The Law Office of Justin Ellis (www.LightBulbLaw.com)

03/23/2012

http://www.technology-law-online.com/article.php/20120323152444771

Technology Law Online - Technology, Media and Intellectual Property Law

03/07/2012

http://www.technology-law-online.com/article.php/2012030619081715

5 Things You Should Know When Seeking Funding for Your Startup

03/04/2012

http://www.technology-law-online.com/article.php/201203040951512

Technology Law Online - Technology, Media and Intellectual Property Law

08/07/2011

The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recently issued a disturbing opinion regarding the patentability of isolated gene sequences in Ass'n for Molecular Pathology v. PTO, No. 2010-1406 (Fed. Cir. Jul. 29, 2011). While the Court went to great pains to explain the reasoning behin...

08/02/2011

I have a number of bands as clients and to me it is always striking when I sit down for that initial consultation and realize the extent to which a band's members or founders are really in the dark regarding some of the most basic concepts behind forming a successful group. I think this is because

12/03/2010

The constitutional ramifications of civil seizures of domain names for suspected civil and/or criminal infringement of copyrights.

The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recently released a list of 82 web domain names that it has seized for alleged violations of copyright law. While these seizures technically make sense under controlling statutes, I believe, and I think many other attorneys also believe,

12/03/2010

Lenz v. Universal already has (and may still further have) had a large impact on how copyright owners must proceed in order to get content removed from sites like YouTube. This article discusses the overall case and also a recent order directing the Plaintiff to turn over documents protected by attorney-client privilege.

This case is an excellent follow-up to yesterday's article, as it is both a very important case for technology and media and an excellent example of another kind of danger social networking sites and electronic communications can represent to a party who will not keep his or her mouth shut. If you

12/02/2010

If you are reading this, you are probably on Facebook; read about the effects that information you post in your public AND private communications can have in litigation.

There have been quite a few cases of late in which judges have had to weigh-in on whether information contained in a party's Facebook or other social media account is discoverable and thus available to be used by an opposing party. This article will explore some of these disputes but, if you're the

09/24/2010

New Article: Ohio's Anti-Piracy Statute Preempted by Federal Copyright Law

Ohio's First District Court of Appeals ruled last week that the state's Record Piracy statute, 13 Ohio Rev. Code, § 133.52, is preempted by federal law, and thus invalid. This article will discuss federal preemption in general and then go on to describe the Court's analysis in this case. For thos...

09/21/2010

New Article: CDA 230 Primer, Court Fails to Address Constitutional Arguments in Craigslist Dismissal.

I know this article is a bit late, but I felt it was important enough to get out there anyway. Early last month the District Court of South Carolina dismissed claims that were brought by Craigslist, Inc. against the State of South Carolina and its Attorney General, Henry McMaster. Craigslist filed...

09/21/2010

Higher Standard for Website Terms of Use and Other “Web Wrap” Agreements?

Anyone who owns a website, whether for personal or commercial purposes, ought to have at least two agreements that are usually (read: always) written to automatically bind the site owner and any visitor: a Terms of Use agreement and a Privacy Policy. These two web wrap contracts serve (among other ...

08/13/2010

New Article:

Tim Armstrong of Harvard Law School has done a wonderful job explaining why the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 (the "DMCA") is such a mess. Mr. Armstrong believes (rightly, in my opinion) that one major issue with the DMCA aside from its shoddy drafting is that it seeks to regulate access ...