celebrity,” so he would begin by going after friends found in photographs with them. He would then hack the friends’ accounts to find the celebrities’ telephone numbers and other personal information.

“It boils down to the weakest link in the chain,” a former official of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Austin P. Berglas, told The New York Times in December, after the charges were announced.

At one point, the complaint said, Mr. Knowles showed the undercover agent a list of names, with phone numbers or email addresses of about 130 celebrities.

Mr. Knowles, in court, apologized to the judge, Paul A. Engelmayer, and acknowledged that he knew his actions had been wrong and illegal.

He pleaded guilty to both of the counts charged in a federal indictment against him: criminal copyright infringement and identity theft.

He could face a total of 10 years in prison when he is sentenced on Aug. 25. The federal sentencing guidelines, which are only advisory, suggested a sentence of 27 to 33 months, according to the plea agreement in the case."

'Game of Thrones' Plot Leaker Risks Drag-on Battle, Dungeon; US News, 5/9/16

Steven Nelson, US News; 'Game of Thrones' Plot Leaker Risks Drag-on Battle, Dungeon:

"Though some of the spoiler's supporters scoff that HBO is misusing the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to force YouTube to remove videos that don't contain copyrighted imagery, experts say it's clear that divulging TV plots does violate U.S. copyright law.

"If he's giving away detailed plot information, he definitely faces the possibility of being liable for criminal copyright infringement, no question," says Deborah Gerhardt, a professor at the University of North Carolina School of Law.

"The coolest thing about 'Game of Thrones' is you think, 'They're not going to go there,' and then they go there – that's such a critical part of the creativity of this work," she says. "When you have a fictional plot that's an original creation of an author, especially a plot like this one in a fantasy work, you get to the area copyright protects: creative expression."

Gerhardt says HBO's right to first publication of its creative works can be enforced using either criminal or civil penalties.

The U.S. Supreme Court, she also points out, ruled against The Nation magazine's fair use defense after it published a leaked part of ex-President Gerald Ford's memoir dealing with his pardon of predecessor Richard Nixon."

Fair use does not mean free: Copyright recommendations would crush Australian content; Sydney Morning Herald, 5/6/16

Kim Williams, Sydney Morning Herald; Fair use does not mean free: Copyright recommendations would crush Australian content:

"The Productivity Commission's draft report on Australia's copyright arrangements makes recommendations that would be incredibly detrimental to our national creative talent. The report is overall profoundly disappointing and a major cause for concern."

[Webinar] Who Pays the Freight? Open Access: The Future of Funding, 5/25/16

[Webinar] Who Pays the Freight? Open Access: The Future of Funding:

Date: Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Time: 11:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

Duration: 1 hour

"Who Pays the Freight? Open Access: The Future of Funding

Now in full flight, the Open Access movement promises to revolutionize the discipline of peer-reviewed research. Billed as a treasure trove for citizen scientists and major institutions alike, the benefits of Open Access still need to be paid for - but by who?

The attention on funding models has been increasing for years, as has discussion around journal transition and conversion. Best practices presume these models are continually refined through historical experience, policy and competition. But the iterative nature of OA can come with a cost in terms of implementation, integration, and aggregation performance. Questions remain about sustainability and integrity.

So, who pays the freight? In this webcast, our experts will highlight how librarians are tackling this important issue, and how the library can shape the future of funding Open Access.

Speakers

Ann Oakerson, Senior Adviser, The Center for Research Libraries

Rebecca Jozwiak, Analyst, The Bloor Group"

Elsevier defends its value after Open Access disputes; The Bookseller, 4/28/16

Benedicte Page, The Bookseller; Elsevier defends its value after Open Access disputes:

"[D]irector of access and policy Alicia Wise, vice-president of global corporate relations Tom Reller and policy director Gemma Hersh say criticism from a vocal minority is unrepresentative of the publisher’s regular contact with millions of researchers. The trio say that detractors obscure a key fact: that Elsevier is seeking to negotiate the new landscapes of OA and content-sharing in such a way that its economic sustainability, and therefore ability to maintain quality, is not compromised.

