Law Commons^™

Highly Automated Vehicles & Discrimination Against Low-Income Persons, William H. Widen

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Law reform in the United States often reflects a structural bias that advances narrow business interests without addressing broader public interest concerns.' This bias may appear by omitting protective language in laws or regulations which address a subject matter area, such as permitting the testing of highly automated vehicles ("HA Vs") on public roads, while omitting a requirement for a reasonable level of insurance as a condition to obtain a testing permit.2 This Article explores certain social and economic justice implications of laws and regulations governing the design, testing, manufacture, and deployment of HA Vs which might advance a business …

Color Of Creatorship - Author's Response, Anjali Vats

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This essay is the author's response to three reviews of The Color of Creatorship written by notable intellectual property scholars and published in the IP Law Book Review.

New Innovation Models In Medical Ai, W Nicholson Price Ii, Rachel E. Sachs, Rebecca S. Eisenberg

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In recent years, scientists and researchers have devoted considerable resources to developing medical artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. Many of these technologies—particularly those that resemble traditional medical devices in their functions—have received substantial attention in the legal and policy literature. But other types of novel AI technologies, such as those related to quality improvement and optimizing use of scarce facilities, have been largely absent from the discussion thus far. These AI innovations have the potential to shed light on important aspects of health innovation policy. First, these AI innovations interact less with the legal regimes that scholars traditionally conceive of as …

Post-Grant Adjudication Of Drug Patents: Agency And/Or Court?, Arti K. Rai, Saurabh Vishnubhakat, Jorge Lemus, Erik Hovenkamp

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The America Invents Act of 2011 (AIA) created a robust administrative system-the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB)-that provides a route for challenging the validity of granted patents outside of district courts. Congress determined that administrative adjudication of the validity of initial patent grants could be cheaper and more scientifically accurate than district court adjudication of such validity.

For private economic value per patent, few areas of technology can match the biopharmaceutical industry. This is particularly true for small-molecule drugs. A billion-dollar drug monopoly may be protected from competition by a relatively small number of patents. Accordingly, the social cost …

The Supreme Court’S Chief Justice Of Intellectual Property Law, Bob Gomulkiewicz

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Justice Clarence Thomas is one of the most recognizable members of the United States Supreme Court. Many people recall his stormy Senate confirmation hearing and notice his fiery dissenting opinions that call on the Court to reflect the original public meaning of the Constitution. Yet observers have missed one of Justice Thomas’s most significant contributions to the Court—his intellectual property law jurisprudence. Justice Thomas has authored more majority opinions in intellectual property cases than any other Justice in the Roberts Court era and now ranks as the most prolific author of patent law opinions in the history of the Supreme …

“A Force Created”: The U.S. Chamber Of Commerce And The Politics Of Corporate Immunity, Myriam E. Gilles

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No abstract provided.

Moonshots, Matthew Wansley

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In the last half-century, technological progress has stagnated. Rapid advances in information technology disguise the slow pace of productivity growth in other fields. Reigniting technological progress may require firms to invest in moonshots—long-term projects to commercialize innovations. Yet all but a few giant tech firms shy away from moonshots, even when the expected returns would justify the investment. The root of the problem is corporate structure. The process of developing a novel technology does not generate the kind of interim feedback that shareholders need to monitor managers and managers need to motivate employees. Managers who anticipate these agency problems invest …

Trade Transparency: A Call For Surfacing Unseen Deals, Kathleen Claussen

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For many years, the executive branch has concluded foreign commercial agreements with trading partners pursuant to delegated authority from Congress. The deals govern the contours of a wide range of U.S. inbound and outbound trade: from food safety rules for imported products to procedures and specifications of exported goods, to name two. The problem is that often no one-apart from the executive branch negotiators- knows what these deals contain. A lack of transparency rules has inhibited the publication of and reporting to Congress of these unseen deals. Dozens if not hundreds of foreign commercial deals are unseen in two ways: …

The Racial Politics Of Fair Use Fetishism, Anjali Vats

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This short essay argues that the sometimes fetishistic desire on the part of progressive intellectual property scholars to defend fair use is at odds with racial justice. Through a rereading of landmark fair use cases using tools drawing from Critical Race Intellectual Property (“CRTIP”), it contends that scholars, lawyers, judges, practitioners, and activists would be well served by focusing on how fair use remains grounded in whiteness as (intellectual) property. It argues for doing so by rethinking the purpose of the Copyright Act of 1976 to be inclusive of Black, Brown, and Indigenous authors.

Taxing Creativity, Xuan-Thao Nguyen, Jeffrey A. Maine

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The recent sell offs of song catalogs by Bob Dylan, Stevie Nicks, Neil Young, and Mick Fleetwood for extraordinarily large sums of money raise questions about the law on creativity. While patent and copyright laws encourage a wide array of creative endeavors, tax laws governing monetization of creative works do not. The Songwriters Capital Gains Equity Act, in particular, solidifies creativity exceptionalism, exacerbates tax inequities among creators, and perpetuates racial disparities in the tax Code. This Article asserts that the law must encourage creativity from all creators. It is time to eliminate tax exceptionalism for musical compositions or expand its …

Unravelling Inventorship, Toshiko Takenaka

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Inventorship, who made an invention, is one of the most important concepts under the U.S. patent system. Incorrect inventorship determinations result in patent invalidity not only because U.S. Constitution requires granting patents to true inventors, but also first-inventorto- file novelty inherited many aspects of first-to-invent novelty which depended on inventorship whether to include prior inventions as prior art. Correcting inventorship may result in sharing patent exclusivity with competitors, which forfeits profits necessary to recover expensive development costs. However, the standard to determine inventorship has been called muddy by judges and commentators because neither the Patent Act nor case law provide …