The Supreme Court has validated the ability of software developers to prevent customers from owning the copy of software they acquire. Because software developers can limit the customers rights to a mere license, they can impose restrictions that can prevent the customer from reselling the software. This is a huge…
Given the great interest in “the cloud” from a business perspective, as well as Microsoft’s popularization of the concept with its “To the Cloud!” advertising campaign, it’s no wonder that many game providers are looking to the cloud as the next viable and profitable gaming platform. The cloud movement not…
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 512 provides many benefits to copyright holders. Add one more to the list. In Xcentric Ventures LLC v. Karsen Limited et al (2011), the court refused the let the Russian Defendant play hide-and-seek to avoid service of process and authorized the Plaintiff…
A great video by Socialnomics on where social media is and where its going.
Many people invest significant time, effort and in some cases real money to acquire virtual goods. There is great perceived value in these virtual goods. But there are a growing number of cases, where users have been the subject of hacking and other situations where they have had their virtual…
The Supreme Court of the United States issued a long-awaited decision in Brown v. EMA. The decision authored by Justice Scalia (in which Justices Kennedy, Ginsburg, Sotomayor and Kagen joined and Alito and Roberts concurred) opined on the validity of California Assembly Bill 1179 (2005), Cal. Civ. Code Ann. §§1746-1746.5…
On June 21, Canada’s Federal Office of Privacy Commissioner released its 2010 annual report on Canada’s data privacy law, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (known as “PIPEDA”). According to the report, in 2010 the Office of the Privacy Commissioner: § Received 4,793 inquiries in 2010 under PIPEDA,…
The EU “Cookie Rule,” which requires companies with European customers to get informed consent from visitors to their websites in order to use most cookies (other than those “strictly necessary” for the service requested by the consumer), went into effect on May 25. As an example of how they wanted…
On April 12, 2011, the Massachusetts Department of Revenue issued Letter Ruling 11-4 holding that a product providing a customer access to information from a Taxpayer’s database is not subject to sales or use tax where the services provided do not involve transfers of prewritten software or a license to…
A recent lawsuit by SocialApps LLC (d/b/a take(5) social and playSocial) accuses Zynga of copyright infringement, theft of trade secret and various other acts concerning Farmville. Farmville is one of the most widely played and profitable social games, with around 80 million users and was released in June 2009. SocialApps allegedly developed…