Publishers are “rubbish at communicating their value,” says Hersh (left), then proceeds to attempt to do just that. “We have over one million submissions a year and immediately reject a third of those,“ she says. “The management of that process in itself is an enormous feat. You then have the co-ordination of those manuscripts you have accepted, finding the right people to peer review those, making that as efficient a process as possible. That takes time.

“Once you’ve gone through the peer review process, if you look at the article that is actually published in a journal, it looks radically different [to the one submitted due to] that process of transformation, the copy-editing, the database linking, the data visualisation tools, making sure that the metadata for the article is all right, so when people come to [Elsevier database] ScienceDirect or type a search into Google, they can actually find what they are looking for on their platforms.”

She continues: “The plagiarism detection tools that we invest in to make sure research is reliable and trustworthy; with journals like The Lancet, the statisticians it employs to verify what goes into the article so it is treated as high-quality, cutting-edge research. The marketing of the journal brand—there’s a reason why journals are well known. People want to publish in them because they are known as having high-quality content. We do all that marketing. The investments we make off the back of that, so people know how their articles are being used, how they can identify collaborators to work with after publication and how they can use tools like [Elsevier’s institutional research networking platform] SciVal.”"

Sony patents contact lens that records what you see; CNet, 5/2/16

Michelle Starr, CNet; Sony patents contact lens that records what you see:

"A new patent, awarded to the company in April, describes a contact lens that can be controlled by the user's deliberate blinks, recording video on request.

Sensors embedded in the lens are able to detect the difference between voluntary and involuntary blinks. The image capture and storage technology would all be embedded in the lens around the iris, and piezoelectric sensors would convert the movements of the eye into energy to power the lens.

Of course, at this point, this technology isn't small enough to be comfortably embedded in a contact lens, so it's only theoretical."

The X-Men: Apocalypse Trailer Cut With Animated Footage Is Perfect; Gizmodo, 5/5/16

Germain Lussier, Gizmodo; The X-Men: Apocalypse Trailer Cut With Animated Footage Is Perfect:

"YouTube user Philysteak took the audio and shots from the latest trailer (which we broke down here) and edited it with very, very similar footage from the ’90s TV show...

The trailer is so good, in fact, it got tweeted out not only by Singer, but the film’s producer too.

X-Men: Apocalypse opens May 27, but reviews will start rolling in next week."

Happy Together' Copyright Dispute in NY Top Court; Associated Press via New York Times, 5/3/16

Associated Press via New York Times; Happy Together' Copyright Dispute in NY Top Court:

"New York's highest court has agreed to rule on a case pitting the owner of The Turtles' 1967 hit "Happy Together" against Sirius XM Radio.

The issue is whether the copyright owners of recordings made before 1972 have a common law right to make radio stations and others pay for their use."

Redskins, and Other Troubling Trademarks; New York Times, 5/4/16

Room for Debate, New York Times; Redskins, and Other Troubling Trademarks:

"The Supreme Court may soon take up two cases in which the government does not want to register trademarks it considers disparaging — for the Washington Redskins football team and an Asian-American band called The Slants. The major federal law on trademarks lets the government deny registration to trademarks that are “immoral, deceptive, or scandalous” or that “disparage.”

Is it a denial of free speech for the government to prohibit registration for such trademarks?"

The Future Of Open Access: Why Has Academia Not Embraced The Internet Revolution?; Forbes, 4/29/16

Kalev Leetaru, Forbes; The Future Of Open Access: Why Has Academia Not Embraced The Internet Revolution? :

"One of the most remarkable aspects of the story of the web’s evolution is that the collective output of the world’s universities has remained largely absent from the open online world, even as most other forms of information have shifted to some form of open online access. In the case of encyclopedias, entirely new forms of collaborative knowledge documentation like Wikipedia have emerged, while journalism has shifted to free advertising-supported distribution and even music and videos are increasingly legally available through ad-supported streaming services or affordable licensed download services.

