LawPundit

Gene Patents : If there is a God, Genes were invented by Creation, otherwise, Genes developed via Evolution : Should a Gene be patentable?

2009-11-08T23:00:00.001+01:00

Yes, Virginia, if there is a God ...
then God invented genes, by creation.
There is very little doubt about that logic.

On other hand, if there is no God,
or if God is more in the nature of a Supreme Principle of the universe,
then all things developed by evolution, over the course of time,
especially the genes,
and surely no human ever "invented" them.
There is also very little doubt about that logic.

Is the day of judgment in terms of "Patent Armageddon" now approaching gene patents?

As reported in PatentlyO, gene patents issued by the USPTO have been challenged as unconstitutional by the Association for Medical Pathology:

"The federal lawsuit argues (1) that the genes are not patentable because they are "products of nature" and (2) that the patentee's use of patent rights to limit scientific research on the genes violates constitutional First Amendment protections."

SU - Dr. Jays Blog: Concerns About Privacy Online?

2009-11-08T15:32:00.000+01:00

SU - Dr. Jays Blog: Concerns About Privacy Online?

Lawyers Must Change With the Times : Legal Industry Facing Unprecedented Change : Unbound by David Galbenski Examines Legal Services Today

2009-11-08T15:19:00.000+01:00

Lawyers must change with times as Jim Middlemiss notes at the Financial Post:

"That's the conclusion in a new book that examines the enormous change sweeping the profession, Unbound: How Entrepreneurship is Dramatically Transforming Legal Services Today by American writer David Galbenski (www.unboundlegal.com)-- a must-read for lawyers and law students who want to build successful law business."

Golf Tips and Information for the Golfing Attorneys

2009-11-07T08:54:00.000+01:00

See

Golf - Golfing Tips And Information at Golfing : Lifestyle Resources by Resources for Attorneys.

Coaching Mentor a Secret to Success : Alexis Martin Neely's Law Business Revolution Blog : Legal Coaching & Consulting For Lawyers & Attorneys

2009-11-07T08:44:00.001+01:00

Having a coaching mentor is perhaps one of the most important elements to being successful, and this may also apply to lawyers. Take a look at

Law Business Revolution Blog : Alexis Martin Neely's Law Business Revolution Blog : Legal Coaching & Consulting For Lawyers & Attorneys

This is NOT an ad. The coaching principle simply looks sensible to us.

Unauthorized Beatles Music Online Leads to Legal Action by EMI

2009-11-06T00:35:00.001+01:00

The Reuters headline reads:

EMI sues U.S. website over Beatles music online.

An outfit called BlueBeat.com has been offering what are apparently unauthorized downloads of not only Beatles songs but also other unauthorized content from other major music labels. This looks like a classic case of copyright infringement.

In the meantime, a temporary injunction has been granted.
See Billboard.biz

Lots of discussion at the ars technica open forum

Four Good Reasons To Take Up Golf As A Sport - Article

2009-11-05T16:45:00.000+01:00

George Gabriel at Resources for Attorneys has an article that concentrates on Four Good Reasons To Take Up Golf As A Sport.

New LawPundit Header accommodates Online Legal Questions to Lawyers (USA) & Solicitors (UK) : Fees Charged for Answers : Affiliate Fee Participation

2009-11-05T01:13:00.004+01:00

The new LawPundit header (at the top of the blog page) now accommodates the justanswer.com widgets for online questions to lawyers (USA) and solicitors (UK). A fee is charged for accepted answers. Affiliates such as ourselves are paid a certain percentage of those fees as a form of "finder's fee".

The process is simple. The user first asks a question of online legal experts. The user then puts a price on the answer to the question. If an online legal expert accepts that price, an answer is forthcoming. If the person who lodged the question accepts the answer given, a fee is due.

We have tried various affiliate programs and are skeptical about them, based upon our experience, but we are trying this one as an experiment, since it seems to make a lot of common sense to have such an online service available to laymen.

We shall see if our readers and users have any use for it.

