Apple wants to register the trademark “Night Shift” for a class of “computer software for controlling computer and mobile device display screens,” the company said in a June 28 application (serial number 87086665) filed at the Patent and Trademark Office. Apple filed a similar application (number 69112) with Jamaican trademark authorities in January, PTO records show. Apple doesn't intend to rely on Section 44(e) of the trademark law on foreign trademark ownership as a basis for registering the same trademark in the U.S., “but wishes only to assert a valid claim of priority,” said the application, signed by Apple Director-Legal Thomas La Perle. “The application should not be suspended to await the submission of the foreign registration,” it said. Apple representatives didn’t comment Wednesday.
U.S. District Court in Boston entered a final judgment Friday in favor of Akamai in the company’s long-running patent infringement lawsuit against Limelight Networks, awarding Akamai $51 million damages. The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled in August that Limelight was liable for direct infringement of an Akamai-owned content delivery system patent (see 1508140059). The Federal Circuit’s 2015 en banc ruling, which remanded the case to the Boston district court, reversed an earlier circuit court decision from the same year. The Supreme Court ruled against the Federal Circuit in 2014 in Limelight v. Akamai (see report in the June 3, 2014, issue). The $51 million damages award announced Friday includes the initial $45.5 million damages a jury awarded Akamai in 2008 and $5.4 interest on the award, District Judge Rya Zobel said in the judgment (in Pacer). “We are extremely pleased after ten years of litigation to have a final judgment entered in Akamai's favor that recognizes Limelight's infringement and the harm it caused," said Akamai General Counsel Aaron Ahola in a statement. "We will continue to vigorously protect our intellectual property to maximize shareholder value." Limelight didn’t comment.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals punted a decision Wednesday on an appeal of a 2015 U.S. District Court ruling in Miami saying no specific Florida law allows for the pre-1972 sound recording royalties sought by the owners of The Turtles' “Happy Together” and the rest of the band's music. The 11th Circuit referred Flo & Eddie's lawsuit against Sirius XM to the Supreme Court of Florida, saying the case “presented issues that have not been addressed” by the state court, “we believe the issues are appropriate for resolution by Florida’s highest court and defer our decision in this case pending” a state Supreme Court decision. Circuit Judge Lanier Anderson said a 1943 Supreme Court of Florida decision involving magician Charles Hoffman's lawsuit against fellow magician Maurice Glazer for infringing one of Hoffman's magic tricks "indicates that there is at least a significant argument that Florida common law may recognize a common law property right in sound recordings," but isn't definitive absent a state Supreme Court ruling. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals similarly deferred a decision in April on its review of Flo & Eddie's lawsuit against Sirius XM in New York until the New York Court of Appeals rules on whether New York state law recognizes a public performance right for pre-1972 sound recordings and the scope of the state's law (see 1604130063).
MPAA Senior Vice President-Government and Regulatory Affairs Neil Fried took issue with Internet Association CEO Michael Beckerman's Medium opinion piece last week that warned against legislative proposals that would revamp the existing safe harbor provisions and notice-and-takedown framework in Digital Millennium Copyright Act Section 512 (see 1606230029). The current DMCA language places too much of the burden for identifying copyright infringement on content creators while putting little onus on online service providers like YouTube, Fried said in a blog post. “Congress did not intend the DMCA to create a relentless game of Whac-A-Mole,” he said. “But that's what we're left with, because technology companies are not truly collaborating.” The best way for Beckerman to accomplish his goal of forestalling legislative changes to DMCA is for tech firms “to work together with creators, rather than just offering more of the same,” Fried said Sunday. He said MPAA's Where to Watch search engine directs viewers to fully legal online sources for movies and TV shows “since other search engines continue to direct audiences to unlawful sites.” If tech firms “would engage voluntarily and collaboratively with the creative community on solutions that work for everyone, we might be able to meet Congress's objectives for the DMCA without having to change the law,” Fried said. IA didn't comment.
The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia erred in its decision to throw out a class action lawsuit against Viacom and Google, which was accused of illegally collecting personal information of children 13 years and younger (see 1606270047), said Electronic Privacy Information Center President Marc Rotenberg, whose group filed an amicus brief with the plaintiffs. It "could not be more wrong about the Video Privacy Protection Act," he emailed. "The text of the Act and the legislative history makes clear that Congress intended a broad interpretation. The court showed a stunning lack of understanding about the nature of Internet advertising, the role of search engines, and the significance of persistent identifiers ('cookies'). ... The discussion of [personally identifiable information] is entirely incoherent." The 3rd Circuit opinion said IP addresses, browser and operating system settings, unique device identifiers, and other pieces of data didn't qualify as personal information. In a blog post Monday, EPIC said the 3rd Circuit's opinion contradicted a 1st Circuit decision in April that said "unique Android ID and GPS coordinates constituted PII" under the Video Privacy Protection Act -- setting up a possible Supreme Court review.
Warner Bros. Entertainment joined HEVC Advance as both an H.265 licensor and licensee, the patent pool said in a Monday announcement. Warner becomes the second new member, after MediaTek last fall, to join HEVC Advance since its 2015 inception (see 1509230066). It's the first since founding member Technicolor bolted the group in early February because it disagreed with the HEVC Advance royalty structure and because it decided it wanted to license its H.265 patent portfolio on its own (see 1602040042). Having Warner’s backing will help eliminate H.265 intellectual property “barriers and greatly accelerate UHD adoption,” said HEVC Advance CEO Pete Moller in a statement.