Academic papers, the lifeblood of the scholarly world of academia, have resisted this transition. To those outside academia it might be surprising that most universities don’t publish all of their books, papers, presentations and course materials on their websites for the world to access...

Yesterday Science published a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at Sci-Hub, one of the most infamous academic pirating sites, which provides free access to more than 50 million illegally acquired papers. One of the most fascinating findings is that its download traffic comes not exclusively from the developing world for which journal subscriptions are often claimed to be inaccessible, but also extensively from major Western universities which likely have legal subscriptions to the journals already. One of the reasons for this, the article claims, is the cumbersome and difficult-to-use web portals that university libraries provide to their holdings, making it incredibly difficult to locate a paper even if the university has a legal subscription to the journal. Having spent more than a decade and a half in academia at multiple institutions from public to private, I can personally attest to just how difficult it can be to navigate library portal systems to locate a particular paper...

As the drumbeat of open access continues to grow, the fierce debate over the future of how academic research is published and distributed will only rage louder. In parallel, as the trend towards open access expands to data sharing and replication, the pressure to change how academia does business will reach a breaking point where change will become inevitable. In the end, it is a fascinating commentary that the world of academia, from which the modern web sprung, has been among the most resistant to change and one of the last to embrace the internet revolution."

A Fight Over Cheerleading Uniforms Is Heading to the Supreme Court; Fortune, 5/2/16

Chris Morris, Fortune; A Fight Over Cheerleading Uniforms Is Heading to the Supreme Court:

"The high court has agreed to hear a case over whether stripes, zigzags and colors worn on uniforms by cheerleaders can be copyrighted under federal law. While it’s a case that might sound unusual, it’s one that could have far-reaching effects.

At issue is an August 2015 ruling by the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. That decision allowed Varsity Brand to pursue a copyright claim against Star Athletica, based on similar uniform designs. Justices said the stripes, chevrons, zigzags, and color blocks in the outfits were more than aesthetic touches – and, in fact, made the outfit a cheerleading uniform.

The 6th Circuit Court Justices, in a split opinion, said the original ruling, which found that the designs weren’t subject to copyright laws “would render nearly all artwork unprotectable.” Also at issue, they wrote, could be designs on laminate flooring as well as the decorative base on some lamps...

Copyright law, when it comes to clothing, is less protective than you might think. Fabric designs are covered, but aspects like sleeve styles, pockets and necklines are not copyrightable, since they’re considered inseparable from the chief purpose of the outfit – to cover your body."

‘Zappa Plays Zappa’ Pits Zappa vs. Zappa; New York Times, 4/29/16

Ben Sisario, New York Times; ‘Zappa Plays Zappa’ Pits Zappa vs. Zappa:

"This month, the Zappa Family Trust, which owns the rights to Mr. Zappa’s music, informed Dweezil that he did not have permission to tour as Zappa Plays Zappa — the name is a trademark owned by the trust — and that he risked copyright infringement damages of $150,000 each time he played a song without proper permission.

“My last name is Zappa; my father was Frank Zappa,” Dweezil said. “But I am not allowed to use the name on its own. I’m not allowed to use a picture of him. I’m not allowed to use my own connection with him without some sort of deal to be struck.”"

Behold, a legal brief written in Klingon; Washington Post, 4/29/16

Brian Fung, Washington Post; Behold, a legal brief written in Klingon:

"A group of linguists is boldly going where no one has gone before.

In a legal brief peppered with idioms written in the original Klingon, the Language Creation Society — a California nonprofit devoted to supporting "constructed languages" — is trying to convince a court that the alien language from "Star Trek" is a real, "living" form of communication.

The made-up language is at the heart of a big copyright case involving CBS and Paramount, which own the rights to the "Star Trek" franchise, and a group of filmmakers who are trying to produce their own, original "Star Trek" film. If the studios win the fight, it would deal a major blow to the crowdfunded movie and to subsequent fan creations."

