(via IPKat). Halliburton has lost its appeal on its case against Smith international with regards to software for designing drill bits. The software patent involved in Halliburton v Smith protected a software simulation program for designing the drill bits. Halliburton sued Smith, claimed it held patents in both the drill Read more
A Spanish court in Pontevedra has ruled in favour of the Sociedad General de Autores y Editores (SGAE) against a café named Direccion000. SGAE initiated action against the cafe to claim royalties for de public performance of music in the locale, while the owners claimed that they did not have Read more
The Californian Supreme Court has ruled on the case of Barrett v Rosenthal. The case was brought by two doctors who operated a website that exposed health frauds. The defendant is one Ilena Rosenthal, who hosts an online forum and discussion group. The two plaintiffs alleged that Rosenthal and others Read more
The GPL does not contravene American antitrust law, according to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. The appeal case is Wallace v IBM, Red Hat and Novell, in which one Mr Daniel Wallace claimed that he would like to compete against the Linux operating system by selling derivatives or writing Read more
I’ve finished reading Aerotel v Telco Holdings, and I have to say that I have been impressed with a lot of the excellent reasoning displayed by Lord Justice Jacob in the ruling. I have selected some quotes: “[…] despite the fact that such patents have been granted for some time Read more
The England and Wales Court of Appeal has decided on the case of Aerotel Ltd. v Telco Holdings Ltd & Ors [2006] EWCA Civ 137. This seems to be one of those decisions that splits opinions, or rather, unites them into a negative opinion regardless of the side of the Read more
A woman in Florida has won $11.3 million USD (¢6 billion Costa Rican colones) in an online defamation case. Sue Scheff has a company called Parents Universal Resource Experts, which provides assistance to troubled teenagers. Scheff filed a defamation lawsuit in her State against a Louisiana woman who posted a Read more
Groklaw has the story of yet another court victory for the GPL in Germany. This is the second such court ruling in Germany, which I find ironic as I was once involved in a heated argument with a German law professor who assured me that open source licensing in general, Read more
(via Out-Law) The England and Wales High Court has ruled that email addresses are not to be considered signatures (Metha v J Pereira Fernandes SA [2006] EWHC 813 (Ch)). JPF is a Portuguese company that supplies bedding products, and supplied then to a British company called Bedcare Ltd. Bedcare failed Read more
(via OUT-Law) The English Court of Appeals has finally ruled in the long running case of the Office of Fair Trading v Lloyds TSB Bank & Others [2006] EWCA Civ 268. The dispute was initially brought by the OFT against several credit card comanies to make sure that they fulfilled Read more