Law Commons^™

The Regulatory State In The Information Age, Julie E. Cohen

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Article examines the regulatory state through the lens of evolving political economy, arguing that a significant reconstruction is now underway. The ongoing shift from an industrial mode of development to an informational one has created existential challenges for regulatory models and constructs developed in the context of the industrial economy. Contemporary contests over the substance of regulatory mandates and the shape of regulatory institutions are most usefully understood as moves within a larger struggle to chart a new direction for the regulatory state in the era of informational capitalism. A regulatory state optimized for the information economy must develop …

The Luxembourg Effect: Patent Boxes And The Limits Of International Cooperation, Lilian V. Faulhaber

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article uses patent boxes, which reduce taxes on income from patents and other IP assets, to illustrate the fact that the jurisprudence of the European Court of Justice has a longer reach than has previously been recognized. This article argues that, along with having effects within the European Union, the ECJ’s decisions can also have effects on countries outside of the EU. In the direct tax context, the ECJ’s jurisprudence has hampered the ability of both EU and non-EU countries to police international tax avoidance.

In 2015, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) proposed restrictions on patent …

Food For Thought: Should Libraries Partner With Nonlibrary Search Engine Providers For Their Opacs And Discovery Layers?, Michelle Wu

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Since the development of integrated library systems (ILS) in the 1970s, the focus of developers and librarians has been on the “integrated” aspect, but with the advances in technology, the time has come for libraries to consider whether a disaggregated system would better benefit their users. This article seeks to make the argument that the design of a user-friendly public interface to library systems is ideal for partnerships with the broader search engine industry; such an approach would enable participants to harness their respective strengths while simultaneously limiting the effect of their deficiencies

"Loser Pays" In Patent Examination, Neel U. Sukhatme

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Many scholars and practitioners believe there are too many “weak” patents—those that should not have issued but somehow get approved by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO). To the extent they exist, such patents unnecessarily tax real innovation and generate welfare losses for society.

Some commentators have focused on the PTO’s failure to exclude weak patents, or the damage caused by these patents in litigation, often by patent trolls. But this scholarly discussion misses the point. The present Article argues that weak patents largely stem from a pricing problem: namely, a patent applicant pays higher patent fees when she …

The First Amendment Walks Into A Bar: Trademark Registration And Free Speech, Rebecca Tushnet

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Section 2 of the Lanham Act, the federal law governing trademarks, lists a number of bars that preclude registration of a trademark on the federal register. These reasons include: the claimed matter is functional, meaning it affects the cost or quality of the underlying product or service; the claimed matter is merely descriptive, meaning that consumers don’t understand that it indicates source and instead think that it just describes some characteristic of the product; the claimed matter is deceptively misdescriptive, which is like descriptiveness except not true; the claimed matter is deceptive, meaning that the untruth would be material to …

Collaborative Academic Library Digital Collections Post- Cambridge University Press, Hathitrust And Google Decisions On Fair Use, Michelle M. Wu

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Academic libraries face numerous stressors as they seek to meet the needs of their users through technological advances while adhering to copyright laws. This paper seeks to explore one specific proposal to balance these interests, the impact of recent decisions on its viability, and the copyright challenges that remain after these decisions.