Feb
26
Open letter to Lessig on net neutrality
Posted by Dirk Avery at 10:28 am under Internet, Technology.
Dear Lawrence,
I’m sorry to hear that you will not be running for congress. We can always use smart people in DC that are champions of human progress.
Good luck in your new endeavor to change congress. I hope you’ll consider net neutrality a part of that effort. Lack of neutrality has the potential […]
Feb
21
Lessig for Congress?
Posted by Dirk Avery at 10:16 am under Copyright, Internet.
Yesterday Keeley posted Lessig’s “final” lecture on free culture as he now plans to move his attention to congressional corruption. CNET’s Anne Broache reports that Lessig is considering running for congress himself. What better way to fight corruption than on the inside?
Larry Lessig, the Stanford University law professor and “free culture” icon, has confessed that […]
Feb
18
Collaboration with geneticists yields faster fiber
Posted by Dirk Avery at 12:49 pm under Internet, Patent, Technology.
This is just plain cool. Researchers in Australia were working to produce faster fiber optics. When they ran into an issue they couldn’t solve, they collaborated with the geneticists in the neighboring lab to come up with new, patent-pending technology. (Hopefully it will help US Internet providers upgrade infrastructures that are falling […]
Feb
14
Copyright: Trojan horse to net neutrality?
Posted by Dirk Avery at 11:34 am under Copyright, Internet.
Craig Aaron sets the scene well:
[I]n The Matrix… Morpheus… offers Neo… a fateful choice.
He holds out two pills. Take the blue pill, he says, and you go back to a life of clock-punching drudgery where your every move is monitored. Take the red one, and you get spaceships, kung-fu and a leather-clad Carrie-Anne Moss.
Take away […]
Feb
14
Update: Microsoft’s bid for Yahoo!
Posted by Dirk Avery at 10:46 am under Internet.
Murdoch’s News Corp., a Web powerhouse thanks to its ownership of top social networking site MySpace.com, is said to be in talks to invest in Yahoo to help it fend off Microsoft’s overtures.
Feb
13
Patenting Patent Notices
Posted by Keeley Vega at 2:41 pm under Internet, Patent.
I ran a title search for the term “patent” in the PTO database (some people play solitaire during class, I search for ridiculous patents) and stumbled upon U.S. Patent 7,130,830 titled “Providing notice of patent rights.”
This patent covers a method for notifying a user of a device that the device is covered by a patent. […]
Feb
13
Three things I enjoy: Patent, copyright and photography
Posted by Dirk Avery at 11:34 am under Copyright, Internet, Patent.
(Name the movie: “Those are three names I enjoy: Marvin, Velma and Provo.”) Canon (to whose cameras I am partial) has submitted a patent application for a very cool new watermarking technology for protecting copyrights. The basic idea (more here) is that you put your eye up to the view finder, the camera […]
Feb
12
Doe v. Geller: DMCA takedown notice & jurisdiction
Posted by Dirk Avery at 2:42 pm under Copyright, DMCA, Internet.
We’ve discussed the issue of online activities and personal jurisdiction before. In Doe v. Geller (download here), filed last week in the Northern District of California, the plaintiff filed suit in response to the defendant sending a take down notice for plaintiff’s YouTube video and the defendant suing the plaintiff in his home state […]
Feb
11
The World of Widgets
Posted by Keeley Vega at 5:16 pm under Internet, Patent.
It’s nearly impossible to survive a patent law class without hearing a boring hypothetical involving a “widget.” After hearing a professor refer to this strange term for the 7,638th time, I decided it was time to learn what it meant.
Some research revealed that there are many definitions.
According to www.dictionary.com, a widget is:
short for window […]
Feb
11
Yahoo! rebuffs Microsoft
Posted by Dirk Avery at 2:41 pm under Internet.
Last week Yahoo! told Microsoft, “Show me the money!” Microsoft has yet to raise its $31 cash/shares offer. Now, Yahoo! is saying “A LOT mo’ money,” or “I’m free to be whatever I, whatever I choose.” Yahoo! is apparently more willing to tie the knot with AOL, Google or, even, Disney. […]