Ipenforcement's Blog

2009-11-05T01:07:00.000+01:00

Ipenforcement's Blog is "a blog about the issues of counterfeiting and piracy" - by Nils Montan.

European Union "Constitutional" Lisbon Treaty now ratified by All 27 EU Member States as Czech Republic signs the Lisbon Treaty on November 3, 2009

2009-11-04T13:49:00.010+01:00

An economically AND politically and militarily united European Union will in the course of time become the world's leading power - a development resisted in many quarters.

Yesterday was therefore a great step forward in the right direction with the ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon as the virtual Constitution of the EU.

Matthias C. Kettemann, an Austrian LL.M. student at Harvard, writes in the Harvard Law Record in We, the People of Europe: How the Lisbon Treaty makes the EU more democratic:

"Today, after the Czech Republic's highest court failed to find any grounds on which it was unconstitutional, Czech President Václav Klaus finally signed the Lisbon Treaty . The treaty's reforms will now enter into force on December 1, 2010. The debate on its contents, however, is far from over."(read the rest here)

From a nation-state point of view, as the German Federal Constitutional Court emphasized in a decision on Germany's then impending ratification of the Lisbon Treaty this past summer, the problem is that the EU is not a federation of states, but rather is primarily a union of 27 sovereign states, a situation which makes unity in economic, political or military affairs extremely difficult.

One could compare this to the hypothetical of 50 sovereign U.S. States each having a governor and a legislature that were more powerful than the President of the United States or its Congress, and each State having its own armed forces, foreign diplomats, etc. It would be chaos, and such a union would be a very weak one, hardly able to withstand modern demands and dangers from without and clearly unable to fulfill the American dream or destiny within.

Seen realistically, it is in fact quite remarkable that the EU functions as well as it does, and the main reason that it DOES function, is that the leading political, economic and intellectual echelons of European countries understand how very important it is to their all ultimate self-interest now and down the road, that the European Union become more solidified as a viable single entity.

How did things get that way in Europe? Essentially, today's remarkably peaceful and economically effective modern Europe - in the past always involved in countless strength-sapping wars - is the direct consequence of World War II and the recognition that things could not continue as they had in the previous eras, where Europe's political life had been largely dominated by the cravings of tyrants, by unfettered lust for "tribal" national power and for unearned stolen prosperity by conquest, domination and theft of others. Something had to give, and it did, as the early very small and loose economic unions, kept together by treaties, evolved into the European Common Market and ultimately into the European Union.

Since its inception, the legal foundations of the European Union and its economic forbears were established by treaties. It is perhaps thus fitting that the "new" de facto "Constitution" of the European Union is also a treaty and not a purely constitutional document as such.

The new Treaty - the Treaty of Lisbon (also called the Lisbon Treaty or the Reform Treaty) - was signed in Lisbon by all of the EU Member States on December 17, 2007 and with yesterday's November 3, 2009 ratification by the Czech Republic, the Lisbon Treaty has now been ratified by all 27 EU States. See the progressive moving map below.

Treaty of Lisbon ratification process,
December 20, 2007 to November 3, 2009.

The order of ratification is shown by this progressive map,
starting with Hungary and ending with the Czech Republic.
Source: Wikipedia, by the user Urpunkt

Clean Water and Mountaintop Mining No Longer Mix : Becker's Iowa Environmental Law Update

2009-11-04T00:48:00.000+01:00

Clean Water and Mountaintop Mining No Longer Mix : Becker's Iowa Environmental Law Update

Angela Merkel : Europe's Quiet Leader : Germany Rises to Power in Quiet Footsteps

2009-11-03T14:54:00.000+01:00

Anne Applebaum - Merkel's quiet ascension in Germany could envelope Europe - washingtonpost.com

Hat tip to CaryGee.

National Health Insurance : The Reality of Need

2009-11-01T20:48:00.004+01:00

An old friend of mine who suffered a massive stroke this past March writes as follows at his blog:

"I know what it’s like to need an insurance card to get help. Boy, that changes everything. When you’re experiencing a painful, maybe life threatening event, all you want is help. You don’t think about politics or what the media has to say. All you want is help, fast.
And that requires buckets full of cash. Or an insurance card.

