Intellectual Property Law Commons^™

Checklist For Open Access Publishers On Implementing The Unesco Recommendation On Open Science, Unesco, Oaspa

Copyright, Fair Use, Scholarly Communication, etc.

Within the subset of open scientific knowledge, this document refers to scientific publications that include, inter alia, journal articles and books, research reports and conference papers. These publications may be, contain or be accompanied by original scientific research results, research data, software, source code, source materials, workflows and protocols, digital representations of pictorial and graphical materials and scholarly multimedia material. According to the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science, access to scientific knowledge should be as open as possible, and may need to be restricted, in specific circumstance, for example to protect human rights, confidentiality, intellectual property rights, personal information, threatened …

Authoring Prior Art, Joseph P. Fishman, Kristelia A. García

Publications

Patent law and copyright law are widely understood to diverge in how they approach prior art, the universe of information that already existed before a particular innovation’s development. For patents, prior art is paramount. An invention can’t be patented unless it is both novel and nonobvious when viewed against the backdrop of all the earlier inventions that paved the way. But for copyrights, prior art is supposed to be virtually irrelevant. Black-letter copyright doctrine doesn’t care if a creative work happens to resemble its predecessors, only that it isn’t actually copied from them. In principle, then, outside of the narrow …

Homography Of Inventorship: Dabus And Valuing Inventors, Jordana Goodman

Faculty Scholarship

On July 28, 2021, the Device for the Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience ("DAB US") became the first computer to be recognized as a patent inventor. Due to the advocacy of DAB US's inventor, Dr. Stephen Thaler, the world's definition of "inventor" has finally fractured - dividing patent regimes between recognition of machine inventorship and lack thereof This division has sparked many scholarly conversations about inventorship contribution, but none have discussed the implications of a homographic inventorship.

This Article addresses the implications of international homographic inventorship - where countries have different notions and rules concerning patent inventorship - and the …

Who Benefits?: How The Aia Hurt Deceptively Non-Joined Inventors, Jordana N. Goodman

Faculty Scholarship

Congress enacted the America Invents Act (“AIA”) to bolster economic development, sustain American innovation, and protect American jobs. This pro-business legislation, however, overlooked one actor critical to any successful innovation endeavor: the inventor. The AIA created access barriers, preventing inventors from efficiently and effectively seeking the entire remedy spectrum to which they are entitled. Paul Morinville and others have opined that the new first-to-file system put small inventors out of business, naming the AIA the single worst disaster in the history of the U.S. patent system. Beyond the filing and subject matter changes, the AIA created fundamental access to justice …

Ms. Attribution: How Authorship Credit Contributes To The Gender Gap, Jordana Goodman

Faculty Scholarship

Misattribution plagues the practice of law in the United States. Seasoned practitioners and legislators alike will often claim full credit for joint work and, in some cases, for the entirety of a junior associate’s writing. The powerful over-credit themselves on legislation, opinions, and other legal works to the detriment of junior staff and associates. The ingrained and expected practice of leveraging junior attorneys as ghost-writers is, to many, unethical. But it presents a distinct concern that others have yet to interrogate: misattribution disparately impacts underrepresented members of the legal profession.

This Article fills that space by offering a quantitative analysis …

Justice Breyer And Patent Eligibility, David O. Taylor

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

Justice Breyer leaves the Supreme Court having left a significant mark on patent eligibility law. In Mayo Collaborative Services v. Prometheus Laboratories, he eliminated the ability to obtain patents on many useful applications of new (and even breakthrough) discoveries. The author discusses how Justice Breyer’s test for patent eligibility both contradicts the historical approach and has had pernicious impact on the patent system and investment in development of technology, including, and in particular, medical technologies.

Investigating Design, Mark Mckenna, Jessica Silbey

Faculty Scholarship

Design is ascendant. Steve Jobs’s legendary obsession with design was widely regarded as Apple’s comparative advantage, and that lesson has not been lost on its competitors. Design thinking is a growth industry, in business and at universities, and design professionals continue to take on increasingly significant roles within firms. The increasing economic significance of design has been reflected in an explosion of design patent applications and increasing amount of design litigation.
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/="/">Despite design’s growing economic and legal importance, relatively little is known by legal scholars and policymakers about designers or the design process. This paper addresses that gap …

The Promise Of Patent-Backed Finance For Smes And Universities, And Shifting Patent Eligible Subject Matter, Mattias Karlsson Dinnetz, Michael S. Mireles

Lewis & Clark Law Review

This Article reviews and addresses some of the problems concerning adequate capital to develop patented inventions and products, and inhibiting the widespread use of patents to raise financing. The Article divides the IP finance market into three separate, but interrelated markets and analyzes problems, including U.S. patent-eligible subject matter doctrine, within those markets impeding patent-backed financing. The Article provides numerous proposals, some of which are in the literature, and calls for additional research for addressing the issues.

