NYSBA Intellectual Property Law Section’s Annual Law Student Writing Competition

Dear Law School Students:

Have you written a paper recently that sits in a drawer somewhere? How about putting it to work to earn some money for you?

The New York State Bar Association (NYSBA), with more than 76,000 members, is the nation’s largest voluntary statewide association of lawyers and the official statewide organization of the legal profession. It is composed principally of practicing attorneys, judges, law professors, and many non-practicing lawyers who are business executives, government officials, court administrators and so forth.

The Intellectual Property Law Section of the NYSBA introduces members of the NYSBA to the interesting and growing areas of law which make up intellectual property law, including patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, licensing, and Internet issues.

We invite you to participate in our Eleventh Annual Law Student Writing Competition. The winners receive cash prizes and are presented with an award during the Annual Meeting in January. In addition, the Section publishes the winning papers on the NYSBA website and in the Section’s newsletter, Bright Ideas. Additional details are available at www.nysba.org/IPWritingContest

We hope you will take advantage of this fantastic opportunity and submit a paper for consideration before the deadline of December 7, 2009. We wish you the best of luck.

Sincerely,

Joyce L. Creidy, Esq.
Chair, IP Law Section

WIPO Summer IP Program in Geneva

IP “Summer School” at WIPO headquarters in Geneva, July 7 – 16.

Students: US $ 300

You may register for the 2009 Summer School on IP in Geneva from January 7 to May 15, 2009. Email resume together with a statement of purpose (giving reasons why you wish to apply for the Summer School and what you hope to gain from it) to: summerschool.geneva@wipo.int

More information

Learn About Virtual Worlds in Bremen This Summer

From Dr. Kerstin Radde-Antweiler:

HOW VIRTUAL IS REALITY?

We would like to call your attention to this year’s Summer School “How Virtual is reality?” (http://how-virtual-is-reality.eu/) held in Bremen (Germany) from July 10 to July 19. The course is mainly addressed to graduate and postgraduate students like Master students and PhD candidates, but undergraduates with experience in the field are also very welcome to apply!

As a cooperation of the University of Bremen, the University of Oldenburg and the Jacobs-University (Bremen) the Summer course will broach the issue of the relevance of new environments like “Second Life” or “World of Warcraft” for nowadays culture and social life with special focus on rituals and religions.

Instructed by more than 15 international teachers, the participants of the Summer School will engage into the interdisciplinary study of practical methods and theoretical approaches for the scientific handling of ritual and media. The media will not only be subject to methodological, theoretical and practical research and discussion but will also serve as platform for academic exchange and teaching. After this Summer School participants will be able to design and perform research projects on religion in and within Virtual Worlds.

Please forward this information to everyone who might be interested in the course! A banner and a poster will soon be available on the “Media” section of the website.
We are looking forward to many interesting applications!

The organizers
Kerstin Radde-Antweiler
Simone Heidbrink

Law & Information Society Symposium: Intermediaries in the Information Society

Looks great:

Date(s): 03.27.09 Fri
Time: 8:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m.
Location: McNally Amphitheatre
Sponsor: Center on Law and Information Policy

This symposium will explore the legal issues faced by internet intermediaries and their impact on society.

http://law.fordham.edu/ihtml/eventitemPP.ihtml?id=37&idc=9597&template=cle

Student RSVP:
http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=pJ8DSJ7UpAi_i_2HIt0I2SQ

Summer Internship / Writing Contest

( Courtesy Professor Bambauer’s e-mail list…)

1. Stanford CIS Summer Intern

CIS is hiring a Summer Intern!

http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/node/6053

The Center for Internet and Society (CIS) at Stanford Law School is looking for a volunteer Summer Intern to work on public interest issues involving technology and the Internet.

Bilski Patent Case appealed to the SCOTUS

QUESTIONS PRESENTED
Whether the Federal Circuit erred by holding that a “process” must be tied to a particular machine or apparatus, or transform a particular article into a different state or thing (“machine-or-transformation” test), to be eligible for patenting under 35 U.S.C. § 101, despite this Court’s precedent declining to limit the broad statutory grant of patent eligibility for “any” new and useful process beyond excluding patents for “laws of nature, physical phenomena, and abstract ideas.”

Whether the Federal Circuit’s “machine-or-transformation” test for patent eligibility, which effectively forecloses meaningful patent protection to many business methods, contradicts the clear Congressional intent that patents protect “method[s] of doing or conducting business.” 35 U.S.C. § 273.

Read more about it at Slashdot.

Optimism

International Intellectual Property Symposium – Philadelphia – Friday, February 27, 2009

International Intellectual Property Symposium – Philadelphia – Friday, February 27, 2009 – 5 CLE Credits

I would like to extend to all of you an invitation to the Temple University’s Journal of Science, Technology & Environmental Law’s annual symposium: Intellectual Property: Innovating Locally, Protecting Globally. The symposium will take place on Friday, February 27, 2009, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Shusterman Hall, which is located on Temple University’s main campus.

Attendees may receive up to 5 CLE Credits (4 Substantive and 1 Ethics CLE credits available, approved by the PA Continuing Legal Education Board). Breakfast and lunch will be provided.

For more information and registration, please visit our website www.temple.edu/law/tjstel/symposia.html , or call (215) 204-1755.

Oogling?

Cory Arcangel is a computer programmer and by now, a well-known artist who often subverts technology in very funny ways.

Dooogle is a great project, a comment on the ubiquitous practice of “Googling someone” (see current raging debate re: the Urban Dictionary definition of “oogle”), the celebrity of the “Google” TM and search interface, and the wealth of personal information that is freely and quickly available online. Also offers a dreamy amount of possible trademark and copyright “concerns.” Dooogle uses Google’s search algorithm and graphic design but fairly — advertisements are absent and Doogle certainly isn’t selling. Parody? Not really. Could one even say use is transformative? Dilution via blurring is weak.

Had this been commercial, what about possible trademark trade dress claims w/r/t website “look and feel”? Or would this be preempted by copyright? Googling “trade dress website,” I learned that, so far, a “novel claim” and NOT preempted by copyright on a motion to dismiss: Blue Nile Inc. v. Ice.com. Also found this charmer.

–JK

Hello world!

Welcome to the new home page of the Brooklyn Law School Intellectual Property Law Association!