FOX WILL NOT PRESENT IN SDCC'S HALL H DUE TO PIRACY CONCERNS; Comic Book Resources, 4/28/16

Brett White, Comic Book Resources; FOX WILL NOT PRESENT IN SDCC'S HALL H DUE TO PIRACY CONCERNS:

"Fans eager to learn more about Fox's slate of X-Men films will be disappointed to learn that the studio will not be attending San Diego's Comic-Con International this year. The report comes from The Wrap, who says that a source close to the studio has said that Fox has pulled out of a Hall H presentation, which would include sneak peeks and information about upcoming Fox movies, over piracy concerns."

Celebrating American Ingenuity and Innovation on World Intellectual Property Day; The White House, 4/26/16

Danny Marti, The White House; Celebrating American Ingenuity and Innovation on World Intellectual Property Day:

"Today, on World Intellectual Property Day 2016, we join our partners around the world in celebrating the important role that the creative and innovative communities play in our cultural and economic lives.

As President Obama said in commemoration of World Intellectual Property Day, or World IP Day, today: “Whether through the music or movies that inspire us, the literature that moves us, or the technologies we rely on each day, ingenuity and innovation serve as the foundations upon which we will continue to grow our economies and bridge our cultural identities.”...

So take a moment today to join President Obama in celebrating the role of intellectual property in our world. And to all the makers out there, keep doing what you do. America’s greatest export truly is the creativity and innovation of the American people."

On IP Protection, USTR Finds Fault With China, India … And Switzerland?; Intellectual Property Watch, 4/27/16

William New, Intellectual Property Watch; On IP Protection, USTR Finds Fault With China, India … And Switzerland? :

"The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) does not hesitate to add even its closest friends to its annual list of concerns about possible inadequate protection of US intellectual property rights...

This year’s report is available here.

Other close partners on the list or facing further scrutiny include Canada, Chile, Colombia and Spain. And as an example of the breadth of the report, problems US rightsholders claim to have defending country-code internet domain names led USTR, in the report, to cite China, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland.

The report also includes an extensive section on geographical indications, taking issue with the European Union system.

This year’s report also reflects the increasing inclusion of trade secrets in the context of intellectual property rights, despite significant differences in purpose. It singles out China and India for problems on trade secret protection."

Copyright Case Victor Returns to Supreme Court for Legal Fees; New York Times, 4/25/16

Adam Liptak, New York Times; Copyright Case Victor Returns to Supreme Court for Legal Fees:

"Three years ago, a Thai student who had helped finance his American education by selling imported textbooks won a major Supreme Court victory, persuading the justices that it is lawful to buy copyrighted books abroad and resell them in the United States. The ruling, which clarified an ambiguous phrase in the Copyright Act, applied to all manner of products, including books, records, art and software.

The student, Supap Kirtsaeng, returned to the Supreme Court on Monday, seeking more than $2 million in legal fees from John Wiley & Sons, the publisher that had sued him.

The usual rule in American civil litigation is that each side pays its own lawyers regardless of who wins. But the Copyright Act allows judges to “award a reasonable attorney’s fee to the prevailing party.”

Federal appeals courts apply different standards in deciding when fee awards in copyright cases are warranted."

Post-Gazette loses court fight to block state agencies from deleting emails; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 4/26/16

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; Post-Gazette loses court fight to block state agencies from deleting emails:

"The Post-Gazette and other media outlets said the practice violated the due process rights of the public seeking records under the state’s Right-to-Know law.

The Commonwealth Court rejected the argument, saying the Right-to-Know law doesn’t have a record-retention requirement, doesn’t outlaw destruction of records and governs only whether existing records should be made public.

The Supreme Court affirmed the lower court and denied the paper’s request for an oral argument."

Ohio State Trademarks Name of Ex-Football Coach Woody Hayes; Associated Press via New York Times, 4/22/16

Associated Press via New York Times; Ohio State Trademarks Name of Ex-Football Coach Woody Hayes:

"After trademarking the name of current Ohio State football coach Urban Meyer, the university has done the same with a predecessor, Woody Hayes.