Let’s make it so no one will ever be denied care again. If not for your own sake, then for your human brothers and sisters. You can effect change just by adjusting your attitude."

Read the rest here.

Every industrialized country in the world has some form of national health insurance, except for the United States, where the status of health - as also the health care of citizens - is on average lower than in comparably industrialized nations. Obviously, any national health insurance program has to be controlled and monitored carefully to avoid abuse, but that is a completely different issue than the question of necessity, about which there can not be much serious doubt.

Google Wave Blog at Waverful : The Wonderful (Waverful) World of Google Wave

2009-10-31T19:32:00.000+01:00

We think that Google Wave will be such a blockbuster application down the road that we have created a special blog, WAVERFUL, for the Wonderful World of Google Wave.

The main problem right now, based upon what we have seen elsewhere - we do not have our own personal copy of Google Wave yet (you can send us an invite, thank you), is the problem of permissions.

Obviously, for "serious" Google Wave uses, each Google Wave originator, or someone else authorized by that originator, will have to be in charge of granting permissions to access a Google Wave designed for a given public. You can not just send things out into the public domain - there are simply too many self-serving and nutty things that people are otherwise tempted to do - and, judging by experience - do do, if there is not some kind of authorizing moderator inbetween.

Modern institutions all work with hierarchies, indeed, multiple hierarchies - just look at your own work place - and there is a reason for this, because experience shows that it just does not work any other way, given the vagaries of human nature.
Google Wave will be no different.

Google Wave in Law: What Does Google Wave Mean For Lawyers?

2009-10-31T18:56:00.000+01:00

Jay Fleischman on What Does Google Wave Mean For Lawyers?

The Scales of Justice, Blogging and Cable News Networks : The Origins of Lady Liberty

2009-10-31T18:34:00.000+01:00

The newest cable news stats show (hat tip to MEDIAite):

Polar Opposites: Fox News Seeing Best Ratings, CNN and MSNBC Worst.

This is not surprising to us, at least in the case of Fox News and CNN.

Fox News has long been known to be on the conservative side of things and now reflects the right-wing backlash against U.S. President Barack Obama while CNN has progressively drifted far too far to left, or as one viewer at Michelle Malkin writes: "No wonder CNN only has three viewers. They don’t "report" for all Americans, only left-wing Americans, forgetting that half this country is on the right, almost a 50/50 split." Picking up the slack at CNN is at least HLN, Headline News, formerly CNN2, whose ratings are strongly increasing.

Where, dear friends, do we find "fair and balanced" reporting?

Blogs - equally biased, of course - developed as balancing agents to the partisanship of the major cable news networks. But to be fair, it is not all bad, of course, and almost all original reporting is still done by the major news networks and newspapers, so we bloggers can probably more truthfully say that we are the powers at the fulcrum of the balance, i.e. at the pivotal point of the scales of justice, as it were.

At the Bay Weekly, J. Alex Knoll in Sky Watch, wrote about The Heavenly Scales: From a weigher of souls to the stalwart of liberty:

"Libra ... the celestial scales [where the] second-magnitude, bluish-white star Zubenelgenubi [is located at] the fulcrum of the scales.... ... nearly 4,000 years ago, the sun passed through Libra during autumnal equinox, when day and night are equal, and so, the Babylonians worshiped this constellation as the Ereshkigal, the goddess of the dead who weighed the souls of men. The Egyptian god Anubis, too, held the scales weighing life and death. The ancient Greeks, however, considered Libra but a part of Scorpius, its stars representing a lamp or lantern and later the lighthouse of Alexandria, held between the scorpion’s outstretched claws. But the Romans wrested the scales from the scorpion, giving them to Astraea, the goddess of justice. She wore a crown of grain, another symbol tied to the scales of early commerce, and she represents purity and innocence. Astraea was the last of the gods to leave earth during the Golden Age. She became Virgo, to the west of Libra, leaving her scales behind as a final gift to mankind. Today, we Americans know her as Lady Liberty."