The Computer and Communications Industry Association told the Copyright Office Thursday it supports the office’s NPRM that would significantly reduce the fee for online service providers to designate agents to receive notifications of claimed infringement under Digital Millennium Copyright Act Section 512, but raised concerns about the NPRM’s agent renewal requirements. The CO sought comment last month on the plan, which would lower the fee to $6 per designation in anticipation of a switch from using paper forms to designate those agents to an online filing system. The designation fee framework currently includes an initial $105 fee and an additional $35 fee for each of up to 10 alternate designated agents (see 1605250055). Comments were due after our deadline Friday. Lowering the agent designation fee “in most circumstances would be a beneficial idea,” but the NPRM “also suggests an unwise recurring formality for intermediaries relying on the Section 512 safe harbor,” CCIA commented. A footnote in the NPRM says the CO “contemplates requiring electronic re-registration of all currently designed agents once the Office’s proposed digital database is released,” CCIA said. “It also suggests that online services would be required to subsequently renew such designations every three years.” The industry group said it believes such a rule “would be inconsistent with Section 512, would have negative implications for continued investment in the Internet industry, and would be ultimately unnecessary.”
Qualcomm said it filed a patent infringement complaint against Chinese smartphone maker Meizu in Beijing Intellectual Property Court. The complaint seeks rulings that terms of a patent license offered by Qualcomm to Meizu comply with China’s Anti-Monopoly Law (AML), and Qualcomm’s “fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing obligations,” said Qualcomm Friday. The complaint also seeks a ruling setting a basis for a patent license with Meizu for Qualcomm technology used in 3G and 4G mobile devices. Meizu has been expanding its business through the use of Qualcomm intellectual property without compensating the company, Qualcomm said. More than 100 other Chinese companies have accepted a rectification plan submitted by Qualcomm and accepted by China’s National Development and Reform Commission last year after the NDRC found that Qualcomm had violated the AML. “Qualcomm’s technologies are at the heart of all mobile devices," said Qualcomm General Counsel Don Rosenberg: "Meizu is choosing to use these technologies without a license, which is not only unlawful, but is unfair to other licensees that are acting in good faith and respectful of patent rights, and ultimately damaging to the mobile ecosystem and consumers.” Meizu didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act has been crucial to the development of the internet over the past two decades, said Internet Association CEO Michael Beckerman in a Medium opinion piece Thursday. “While a few players are pushing a divisive narrative and attacking the laws that form the economic foundation of the internet, the reality is that we are all in this together,” Beckerman said. DMCA “is working,” he said. “The internet sector is now a global driver of the economy, reaching nearly $1 trillion -- or 6 percent -- of our GDP in 2014 alone. An era of previously unimagined cultural diversity is available globally at the touch of a finger.” The internet’s overall growth “surpasses the growth of infringing activity on a percentage basis,” Beckerman said. “DMCA has ensured that legal platforms can scale: studies indicate that the introduction of lawful online video and music platforms is typically followed by reductions in online infringement by 50 percent and 80 percent, respectively.” Beckerman said top internet companies have demonstrated their “commitment to holding up our end of the bargain” in the DMCA-created notice-and-takedown system via a “plethora of voluntary ‘DMCA-plus’ programs in use today” like Facebook’s Rights Manager and YouTube’s Content ID program. “Rather than spending their time lobbying Congress for wholesale legislative rewrites, our hope is all sides can come together and focus efforts on doing everything possible to improve the system,” Beckerman said. The Internet Association previously defended the DMCA Section 512 Tuesday, when the group said it opposes legislative proposals that would revamp the statute’s safe harbor provisions and the framework for the notice-and-takedown system (see 1606210040). An advertising campaign by almost 200 recording artists and music industry entities urging Congress to enact a DMCA revamp to rein in Internet Association member Google and other internet companies is underway (see 1606200047). Free State Foundation President Randolph May and Senior Fellow Seth Cooper supported the recording industry’s DMCA revamp campaign Thursday in a blog post for The Hill. A DMCA revamp “shouldn't be about taking sides in the disputes,” Cooper and May said. “Online service providers should retain a safe harbor for good-faith efforts to remove infringing content. But songwriters and recording artists deserve an easier and more efficient means for curtailing online posting of copyrighted music. And reforms should include simpler ways to combat multiple postings by repeat infringers.”
A new LG Electronics trademark application at the Patent and Trademark Office suggests further proof that the company wants to be a big player in components for autonomous cars. LG seeks to register the trademark “Lightminum” for a class of goods and services related to self-driving vehicles, including vehicle traction control systems, “sensors for use in the control of engines” and vehicle “braking devices” and systems, said the application (serial number 87070709), filed June 14. LG also wants to reserve use of Lightminum for a range of other possible goods and services in consumer and industrial applications, including battery chargers for mobile phones, tablets, headphones, digital signage and data-processing equipment, the application said. LG filed a similar application June 13 (application number 4020160044102) with South Korean trademark authorities, the PTO application said. “While I can’t comment on the trademark application specifically, it’s no secret that LG is working on autonomous car technologies," spokesman John Taylor emailed us Wednesday. For example, LG’s Advanced Driver Assistance Systems technologies "support autonomous driving systems," Taylor said. "The vehicle components business represents one of LG’s fastest growing areas, and our core technologies and open-standards philosophy position LG to be a strong player in autonomous vehicle components.”