The university filed for the trademark earlier this year from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, The Columbus Dispatch (http://bit.ly/1Sx5w8d ) reported.

The director of trademark and licensing services at Ohio State, Rick Van Brimmer, said the school has used the late coach's name or face on T-shirts, hats and bobblehead figures over the years."

Chief Justice Calls U.S. Patent Challenge Process Bizarre; Reuters via New York Times, 4/2/5/16

Reuters via New York Times; Chief Justice Calls U.S. Patent Challenge Process Bizarre:

"U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts on Monday described as bizarre the legal process used by companies to challenge competitors' patents as the Supreme Court heard a case involving a vehicle speedometer that alerts drivers if they are driving too quickly.

The eight justices heard an appeal filed by Cuozzo Speed Technologies LLC, whose speedometer patent was invalidated in a U.S. Patent and Trademark Office review board procedure after being challenged by GPS device maker Garmin Ltd in 2012.

The issue before the justices during a one-hour argument in the case was whether the U.S. government has made it too easy for companies to pursue challenges to the patents of other companies...

Roberts was the most outspoken critic among the eight justices of the current system in which companies can adopt a dual-track strategy by challenging patents simultaneously in federal court and through the agency review board."

Cassandra Clare Created a Fantasy Realm and Aims to Maintain Her Rule; New York Times, 4/23/16

Penelope Green, New York Times; Cassandra Clare Created a Fantasy Realm and Aims to Maintain Her Rule:

"These high stakes may be why so many young-adult and fantasy authors find themselves ensnared by lawsuits.

In February, Ms. Clare was sued for copyright infringement, among other charges, by Sherrilyn Kenyon, an American young-adult author who writes an urban fantasy series about demon killers named Dark-Hunters. Ms. Clare’s lawyer, John R. Cahill, said he expected the suit to be dismissed and issued a statement that read, in part, “The lawsuit failed to identify a single instance of actual copying or plagiarism by Cassie.”

But the dispute puts Ms. Clare in good company: Ms. Meyer; Rick Riordan, another successful author who drew from Greek mythology when he created his young-adult series; and Ms. Rowling have all been sued for plagiarism, often more than once."

Prince; RobRogers.com, 4/24/16

Rob Rogers, RobRogers.com; Prince

"Prince's impact will continue to be felt..."

Canadian journal breaks new ground in open access science; Globe and Mail, 4/12/16

Ivan Semeniuk, Globe and Mail; Canadian journal breaks new ground in open access science:

"On Tuesday, Canadian Science Publishing – an organization born out of the downsizing of the National Research Council – officially launches FACETS, an online multidisciplinary journal that is Canada’s most ambitious effort yet to carve a niche in the burgeoning world of open access science.

FACETS will charge a fee of $1,350 for each paper it publishes, a few hundred dollars less than the cost of publishing in PLOS ONE, the world’s leading open access journal, which uses a similar model.

But while PLOS ONE requires only that a scientific paper be technically sound for publication, FACETS will also require that each paper it publishes contributes new knowledge, Dr. Blais said.

FACETS will also publish opinion pieces and articles on science policy, he added, providing a forum that could lead to a more public airing of issues related to science in Canada and its interaction with government and politics."

Is Open Access To Research Biden's Answer To Curing Cancer?; Forbes, 4/22/16

Lindsey Tepe, Forbes; Is Open Access To Research Biden's Answer To Curing Cancer? :

"Vice President Joe Biden sees hope beyond the horizon for cancer research. As the man tapped by President Obama to tackle the disease with a new “cancer moonshot,” Biden addressed the nation’s leading cancer experts at their annual research meeting this week by invoking an example from outer space—the Hubble Telescope—and laying out an exciting vision for open research in the process.

