The global economic downturn continues to make its impact. A few months ago, I mentioned the possibility that patents might be used to leverage credit, in the face of cautious lenders. Bloomberg.com is reporting that firms might be more desperate: “Small-cap technology companies from Silicon Valley to Israel, struggling to raise enough money to survive […]
The balance between private and public interests is usually the centre of most intellectual property policy debates, but this can be said to be especially significant with medical research performed by publicly funded institutions. In a nation such as ours where the health of our citizens is a responsibility of the government, public funds invested […]
Sanjukta Tole is an Osgoode Hall alumnus and practiced with the IP Group of a large Vancouver law firm. In 2006, the Supreme Court of Canada released its decision in the case of Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin, Maison Fondee en 1772 v. Boutiques Cliquot Ltee, 2006 SCC 23 ("Veuve Clicquot"), in which the maker of the […]
For the past year and a half, one political figure has evoked much publicity around the world that very few celebrities or politicians have enjoyed during their whole life. This political figure is the newly elected U.S. president, Barack Obama. The Obama craze has resulted in, what Megan Boler calls, a ‘merchandising mayhem’. In the U.S., […]
Sara Grimes is a PhD Candidate with the School of Communication at Simon Fraser University. Digital games have evolved considerably in recent years, but from an IP perspective, one of the most interesting and significant shifts has been the introduction of user-generated content (UGC) into corporately-owned digital games and virtual worlds. Early evidence of the […]
In 2005, Apple publicly announced their transition from the IBM/Motorola PowerPC chipset to the Intel x86 chipset. In addition to the speed improvements, and efficiency gains (higher performance per watt) with the Intel processors, the transition also gave Mac users greater flexibility in the operating systems and programs that could be run without an x86 […]
Do you remember the last time you made an online purchase from Amazon or the Apple Store? When you entered in all your personal information, do you remember reading Amazon or Apple’s privacy notices? If you clicked on it, did you read through the entire thing? It is quite likely that your answer would be […]
A six year quest of the Toronto Star has been finally put to rest by an Ontario Court of Appeal decision favouring a ‘freedom of information’ request filed by the Star. The landmark decision held that municipal government institutions, such as the Toronto Police Services Board (the "Board"), are required to produce electronically stored information that the public […]
A Northern Ireland court has barred a Belfast newspaper, Sunday Life, from publishing unpixelated photos of the perpetrator of a sex related murder who is now being released after serving out his sentence. It had been the paper’s intent to publish pictures to enable the public to identify the man should he end up in […]
In a recent U.S. patent dispute between two information technology players, a court has ruled that a patentee’s destruction of potentially relevant evidence may be sanctioned by a declaration of patent unenforceability. The ruling in Micron Technology, Inc. v. Rambus, Inc. (Civ. No. 00-792-SLR, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1260 (D.Del., Jan. 9, 2009)) penalizes Rambus, a […]