Tag Archives: technology

If you use or develop online software or smartphone “apps” then you need to know about CalOPPA.  No, that’s not some form of steam-driven musical device from an old-time carousel. It’s the California Online Privacy Protection Act, and it has very real consequences for any company that does business online. This month, the State of California […]

Do you have a Facebook Account?  Do you realize that every time you click the “Like” button for a product, service or website,  Facebook may distribute a paid advertisement (“a sponsored story”) using your name to all of your “Friends” suggesting that you are recommending the product or service?  While Facebook is described in the […]

Trademark lawyers often enjoy following trademark disputes involving  famous trademarks. If you haven’t heard about Apple Computer’s court battle over ownership rights for the “iPad” trademark in China, read on. The Chinese owner of the “iPad” trademark is not Apple but  a beleaguered video display manufacturer known as Proview.  In 2001, Proview obtained rights to the […]

On August 16, 2011, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals in CyberSource v Retail Decisions concluded that a claim to a method for detecting Internet fraud was not patentable.  The court also concluded that a claim to computer memory storing software to implement the method also was not patentable.  The Federal Circuit treated the claim […]

On February 14-16, 2011, we watched “Watson“, an IBM system of computers the size of a two-car garage, compete against the all-time best champions on the game show Jeopardy!®. On subjects from diseases to characters in Beatles® songs, the computer was impressive, pressing the buzzer faster than its human opponents, and getting so many answers […]