* LawLawLaw 2007-03-17

Technology, Law, Baseball, Rock ‘n’ Roll, Etc.

LawLawLaw
• Introduction Stuff
• Client Stuff
• Law Stuff
• Technology Stuff
• Baseball Stuff
• Rock ‘n’ Roll Stuff
• Random Stuff

Introduction Stuff

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The opinions expressed in LawLawLaw do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Clock Tower Law Group, its employees, or the author. May contain cheese.

Client Stuff

Clock Tower Law Group’s clients range in size from a sole proprietor to a publicly traded company. Here’s what some of them are up to.

Right Media In Business 2.0 (2007-02-26)
“[Right Media] founder Mike Walrath … built an exchange, called RMX, that’s become a kind of eBay for display-ad inventory. Bidders specify their audience and Right Media’s system predicts where the ads will work best. The software matches them with sellers in a fraction of a second and serves up the ad; Right Media takes an 8 percent cut. Right Media won a big endorsement [in May 2006] when Yahoo paid $45 million for a fifth of the company.”

Ozzie Osborne’s Guitarist Plays For WAAF At A Listener’s Workplace (2007-02-26)
“WAAF in Boston has lately been promoting concerts in a lucky listener’s ‘lunch room.’ It was through such a promotion that Zakk Wylde, guitarist for Ozzy Osbourne, ended up playing in a most unusual venue, Brideau’s Machine Shop in Leominster…. DSL was available, but little else to deliver the remote…. For this remote, the Comrex ACCESS on IP was the obvious choice. The remote went off without a hitch and sounded great! Stereo high fidelity sound was easily delivered, thanks to the ACCESS.”

iProspect Selects SiteSpect For Web Site Testing And Optimization (2007-03-05)
“SiteSpect, the first and only provider of non-intrusive web site testing and optimization solutions, announced that iProspect is using SiteSpect’s multivariate testing solution to optimize its clients’ web sites. iProspect is using SiteSpect to create, launch, and analyze multivariate tests without the need to conduct time-consuming page tagging or content modifications.”

MSNews: Accelerated Cure Project Publishes Its First Multiple Sclerosis Paper (2007-03-07)
“Hollie Schmidt, in collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control and Duke University, has produced a review paper looking at the role of the HLA-DR15 Haplotype in MS. This is a cluster of genes that has shown repeated association with MS in many previous studies. Hollie was approached to work on this review as a result of her work on the Cure Map project at Accelerated Cure Project.”

Online Auctioneer Right Media Hopes To Reinvent Advertising – Unless eBay Gets There First (2007-03-07)
“Online display ad specialist Right Media was put on the map when Yahoo purchased a 20 percent stake valued at $45 million. Now, after experiencing revenue growth of 81 percent in the past six months, NY-based Right Media harbors ambitions of soon challenging its patron and other web giants like Google.”

Law Stuff

Can You File Your Own Trademarks? Sure!
We make more money from fixing problems in trademark applicatons that we didn’t initially file than we do from filing them from scratch. That said, we prefer avoiding problems and recommend not filing your own trademarks. Sometimes, when I’m searching trademarks, I find one that was obviously filed without the assistance of a trademark lawyer. Like this application (which was ultimately abandoned) in which the applicant included instructions/suggestions in the mark field itself. (Um, you can’t do that.) As far as the USPTO was concerned, the entire proposed trademark was as follows:

THE SLEEP SHOP (NOTE: IF THIS NAME IS NOT ACCEPTABLE, AS AN ALTERNATIVE, I WOULD BE SATISFIED WITH THE TRADEMARK “THE SLEEP SHOPPE”)

USA: Copyright Leader Or Copyright Renegade? (2007-02-27)
Countries around the world demonstrate just how out-of-touch US copyright laws (aka copyright lobbyists) are with the rest of the world. The US is no longer viewed as a leader, rather as a rebel. “Countries singled out for criticism [by the US] should not be deceived into thinking that their laws are failing to meet an international standard.” See also this related copyright article by Micheal Geist.

Buy And Sell Patents At LegalForce (2007-03-06)
A newly launched website, LegalForce, offers an online “marketplace” for buying, selling and licensing patents.

Call Congress To Ask The Copyright Office To Save Internet Radio (2007-03-07)
The Copyright Office approved new rates for Internet radio stations that will put many (if not all) of them out of business. The Copyright Office is propping up old broken technology (broadcast radio) at the expense of newer better technology (Internet radio). If a subsidy system is going to be implemented, shouldn’t the rich be subsidizing the poor, not the other way around? Copyfight has more details, including what you can do to help save Internet radio.