The Hubble Space Telescope mission promised to bring into focus faraway objects, celestial bodies beyond the view of astronomers. But when it was first launched in 1990, a faulty mirror blurred the telescope’s vision—it wasn’t until three years later that the NASA team was able, using tiny mirrors, to improve its sight and take its first, sharp photographs of the universe. With the addition of improved spectrograph technology a few short years later, the team was able to improve its search for supermassive black holes...

Openness isn’t just an argument for the public interest, though perhaps that’s where it starts. Taxpayers in the United States currently fund almost $5 billion in cancer research annually, with an additional $800 million in the President’s Budget for fiscal year 2017 to support cancer research. Right now, the results of that research are overwhelmingly published in closed journals that can cost hundreds, even thousands of dollars to access. When even Harvard can’t keep pace with the rising cost of journal subscriptions, just imagine what that means for everyone else.

Quoting an op-ed published on Monday in Wired by Creative Commons CEO Ryan Merkley, Biden asked the researchers assembled to imagine if, instead, we broke down these barriers to cancer research and made the findings of our public investment openly available to all. Establishing a system of open access—free, immediate access to research articles online, coupled with legal permissions to reuse it—holds the potential to address distorted priorities built into this closed system for publication."

E.U. urged to free all scientific papers by 2020; Science, 4/14/16

Martin Enserink, Science; E.U. urged to free all scientific papers by 2020:

"One of the perks of holding the rotating presidency of the European Union is that it gives a member state a 6-month megaphone to promote its favorite policy ideas. For the Netherlands, which took over the presidency on 1 January, one surprising priority is open access (OA) to the scientific literature. Last week, the Dutch government held a 2-day meeting here in which European policymakers, research funders, librarians, and publishers discussed how to advance OA. The meeting produced an Amsterdam Call to Action that included the ambition to make all new papers published in the European Union freely available by 2020.

Given the slow pace with which OA has gained ground the past 10 years, few believe that’s actually possible, but the document is rallying support."

Pennsylvania Announces Open Data Portal; Government Technology, 4/18/16

Colin Wood, Government Technology; Pennsylvania Announces Open Data Portal:

"Pennsylvania is renewing its commitment to transparency.

On April 18, Gov. Tom Wolf, who assumed office in January, signed an executive order to create an open data portal. The new portal is mandated to contain downloadable, machine-readable data, a feature not offered by the state’s existing transparency site called PennWATCH. The state Office of Administration is also mandated to help agencies find their most valuable data sets...

The commonwealth’s data portal efforts are to be led by Julie Snyder, director of the Office of Data and Digital Technology at the Office of Administration. By working closely with the state’s agencies, civic hacker community, universities and cities, she will identify which data sets are most useful to be unlocked first, said Sharon Minnich, secretary of the Office of Administration. To develop its plan, Minnich said, Pennsylvania not only looked around the nation to spot best practices, but also assessed plans closer to home, asking Pittsburgh for advice.

“There’s a lot of open data out there that doesn’t necessarily get downloaded, so we want to make sure we put out the most valuable information,” she said. “In speaking to the universities, there really were a broad spectrum of interests. It’s going to depend on what the use cases would be for those data sets we would publish.”"

Gov. Wolf signs open data executive order; Technical.ly, 4/18/16

Juliana Reyes, Technical.ly; Gov. Wolf signs open data executive order:

"Four years after Mayor Michael Nutter signed an open data executive order for the City of Philadelphia, Gov. Tom Wolf is signing one for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

“Our goal,” Wolf said in a statement, “is to make data available in order to engage citizens, create economic opportunities for businesses and entrepreneurs, and develop innovative policy solutions that improve program delivery and streamline operations.”

As part of the order, the state will form an advisory committee and launch an open data portal. The state aims to launch the portal in August, where it says it will post data in a machine-readable format. The first datasets slated for release will be focused on Wolf’s goals, said Office of Administration Secretary Sharon Minnich.

The order will be carried out by Julie Snyder, director of the Office of Data and Digital Technology. Snyder, the former chief information officer of the Department of Environmental Protection, reports to Minnich."

