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Full-Text Articles in Law
Property Or Currency? The Tax Dilemma Behind Bitcoin, Scott A. Wiseman
Property Or Currency? The Tax Dilemma Behind Bitcoin, Scott A. Wiseman
Utah Law Review
At Bitcoin’s peak in November 2013, there were 93,000 global transactions made in a single day. These users purchased everyday items such as personal services, food, and real estate. This alone suggests that Bitcoin is not primarily used as a long-term investment tool, but rather is used as a currency and a vehicle for global transactions. Congress and the IRS should regulate it accordingly. Representative Stockman’s Virtual Currency Reform Act offered an attempt to negate the IRS decision and officially classify Bitcoin and other virtual currencies as currency instead of property. A tax reclassification would alleviate typical users’ many inconveniences …
Alice Was No Rabbit Hole: Why Software Inventors Should Be Neither Surprised, Nor Alarmed, Sherman Helenese
Alice Was No Rabbit Hole: Why Software Inventors Should Be Neither Surprised, Nor Alarmed, Sherman Helenese
Utah Law Review
Trade secrets offer an alternative to patent - ineligible innovations and to the problems and perils of protecting, defending and enforcing patents. Although there is currently limited trade secret legislation on the national level, nearly all states have adopted, with little substantive variation, the Uniform Trade Secrets Act. Unlike patent - eligibility requirements that precluded software in Gottschalk, Diehr, Alice, and Tenon from patent protection, no trade secret is automatically deemed out of scope. Trade secrets encompass anything of value, so long as it is not generally known and reasonable steps are taken, such as the use …
The Interconnections Between Entrepreneurship, Science, And The Patent System, Amy Landers
The Interconnections Between Entrepreneurship, Science, And The Patent System, Amy Landers
Utah Law Review
This Article considers several related points about the recent changes to the patent system and the opportunities for entrepreneurship. The concern about the adverse effect of the recent changes to patent law on innovation may be overstated. As a practicalmatter, the concept that patents are a necessary input to innovation is built on a model that does not account for the complex relationship between this legal system, science, and innovation. Although it can be expected that there may be some adverse impacts from these decisions, this trend opens up the opportunity for entrepreneurship. By releasing more foundational information into the …
Altering Rules, Cumulative Voting, And Venture Capital, John F. Coyle
Altering Rules, Cumulative Voting, And Venture Capital, John F. Coyle
Utah Law Review
Legal scholars have long debated the proper balance betweenmandatory and default rules in corporate law. One group — the contractarians — maintain that corporatelaw should function as an off-the-rack set of default rules that approximate, as much as possible,the rules that the transacting parties would have agreed to if bargaining were costless. The contractarians are generally skeptical of mandatory rules because they interfere with the ability of the parties to decide for themselves how to organize their economic relationships. Another group of scholars—the anti - contractarians — have argued that corporate law should seek to achieve certain regulatory objectives separate …
Startups And Unmet Legal Needs, Alice Armitage, Evan Frondorf, Christopher Williams, Robin Feldman
Startups And Unmet Legal Needs, Alice Armitage, Evan Frondorf, Christopher Williams, Robin Feldman
Utah Law Review
Our survey results demonstrate that startup companies are exposed to a wide variety of legal needs from an early stage: when attorneys associated with the Startup Legal Garage were asked to handle a company’s most pressing legal needs, the average startup received assistance with over three distinct legal matters over the course of a thirteen-week academic semester. These issues often spanned multiple categories. Although matters frequently touched on a variety of topics within companies, strong similarities emerged in the types of issues faced by all startups in our sample. Almost 90% of the legal matters addressed by Startup Legal Garage …
Inclusive Crowdfunding, Andrew A. Schwartz
Inclusive Crowdfunding, Andrew A. Schwartz
Utah Law Review
Retail crowdfunding under Title III of the JOBS Act has a fundamental advantage over accredited crowdfunding and intrastate crowdfunding: the value of inclusivity. What that is worth in a given instance may be difficult to calculate, but it is surely more than zero. This is one reason to expect that retail crowdfunding, once it commences, may prove more successful than many commentators anticipate.