HootSuite for Twitter : Review by 3 Geeks and a Law Blog

2009-10-30T18:20:00.001+01:00

HootSuite is a useful online application for Twitter, especially for multiple accounts.

3 Geeks and a Law Blog reviewed Hootsuite some time ago. It is definitely worth a read.

Google Wave and the practice of IP law | The Invent Blog®

2009-10-30T14:47:00.000+01:00

Google Wave and the practice of IP law | The Invent Blog®

Naming Your Business: Choosing A Name Capable of Trademark Protection | Citizen Media Law Project

2009-10-29T04:13:00.002+01:00

Naming Your Business: Choosing A Name Capable of Trademark Protection is a non-commercially attribution-distributable article from the Citizen Media Law Project, Harvard - Berkman, which I think is worth sharing:

"Choosing a distinctive name is important from a business perspective, but it is also important if you want trademark law to protect your business name. A business name is potentially a trademark protected by the law, but this protection depends on the type of name you choose.

As a general matter, the more unique or distinctive the name is, the greater trademark protection it receives. Fanciful marks (made-up words like "Kodak"), arbitrary marks (existing words used in a way unrelated to their normal meaning, like "Apple" for computers), and suggestive marks (those that hint at a quality or aspect of the product or service, like "Netscape") receive the highest level of protection. You can register these kinds of trademarks immediately, without any evidence of "secondary meaning" -- i.e., proof that, through your use of the name in commerce, the public has come to identify it specifically with your good or service. Similarly, in the event of a lawsuit, you would not need to produce evidence of secondary meaning in order to make out your case.

In contrast, a merely descriptive name can only receive full trademark protection after it acquires secondary meaning. Some examples include names that describe the product or service directly, such as Speedy Rental Car, or one that merely uses a person's name, such as Smith Computers or Jane's Collectibles. Terms that describe the geographic location of a good or service, like the New York Times, also are considered descriptive, and they can be protected as trademarks only upon proof that through use they have acquired secondary meaning. If you choose a merely descriptive name for your citizen media site or blog, you would not be able to register it at first, and you would not be able to successfully sue someone for using a confusingly similar trademark. You might be able to register it and/or bring a successful lawsuit at a later date, however, assuming that Internet users at some point come to identify your business name specifically with your work (i.e., it acquires secondary meaning).

Lastly, a generic name can never receive trademark protection. A generic name is identical to the product or service to which it attaches. For instance, calling a business that hosted email accounts "email" would be a generic name. Keep in mind that a term can be a generic name for one product or service, but a valid trademark for another. For instance, "Apple" is a generic name for selling apples, but a valid trademark for computers, and "Bicycle" is a generic name for selling bicycles, but a valid trademark for playing cards. Some geographical terms like "swiss cheese" and "French fries" are also generic because they are synonymous with the item itself. However, this does not mean that all geographical names are generic.

Choosing a business name presents a special problem for a community journalism site or blogger with a regional focus, where using a geographical or other descriptive term makes intuitive sense. After some thought, you may decide that the appropriate descriptive name is more important to you than strong trademark protection. Or, you may come up with a creative way of using a geographical term in a distinctive way (e.g., h2otown). Be aware also that your descriptive name may obtain secondary meaning should your site prove an influential and often-visited source of information -- think, for instance about the New York Times. So, keep in mind that you may start out with a business name that enjoys little protection under trademark law, but the amount of protection may grow over time."

‹ Trademark Law and Naming Your Business up Naming Your Business: Searching for Trademarks of Others ›

via citmedialaw.org

Posted via web from Andis Kaulins

Trademarks and the Name of a Business : The Citizen Media Law Project at Harvard Instructs on How to Choose a Trademark-Protectable Name

2009-10-29T03:49:00.001+01:00

The Citizen Media Law Project, a non-profit at Harvard which provides legal assistance and resources for online and citizen media, at their website, hosted by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, has a very nice summary of trademark law as relates to the naming of a business.