USPTO appeals to Supreme Court for ruling on racially tinged trademarks; Ars Technica, 4/22/16

Joe Mullin, Ars Technica; USPTO appeals to Supreme Court for ruling on racially tinged trademarks:

"In December, a court case brought by Portland-based Asian American rock band "The Slants" led to what could be a major change in US trademark law. The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit overruled the US Patent and Trademark Office, which had refused to give the band a trademark, citing a law barring "disparaging" marks.

The battle isn't quite over, though. Patent Office lawyers have appealed to the Supreme Court, asking them to consider the case. If the Supreme Court takes up the case and reverses the Federal Circuit—something the high court has not hesitated to do in recent patent cases—the USPTO will retain its ability to quash disparaging trademarks.

Either way, the results of the case will have repercussions for other owners of controversial trademarks—most notably, the Washington Redskins. The football team was stripped of its trademark rights after years of litigation but is continuing its fight at the US Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit."

Study: Lawsuits Down, But Non-Practicing Entities Buying Patents At 'Steady Rate'; Forbes, 4/21/16

Michael Carroll, Forbes; Study: Lawsuits Down, But Non-Practicing Entities Buying Patents At 'Steady Rate' :

"The amount of patent-infringement litigation took a noticeable dip in the first quarter of this year compared to the same time period in previous years, but whether the numbers reflect a true downturn rather than a temporary hiccup remains to be seen – especially considering prospective plaintiffs are still amassing patents at their normal rate.

That’s the conclusion of an analysis of patent litigation volume reported by RPX Corp., a patent aggregator that helps clients manage and mitigate risks associated with patent-infringement lawsuits.

The company tracks litigation by non-practicing entities, or NPEs – those who hold patents and launch patent-infringement lawsuits against people or companies for allegedly using or profiting from an element of the patents the NPE holds. As a rule, NPEs obtain patents for products but don’t develop or market them.

Some refer to NPEs as “patent trolls.” RPX has spent more than $2 billion to acquire more than 15,000 patents in order to help companies avoid litigation. They both purchase patents before they can be obtained by non-practicing entities that will target their clients with lawsuits and obtain patents from NPEs after a lawsuit has been filed."

Google Case Ends, but Copyright Fight Goes On; Publishers Weekly, 4/22/16

Andrew Albanese, Publishers Weekly; Google Case Ends, but Copyright Fight Goes On:

"In a statement, Authors Guild officials called the Supreme Court’s denial a “colossal loss” for authors and bemoaned the “expansion of fair use” in the digital age. Executive director Mary Rasenberger suggested that the courts in the Google case were “blinded” by the “public-benefit arguments.” And Authors Guild president Roxana Robinson added that the Supreme Court’s denial was “further proof that we’re witnessing a vast redistribution of wealth from the creative sector to the tech sector.”

Others, however, including public advocacy group Public KnowIedge hailed the end of the litigation. “The Supreme Court’s decision to let the Second Circuit’s ruling stand reflects what we have long said, that fair use is a powerful and flexible doctrine that enables not only new works, but also innovative uses of existing works," said Raza Panjwani, Policy Counsel at Public Knowledge. "This denial will hopefully lead to new efforts to expand our access to culture and knowledge through digital formats.”

Jonathan Band, an attorney for the library community agrees. "I don't know if anyone else will create another search database for books," he told PW, "but others will create search databases for other sorts of materials, to the benefit of public and the copyright owners."

But that theme—that the courts are enabling the tech sector to unfairly build its value off the backs of creators—has become an animating principle in a copyright policy fight that is slowly beginning to take shape. And while the Google case may have ended in the courts, the copyright fight in the policy arena is likely just getting started...

“I think it hurts them,” [Grimmelmann] said. “The way they lost this case, by litigating this through to four resounding fair-use decisions, the last of which was written by Pierre Leval [considered the nation’s foremost jurist on fair use], it’s hard to imagine any way to lay down stronger bricks for fair use than that.”"

