AmiCOUR IP Group News and Opinions

PAX Rights:
New DOT Rule Promises Fines for Tarmac Delays






 Ballooning Environmental Solutions:
Are They Real Solutions or Just Intellectual Ventures?








 Did You Get the Word?
MS Word Risks Legal Shut Down






Bubblegate: KCC Patent Application May Solve Mystery

 


Welcome to the AmiCOUR IP Blog.  We invite your comments.  Past Issues.

December 22, 2009 - Airline passenger rights leader Kate Hanni has reason to celebrate the holidays.  The Department of Transportation just announced new rules governing airline tarmac delays. Refusing to release captive passengers after three hours can result in fines of $27,500. Secretary Ray LaHood stated in a news release, "Airline passengers have rights, and these new rules will require airlines to live up to their obligation to treat their customers fairly."

December 21, 2009 - Former Microsoft executive and Intellectual Ventures founder Nathan Myhrvold made headlines this week when Matt Drudge linked in a reporter's article on  his "Stratoshield" idea for "geoengineering." The controversial invention comprises a unique approach to control global warming by using balloons to hoist a hose up to the stratosphere and then pumping sulfur particles  through the hose in sufficient quantity to block a small amount of sunlight.  Myhrvold claims a surprisingly affordable price tag of about $250 million, and cites the same effect occurring in nature when volcanoes erupt. Read entire article.

December 16, 2009 - If you didn’t get the word, perhaps it was because the i4i v. Microsoft case hasn’t received the same media attention as the high profile NPT v. Rim wireless email case.  Nevertheless, the accused product, Microsoft Word software using XML, potentially affects billions of documents and hundreds of millions of users. On May 20, 2009, a Marshall, Texas jury issued a two page verdict that Microsoft willfully infringed upon claims 14, 18, and 20 of USPN 5,787,449. Read entire article.

December 4, 2009 - Cold fusion seems to be the third rail of physics research. In late November, a former Oak Ridge researcher and Purdue University professor, Dr. Rusi Teleyarkin, was stripped of federal funding for 28 months by the Office of Naval Research (ONL) after struggling for years to prove his bubble fusion results weren't mere Swiss cheese. UCLA researchers failed to replicate Teleyarkin's dramatic yet controversial results (video).  Purdue admonished his academic conduct in findings used by ONL for its "bubblegate" investigation. In the IP world, there is no evidence anyone has cut funding for Teleyarkin's 2003 patent application, still  working its way through the USPTO. Teleyarkin's work is directly cited on at least two published US applications. Read entire article.