Apple is sued over the search technology of the IPhone

EMG Technology LLC, a one-man's company, filed a patent infringement lawsuit on Monday against Apple in the US District Court in Tyler, Texas.

The suit alleges that the navigation and display technology used for mobile websites by the IPhone infringes a patent that was obtained last month by EMG's founder and two co-inventors and assigned to EMG.

Mobile websites are modified versions of regular websites, designed for display on small screens.

The complaint is available here.

HLS Professor Challenges the Constitutionality of RIAA File-sharing Lawsuits

Joel Tenenbaum, a graduate student from Harvard, is just one of the random assortment of individuals being sued for sharing music via peer-to-peer application.

For Harvard professor Charles Nesson this lawsuit was the last straw. He is defending Tenenbaum, and has filed a counterclaim against the specific plaintiff and against the RIAA, challenging the constitutionality of the Digital Theft Deterrence and Copyright Damages Improvement Act of 1999, upon which the suit was filed.

This act is one of several legslative initiatives designed to provide a stronger protection to copyright owners in the digital age. Nesson claims the act has basically made the courts “a low-grade collection agency” for the RIAA. Suits are being brought randomly, singling out few out of the many Americans who use peer-to-peer networks, and seeking to punish them beyond any relation to the damage that they have allegedly caused. Many of these suits lead in fact to significant results for the RIAA in outside the court settlements, only because their targets do not have the resources to defend themselves in court.

Prof. Nesson’s ultimate goal is to drive the music industry to find new ways of distributing music in the digital age and encourage the legalization of the phenomenon of sharing of music on-line.

This is not the first attempt to render copyright legislation excessive and unconstitutional, so expectations should be reduced for Prof. Nesson. However, questioning the RIAA strategy may have the power to drive a change in the arena of on-line music consumption.

Read more:
Eon (Charles Nesson’s blog): The Copyright Theft Deterrance Act of 1999
Computerworld: Harvard professor offers new challenge to RIAA antipiracy campaign

Is the Poor Economy Affecting Patent Filings?

It is commonly accepted wisdom that patent lawyers will be in demand no matter how badly the market is faring. However, a recent Patently-O post, courtesy of Paul Janicke at the University of Houston Law Center, now casts doubt on that belief.

Since the economy tanked in September, Prof. Janicke has found that patent filings are down by 20%. In September and October of 2007, 513 patent suits were filed; during that same period in 2008, there were only 409 filings.

Could the decrease be due to the fact that there are fewer deep pockets to sue? As one Patently-O commentator put it, "When the host dies, the parasites die with it. With fewer profitable companies to leach off it is inevitable that there are fewer leaches."

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act Turns 10

October 28th marked an important anniversary for the digital IP community, as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act celebrated its tenth birthday. For a birthday present, the Electronic Frontier Foundation issued a scathing report, arguing that the law has been unjustly applied against "consumers, scientists and legitimate competitors."

The DMCA, designed to protect copyrights in the digital age, bans circumvention of digital rights management and other technological protection measures in return for limited safe harbors for ISPs who comply with the law's notice-and-takedown provisions.

The Act remains highly controversial, challenged from the perspectives of practical aspects as well as policy considerations. The EFF report claims that the act has failed to prevent digital piracy, and has instead succeeded in creating severe side-effects--such as harming fair use, free speech, scientific research, technology progression and legitimate competition.

You can access the EFF's full report here: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/10/dmca-ten-years-unintended-consequences