Librarian of Congress Nominee Carla Hayden Confirmation Hearing; C-SPAN, 4/20/16

C-SPAN; Librarian of Congress Nominee Carla Hayden Confirmation Hearing:

"Librarian of Congress Nominee Carla Hayden Confirmation Hearing: Carla Hayden, President Obama’s nominee to be the next librarian of Congress, testified at her confirmation hearing. Many questions Ms. Hayden answered concerned the Library of Congress’s functions, including its copyright office, and what challenges she sees ahead for the institution. Maryland Senators Barb Mikulski and Ben Cardin and former Maryland Senator Paul Sarbanes testified in support of her nomination."

Why U Can’t Find Prince’s Music Online; Slate, 4/21/16

Dan Kois, Slate; Why U Can’t Find Prince’s Music Online:

"The singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist/genius had a famously fraught relationship with distributive technology: He embraced it in disseminating his music, as long as he maintained control over his own work. But he battled for decades with his record company, subverted traditional channels of distribution, and even last year removed his catalog from nearly every streaming service. And he was fervent in defending his copyright against exploitation, to a degree that seemed, at times, excessive, including issuing takedown notices to Vine users, threatening fan-site operators for running his photo, and filing a DMCA complaint against a mom who posted a video of her kids dancing to “Let’s Go Crazy.” (That case made it to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in September.)

The practical result of all this is that, through Prince’s own efforts and expressed wishes, the standard methods of mourning a great artist are a little bit cockeyed this afternoon. Sure, everyone is digging up whatever remarkable videos they can—we’re on it—but nearly all his fantastic live performances, his surprising covers, his leaked material are nowhere to be found on my Twitter feed and Facebook news feed. And while I’d love nothing more than to stream Prince on Spotify right now, he’s not there."

The Prince of Copyright Enforcement; Wall Street Journal, 4/21/16

Jacob Gershman, Wall Street Journal; The Prince of Copyright Enforcement:

"The pop music world suffered a huge loss on Thursday with the sudden death of Prince, who will be long remembered as one of the industry’s most innovative and influential stars.

But in the legal arena, “the artist formerly known as Prince” was known as perhaps the recording industry’s most tenacious defender of copyright protections.

The artist and music companies representing him pushed the boundaries of copyright law with disputes that set legal precedents and polarized fans.

It was just last year when a federal appeals court in California ruled in the famous “dancing baby” case that centered on a 29-second home video of a baby dancing to the Prince song “Let’s Go Crazy.” The court ruled against Universal Music Corp., which enforced Prince’s copyrights, concluding that the company failed to consider whether the content in the video qualifies as fair use before trying to scrub the Internet of it."

Challenge to Google Books Is Declined by Supreme Court; New York Times, 4/18/16

Adam Liptak, New York Times; Challenge to Google Books Is Declined by Supreme Court:

"The Supreme Court on Monday refused to revive a challenge to Google’s digital library of millions of books, turning down an appeal from authors who said the project amounted to copyright infringement on a mass scale.

The Supreme Court’s brief order left in place an appeals court decision that the project was a “fair use” of the authors’ work, ending a legal saga that had lasted more than a decade...

As is their custom, the justices gave no reasons for declining to hear the case, Authors Guild v. Google Inc., No. 15-849.

Last year, a unanimous three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit said that Google’s project was lawful and beneficial.

“The purpose of the copying is highly transformative, the public display of text is limited and the revelations do not provide a significant market substitute for the protected aspects of the originals,” Judge Pierre N. Leval, an authority on copyright law, wrote for the panel."

Obama’s Secrecy Problem; Slate, 4/15/16

Fred Kaplan, Slate; Obama’s Secrecy Problem:

"Steven Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, told me Thursday, “This is a time of particularly promising ferment over secrecy policy. There is a recognition, even within the national-security apparatus, that the classification system has overreached and needs to be pruned back.” Yet by all measures, the bureaucracies persist in resisting this pruning, Congress won’t allocate the money for the shears, and the president hasn’t mustered the full attention and commitment that the task requires. Information may want to be free, but Washington has it wrapped in a tangle."