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Top Tens In 2017: Patent, Trademark, Copyright And Trade Secret Cases, Stephen M. Mcjohn
Top Tens In 2017: Patent, Trademark, Copyright And Trade Secret Cases, Stephen M. Mcjohn
Suffolk University Law School Faculty Works
The Supreme Court loosened the grip of patentees on their products, holding that contractual restrictions on patented product are ineffective to preserve patent rights. The Court also loosened the grip of the Eastern District of Texas on patent cases, announcing a narrower standard that will send more cases to Delaware. The Federal Circuit cases piled up on applying the Alice standard to filter nonpatentable abstract ideas from patentable inventions. Meanwhile, even as the constitutionality of the Patent Trial and Appeals Board pends before the Supreme Court, hundreds of PTAB decisions on the validity of patents move onward to the Federal …
Some Speculation About Mirror Neurons And Copyright, Stephen M. Mcjohn
Some Speculation About Mirror Neurons And Copyright, Stephen M. Mcjohn
Suffolk University Law School Faculty Works
The internet, a world-wide copy machine, caused some rethinking of copyright law. Cognitive science increasingly suggests that humans are smaller scale, more adaptable, copy machines. Copyright law may again change. V.S. Ramachandran’s "The Tell-Tale Brain" discusses how mirror neurons may enable imitation, detection of others’ intention, and empathy. Ramachandran suggests that mirror neuron circuits could provide the neural substrate for cultural transmission, language, and even consciousness. This essay speculates on the implications for copyright law. It’s not news that people copy. But if cognition and culture depend on the bottom-up imitation by mirror neurons, perhaps some of the central tenets …