Bears Lose SuperBowl, Win Trademark Appeal (2007-03-12)
I love it when I find a story about sports and IP law. The Chicago Bears won a trademark opposition over the proposed mark 12TH BEAR for jewelry, bumper stickers, insulated beverage containers, towels, clothing, and ornamental novelty buttons. The TTAB found 12TH BEAR likely to cause confusion with the marks BEARS and CHICAGO BEARS.

American Inventor Conducting Casting Calls For Season Two (2007-03-15)
“Producers of ‘American Inventor’ are coming to a major city near you as they get ready to kick off the second season of the popular ABC program. A nationwide search to discover the ultimate in homespun ingenuity will make one struggling inventor’s dream come true with a grand prize of one million dollars.”

Splenda Registers Hundreds Of Negative Domains (2007-03-15)
Splenda has registered hundreds of domain names in an apparent attempt to prevent others from starting anti-Splenda websites. Methinks that the determined critic will still find a way.

Twirl-A-Squirrel vs. Yankee Flipper
Both companies make bird feeders that rotate when a heavy squirrel sets foot (paw?) on them, but not when a light bird does. The Twirl-A-Squirrel website lists plenty o’ patents, the older Yankee Flipper website lists no patents. Discuss. Hat tip to Augie De Blieck Jr. for the Twirl-A-Squirrel pointer.

Technology Stuff

MIT Thesis of Erik J. Heels (1988-05-16)
OK, I admit it, I check the Internet for references to myself. (You should too, since Google is your home page.) One of the things that I was pleasantly surprised to discover is that MIT, through it’s DSpace program, has been scanning theses. My EE thesis is, as a result, now online. I think it stands up well after nearly 20 years.

The 10 Most Techie Presidents (2007-02-19)
eWeek’s Presidents Day summary of techie (and tech-friendly) US Presidents. Lincoln is the only US President to hold a patent (US Patent 6469, Buoying Vessels Over Shoals). Hat tip to Bob Ambrogi for the pointer.

Google Reader vs. SharpReader (2007-02-23)
How and why I switched to the web-based feed reader.

How To SFTP From Mac To Windows With Fugu (2007-03-08)
Secure file transfer between Windows Cygwin server and Macintosh Fugu SFTP client. I have previously discussed how to SCP with a Windows WinSCP client to a Windows Cygwin SSH server, and that article is relevant for the server side of the equation. But what if you want to use a Macintosh, OS X 10.4 (Tiger), with Fugu as your SFTP client? That’s what this article is about.

How To Print OS X To XP (2007-03-10)
How to print from a wireless Apple MacBook running OS X 10.4 (Tiger) to a shared printer on a Windows XP computer. It’s hard to share printers on a network. Always has been, always will be. Of course, it should not be this way. Computers should be easy to use, and they have gotten easier through the years, but it puzzles me that something so simple is still so difficult.

Gmail For All (2007-03-14)
“Nearly three years after its debut, Gmail has finally shed its invitation-only status. In the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and other countries, anyone can sign up for an account.”

Baseball Stuff

Root, Root, Root, for the Home Team (2006-09-01)
With opening day just around the corner, here’s a brilliant piece by John Kwoka from Northeastern University alumni magazine. In it, Kwoka uses economic analysis to determine the best sports town in America.

One Of These Mornings You’re Going To Rise Up Singing (2007-02-28)
Even though Curt Schilling is now blogging, Beth is still my favorite Sox blogger. Here she writes up, beautifully, the first Red Sox broadcast of the (pre)season.

Rock ‘n’ Roll Stuff

The BitTorrent Entertainment Network Launches (2007-02-26)
BitTorrent (the company), in partnership with movie studios, launched a service that gives subscribers access to a large catalog of movies, music, and videos. New movies can be purchased for $3.99 and older films cost $2.99 to download.

Random Stuff

Securify
There is a building on Route 128 in Waltham with the name “Securify” on it, and every time I drive past it, I chuckle and think of the SNL sketch featuring George Bush debating Al Gore and summarizing his campaign with the term “strategery.”

SNL Transcripts
Over 3000 transcripts from NBC’s Saturday Night Live.

British ‘Get A Mac’ Ads (2007-01-29)
Same concept, drier humor.

Topping Survival Training (2007-03-03)
Recalling the (formerly) worst night of sleep of my life.

The Things I Say (2007-03-04)
“[T]he moon lost its orbit and its going to destroy all life on earth… When it comes to romance, the important thing is to win the argument.”

Lobster Petting X 1.0.2.8 – Because you always wanted to pet a lobster (2007-03-08)
This is from the truth-is-stranger than fiction files and is appreciated, at least, by this Mainer. My brother once “hypnotized” a lobster by stroking the top of its head. This program is “a picture of a lobster. Using the mouse, you ‘pet’ the lobster by clicking on it. It squeaks. Repeat. Enjoy.”