Sean O’Connor is a Professor at the University of Washington School of Law and Chair of the Law, Technology & Arts Group, specializing in intellectual property and business law involving biotechnology, cyberspace/information technology, and new media/digital arts. Professor O’Connor is an IP Osgoode Research Affiliate. This is the second part of Professor O’Connor’s feature blog […]
Stan Liebowitz is the Ashbel Smith Professor of Economics at the University of Texas at Dallas, School of Management. Economists and non-economists alike tend to be familiar with the phrase “creative destruction” and its implications that, although established firms may bemoan new innovation upsetting apple carts in their industry, and government may try to protect […]
In her research paper titled “Of Trolls, Davids, Goliaths, and Kings: Narratives and evidence in the litigation of high-tech patents,” Assistant Professor Colleen V. Chien, at Santa Clara University School of Law, provides a snapshot of U.S. patent litigation that could not only inform current efforts to reform the patent system, but could also serve […]
A recent proposal by European Commissioners Meglena Kuneva and Viviane Reding outlined a number of consumer protections relating to licensing agreements. In the event that the proposal becomes law, software companies could be held liable for their code. The directive requires that products, including software licensed under licensing agreements, be held to a higher standard […]
This is the issue currently being considered in the US Congress through an attempt to introduce the Design Piracy Prohibition Act (Act). The Act was initially presented in 2006, but at that time the bill was criticized because the broad wording attempted to stop any design that was “substantially similar” to the original, which would […]
A recent Ontario Superior Court ruling may impact how employees use computers at work. In R. v. Cole, 2009 CanLII 20699 (ON S.C.) Justice Paul Kane overturned a trial level decision and found that Cole did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy when using a computer provided by his employer. Mr. Cole was a […]
Stan Benda, is adjunct faculty at Osgoode Hall Law School. He is Senior Counsel at Justice Canada acting for Agriculture Canada’s Intellectual Property Office and Multilateral Science Relations Office (International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources, Convention on Biological Diversity, Cartagena). He recently completed his Ph.D. on the Labelling of GM Foods. According to a Globe […]
Sean O’Connor is a Professor at the University of Washington School of Law and Chair of the Law, Technology & Arts Group, specializing in intellectual property and business law involving biotechnology, cyberspace/information technology, and new media/digital arts. Professor O’Connor is an IP Osgoode Research Affiliate. Qualcomm and Broadcom finally seem to have ended their long […]
My first experience with intellectual property occurred several years ago when I watched a documentary on the patents on the genes BRCA1 and 2. Individuals with certain types of mutations within these genetic sequences are at a significantly higher risk for developing hereditary breast and ovarian cancer. Despite knowing little about both genetics and law at the […]
On April 24th the Minister of Industry, Tony Clement, tabled a government bill with the aims of protecting consumers and businesses from dangerous forms of spam and regulating activities that are believed to discourage the use of electronic means of carrying out commercial activities. Bill C-27, the Electronic Commerce Protection Act, contains provisions that prohibit […]