See:

Naming Your Business: Choosing A Name Capable of Trademark Protection | Citizen Media Law Project

Make Hop not War : Sony Ericsson Hoppers in Barcelona

2009-10-28T23:56:00.000+01:00

Have you seen this?
This is not an ad on my part.
It is my selection for video of the decade.
HAPPY! I fell off my hopper smiling.

Sony Ericsson Hoppers in Barcelona

TwitterBar is a Useful Tool for Posting Twitter Tweets from the ADDRESS BAR of the Browser

2009-10-24T00:11:00.000+02:00

TwitterBar is a Useful Tool for Posting Twitter Tweets from the ADDRESS BAR of the Browser. This makes it very fast and easy to use. The TwitterBar Widget currently mentions LawPundit as a blog that has posted about Twitter Bar (scroll the widget).

TwitterBar

Embed this widget See full results for TwitterBar

Twitter Addresses of Legal Blogs (Blawgs) as Referenced on the LawPundit Law Blogroll

2009-10-22T23:26:00.000+02:00

Having initially compiled these legal Twitter tweet feeds for our own use, we are happy to provide our readers with the Twitter links (that we could find) for blawgs and legally-related blogs on our LawPundit law blogroll. We follow numerous of these Twitter tweet feeds ourselves at @Law_Pundit (note the underline necessitated by our inability thus far to obtain the @LawPundit address at Twitter which is currently squatted by an imposter). Our current Twitter address is: @Law_Pundit (full address at http://www.twitter.com/Law_Pundit).

The Twitter blawg addresses we have located for law bloggers on our LawPundit law blogroll:

The Blog of the White House - @Whitehouse
ABAJournal - @ABA Journal
ABAJournal.com Web producer - @BlogWhisperer
ABA President's Blog - @tommywellsaba
Above the Law - @atlblog
AbsTracked - @abstracked
ACLU Blog of Rights - @aclu
A Connecticut Law Blog - @ryanmckeen
ACSBlog - @acslaw
Advocate's Studio - @advocatesstudio
Al Nye the Lawyer Guy - @AlanNye
Althouse - @annalthouse
Anticipate This! - @jacobward
Anything Under the Sun Made by Man - @russ_krajec
Bag and Baggage - @dhowell
Balkinization - @jackbalkin
Bank Law Blog (.uk) - @banklawblogger
Bibliotheksrecht (.de) - @BibliothekRecht
Binary Law (.uk) - @nickholmes
BlawgIT - @BrettTrout
Blawgletter - @blawgletter
Blawg Review - @blawgreview
Blog@IP::JUR - @axelhorns
Build a Solo Practice - @SCartierLiebel
Business Golf Blog - @suzannewoo
Canadian Trademark Blog - @CanadianTMBlog
Cearta (.ie) - @cearta
Charon QC (.uk) - @charonqc
China Law Blog - @danharris
Class 46 (EU trade mark news) - @class46
Conglomerate - @GlomPosts
Copyright Trademark & Entertainment Blog - @tamerabennett
Counterfeit Chic (Copying) - @CounterfeitChic
Current Awareness (.uk) - @inner_temple
Daily Kos - @markos
Deal Attorney (M&A) - @acerminaro
Deal Book - @nytimesdealbook
Deliberations - @annereed
Dennis Kennedy Blog - @dkennedyblog
Discourse.net - @mfroomkin
Doc Searls Weblog - @dsearls
Dorf on Law - @dorfonlaw
Drug and Device Law Blog - @ddlw
E-Commerce Law - @JonathanFrieden
Election Law - @rickhasen
Embassy Law Blog - @embassylaw
Ernie the Attorney - @ernieattorney
Faculty Blog Chicago - @UChicagoLaw
Feminist Law Professors - @FeministLawPrfs
For the Defense (DRI) - @forthedefense
Freedom to Differ (.au) - @peterblackQT
German Trademark Law in a Nutshell - @germantrademark
Groklaw - @Groklaw
Guiding Rights Blog - @mvbpartridge
Handakte (.de) - @handakte
Head of Legal (.uk) - @carlgardner
Health Blawg - @healthblawg
Hollywood Entertainment & Media Law - @THREsq
Houston's Clear Thinkers -@bigtkirk
Immateriblog (.de) - @spielkamp
Infamy or Praise - @colinsamuels
Informationoverlord (.uk) - @iOverlord
InstaPundit - @instapundit
International Economic Law & Policy - @worldtradelaw
International Trade Law News - @tradelawnews
Internet Cases - @internetcases
IP Dragon 知識產權龍 - @ipdragon
iPhone J.D. - @jeffrichardson
IPKat - @IPkat
IP Think Tank - @IPThinkTank
IPwars (.au) - @wrothnie
IT Law in Ireland - @TJMcIntyre
Lawdable - @BarryWilms, @dmac1957
Law Firm Web Strategy - @stevematthews
LawLibTech - @cchick
Law Practice Tips Blog - @jimcalloway
LawPundit - @Law_Pundit (@Law_Pundit)
Legal Blog Watch - @LegalBlogWatch
Legal History Blog - @legalhistory
Legal Jobs & Recruitment (.uk) - @TenPercentLegal
Legal Pad (a Cal Law Blog) -@LegalPadblog
Legal Talk Network - @legaltalk
Legal Theory Blog - @lsolum
Legal Tweets - @nikiblack
Legal Underground - @eschaeff
Lessig Blog - @LESSIG
Lex Ferenda (.ie) - @macsithigh
LibraryLawBlog - @librarylaw
Lightbulb (Dilanchian IP Blog) (.au) - @noricd
MassLawBlog - @gesmer
Opinio Juris - @opiniojuris
Overseas Property Investment Blog - @nubricks
Paper Chase - @JuristNews
Patent Baristas - @patentbaristas
Patent Docs - @PatentDocs
Patentability Blog - @BrianNFletcher
Patently-O - @PatentlyO
Patterico's Pontifications - @Patterico
Peter Zura's 271 Patent Blog - @PZura
Phosita - @Phosita
PLI Patent Blog - @PractLawInst
Precedent (Law & Style) - @shortcellar
Privacy & Security Law - @DWTLaw
SCOTUSblog - @scotusblog
Securing Innovation - @ipdotcom
Singularity Law - @JoshKagan
Slaw (.ca) - @slaw_dot_ca
Southern Appeal - @SouthernAppeal
Strategic Legal Technology - @ronfriedmann
Sui Generis - @nikiblack
TalkLeft - @talkleft
taxgirl - - @taxgirl
Techdirt - @techdirt
TechnoLlama (.uk) - @technollama
Technology & Marketing - @ericgoldman
The Common Scold - @CommonScold
The Invent Blog - @nipper
The Lawyer Coach Blog - @TheLawyerCoach
the [non]billable hour - @matthomann
Trademark Blog - @mschwimmer
TTABlog (Trademarks) - @TTABlog
Useful Arts - @usefularts
WisBlawg - @shucha
Wise Law Blawg (.ca) - @wiselaw
WSJ.com Law Blog - @WSJLawBlog
Zeugma - @paulmaharg

Video of the Ceremony Opening the New Supreme Court of the United Kingdom

2009-10-22T22:46:00.003+02:00

We posted previously about the historic opening of the new Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, the ceremony of which was attended by Queen Elizabeth II, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, UK Supreme Court President Lord Nicholas Phillips, three U.S. Supreme Court Justices (Chief Justice Roberts and Associate Justices Scalia and Breyer) and Supreme Court Justices from around the world. Below is a C-SPAN video from YouTube showing this significant event:

European Union : EU Jurisdiction : Recognition and Enforcement of Judgments in Civil and Commercial Matters : Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001

2009-10-22T13:44:00.002+02:00

The European Union COUNCIL REGULATION (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 is one of the most important documents of the EU, covering jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters.

The EU Law Blog in the posting Cases of the Court of Justice on Regulation 44/2001: Council Document informs us that:

"The Council has prepared a handy compilation of the case-law of the Court of Justice interpreting Regulation 44/2001 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters."

Read the whole thing here.