Reconstruction Of The Reasonable Person Standard Under Chinese Patent Law, Weihong Yao, Robert H. Hu

Faculty Articles

The standard of a Reasonable Person is the common basis for determining the duty of care of a patent infringer. Under the Chinese patent law, the standards for Reasonable Manufacturer and Reasonable Importer are among the highest standards in the world; such high Chinese standards impose an excessive duty of care for Chinese manufacturing enterprises, importers, and distributors, which hinder the development of those enterprises. We should reconstruct the Chinese patent law's Reasonable Person standard based on the characteristics of the patent system and the status quo of China's economic production. A Reasonable Manufacturer should be defined as an ordinary …

Examining The Fourth Amendment And Biometric Data Privacy Law Implications Of Ncaa Athletes' Mandated Use Of Athlete Biometric Data Tracking Devices, Alicia Jessop

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

This Article presents the first in-depth analysis of the privacy law implications, under both the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and individual states' biometric data privacy laws, resulting from National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) member institutions mandating that athletes wear athlete biometric data (ABD) tracking devices. The Article provides the NCAA' and its member institutions, athletes, and Congress with recommendations of how to respond to the privacy law concerns that exist in a period of expanded ABD collection, use, and storage. Part I discusses the growing practice of athletics departments requiring intercollegiate athletes to wear ABD tracking devices. …

Any Port In A Storm: What Social Media Platforms Should Do To Address The Shifting Legal Tides Governing Content Embedding, Laura Cohen

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

#Freebritney: The Importance Of Public Access To The Guardianship System, Cecily D'Amore

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

The note examines the systemic issues in the U.S. guardianship system, highlighted by Britney Spears' highly publicized conservatorship case, and advocates for increased transparency and accountability. It argues that while guardianship laws are designed to protect vulnerable individuals, cases like Spears' reveal gaps in oversight, inconsistent public access to records, and the need for less restrictive alternatives. The note proposes reforms, including enhanced public access to guardianship case information and the creation of a centralized database, to address these shortcomings and prevent abuse.

Mechanical Licenses And The Willing Buyer/Willing Seller Standard: Establishing Royalty Rates In A Vacuum Of Knowledge, Natalie Linn

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

The Music Modernization Act (MMA) introduced a significant shift in determining mechanical royalty rates by replacing the 801(b)(1) standard with the willing buyer-willing seller standard. This change, while aiming to establish fair market value, presents challenges for the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) due to the lack of a comparable market and the influence of statutory licensing. The transition is expected to increase royalty rates, impacting various stakeholders, including copyright owners, streaming services, and consumers, and may lead to heightened disputes and uncertainty in the industry.

Opening Remarks, Christopher J. Buccafusco, Matthew Vernace

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Panel 2: Modern Trends And Internet Speech, Enrique Armijo, Paul M. Barrett, Michael A. Cheah, Zahra Takhshid, Felix Wu

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

The article explores the complexities and future of Section 230, focusing on its role in protecting online platforms from liability for user-generated content. Panelists argue that Section 230 is an immunity, not a subsidy, and discuss its implications for content moderation, new technologies, and regulatory oversight. They propose various reforms, including FTC regulation and clarifying Section 230's scope for emerging harms.

Protecting The Public Domain And The Right To Use Copyrighted Works: Four Decades Of The Eleventh Circuit’S Copyright Law Jurisprudence, David E. Shipley

Scholarly Works

This article is about the importance of the copyright law jurisprudence from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. This appellate court turns 40 in 2021, and it has rendered many influential copyright law decisions in the last four decades. Its body of work is impressive. This article discusses the court’s important decisions in the following areas: the originality standard; the application of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Feist decision to compilations, directories, computer software, architectural works, and other creative works like movies, photographs, and characters; copyright protection for unfixed works; the scope of the government edicts doctrine; and, …

Innovation's Hidden Externalities, Stephanie Plamondon Bair

Faculty Scholarship

When commentators discuss innovation’s externalities, they often classify them into one of two categories. On the positive externalities, or “spillovers” side, legal and economics scholars often speak of the benefits innovation confers on other innovators. Future innovators profit from past innovation as they “stand on the shoulders of giants” to develop progressively new and better innovation. Discussion of innovation’s negative externalities, on the other hand, has mainly focused on social harms not directly related to future innovation that particular advances impose on third parties—the classic example being pollution. Thus, the common understanding is that innovation’s spillovers positively impact innovation (among …

The Sociology And Psychology Of Innovation: A Synthesis And Research Agenda For Intellectual Property Scholars, Stephanie Plamondon Bair, Laura Pedraza-Fariña

Faculty Scholarship

Intellectual Property (IP) and innovation law scholarship is generally concerned with the question of how to promote socially beneficial innovation. Until recently, the analysis brought to bear on that question in the literature has been dominated by an individual, rational-actor-centered model grounded in the neoclassical economics tradition. Under this model, individual innovators are assumed to respond to innovation incentives in rational ways, unswayed by their social environments or their own psychology.

Of course, as innovation scholars are beginning to recognize, the road to innovation is much more winding and complex than the straight path from incentive to innovation that the …

The Monetization Of Childhood: How Child Social Media Stars Are Unprotected From Exploitation In The United States, Jessica Pacht-Friedman

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note highlights the legal vulnerabilities of child social media influencers, or "kidfluencers," who are increasingly exploited due to inadequate protections under U.S. labor laws. The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) exempts child performers, and while some states have Coogan Laws, these are insufficient to address the unique challenges posed by digital platforms like YouTube. The author advocates for expanding these protections to include social media stars and adopting a "Right to be Forgotten" to safeguard children's privacy and financial interests.

Moonshots, Matthew Wansley

Articles

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 …