Second Appellate District of the Court of Appeal in California denies Sony’s motion to strike an action brought against it for fabricating quotes by fictitious reviewers in its movie ads. Sony argued that because its movies receive First Amendment protection, that the ads for the movies do as well. The Court held that while movies
Making A Mountain Out of a Swale
Lucas Nursery didn’t do a good good on a customer’s swale. Customer registered lucasnursery.com and posted information criticizing them. Lucas brought an ACPA count. Sixth Circuit held that this was a non-commercial criticism site and registration of the domain name was not cyber-squatting. This case is interesting as it represents the domain name registrant
Is Your Small Business Trademark Infringement Proof?
About.com introductory article bearing the title above, in which I am quoted as viewing trademark protection as a good thing. Not given to absolutes, I would never personally use an expression such as ‘infringement proof.’
BI-AGRA v. VIAGRA
IPKat reports on UK Trademark Registry decison finding BI-AGRA for fertilizer confusingly similar to VIAGRA (for virilizer), on grounds of aural similarity.
Medieval Spawn Spawns Copyright Case in Seventh Circuit
Put some time aside and read this case, in which comic book greats Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane tussle over ownership of characters that Gaiman created for McFarlane’s Spawn comic book (including Medieval Spawn, pictured). It’s worth the read just to hear Judge Posner tells us the legend of Spawn. Judge Posner’s discusses what can
Reading Is More Than Just A Good Idea, It's the Law
Cite Judge Posner to your kids (gloss over the dictum point):
“A reader of unillustrated fiction completes the work in his mind; the reader of a comic book or the viewer of a movie is passive. That is why kids lose a lot when they don’t read fiction, even when the movies and TV that
Bored of the Rings
Rights-owners of LOTR sue DVD distributor for trademark and copyright infringement, via EntLawDigest.
Big Red v. Gabibbo
According to AP, Western Kentucky University has sued Mediaset, a media company owned by Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, in Rome, alleging that Mediaset’s Gabibbo character (left) infringes its Big Red mascot. The article reports that the creator of the Gabibbo character admitted in an interview to copying the character.
BREAKING THE DA VINCI CODE
The publisher of BREAKING THE DA VINCI CODE has agreed to place a sticker on its cover indicating that it is a critique of THE DA VINCI CODE. Via MSNBC.
Shameless Self-Promotion: My Book Chapter On the UDRP Is Out
INTA’s book “Trademarks Law and the Internet” has now been updated. The book is edited by Neal Greenfield (who is affiliated with SchwimmerLegal, helping clients, among other things, manage their domain names); and Lisa Cristal (who comes by here for lunch sometimes). I co-authored a chapter for the supplement entitled “UDRP Trends” with