Too Much Trademark “Melodrama”: Court Sanctions Author for Fraudulently Registering Book Publisher’s Trademark . . . and Then Using the Registration to Claim Publisher Is a Trademark Infringer

The burden of showing fraud in a trademark filing is ever-evolving but always high. A similarly high standard applies when it comes to meeting the “exceptional case” requirement for an award of attorneys’ fees for the prevailing party. Nevertheless, some cases involve such obvious wrongdoing that the burdens can be met before discovery even opens.

Photographer William Eggleston Beats Claim By Collector For Creating New Prints Outside Of Edition

On March 29, 2012, U.S. District Judge Deborah Batts dismissed collector John Sobel’s complaint against celebrated fine art photographer William Eggleston. The lawsuit stemmed from allegations that Eggleston diluted the value of Sobel’s limited edition Eggleston prints when Eggleston created additional reprints derived from the same images, but of a different size, medium and print

Southern District Not Buying Digital Music Marketplace

Founding executive editor of Wired Magazine Kevin Kelly once observed that, at its core, the Internet is the world’s largest copying machine and that the digital economy has been built on a stream of copies. Unfortunately for the hopes of digital music reseller ReDigi, Judge Sullivan of New York’s Southern District agreed, granting Capitol Records’
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Copyright In the Data Age: Nancy E. Wolff to Lead Discussion

CDAS Partner Nancy E. Wolff is one of the attorneys leading the session New Cases in Copyright Law – Internet and Beyond at the Fundamentals of Copyright Law in the Data Era event in Chicago and New York. The discussion will cover all the major recent copyright decisions. See below for a full event description:
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Ora TV Buys Stick Figure Productions

Ora TV, the digital network backed by Carlos Slim, today announced that it has purchased CDAS client Stick Figure Productions, a specialist in documentaries and unscripted television production. Stick Figure, represented by CDAS partner Frederick P. Bimbler, has produced over 250 hours of television for more than 40 networks including: “American Gypsies,” “Repossessed” and “Amish: Out

Tory Burch Sinks Fashion Pirates

Luxury fashion brand Tory Burch scored a victory in the Northern District of Illinois Eastern Division, as the court granted its motions for a temporary restraining order, domain name transfer order and other relief against a syndicate of Chinese counterfeiters selling counterfeit goods across the internet. The unnamed defendants were using hundreds of interactive websites

Columbia Pictures Industries v. Fung: IsoHunt Found Liable for Contributory Infringement

The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit substantially affirmed a district court judgment in favor of several film studios in Columbia Pictures Industries v. Fung, holding on March 21st, 2013 that the defendant was liable for contributory copyright infringement because its bittorrent hosting service, known as isoHunt, induced third parties to download

Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons: Supreme Court Applies First Sale Doctrine to Foreign-published Books Despite Publisher’s Geographic Import Restrictions

In the recent case of Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons, the Supreme Court held that the first sale doctrine, codified in Section 109(a) of the Copyright Act, applies to copyrighted works manufactured overseas. Kirtsaeng, a Thai national studying mathematics in the United States, made himself thousands of dollars reselling textbooks on eBay that had