Chicago IP Attorney & Lawyer : R. David Donoghue : Chicago IP Litigation Blog

IP Law & Business recently named its top 50 IP lawyers under 45 years old (free registration required).  Two of those 50 are Chicagoans -- David Callahan and James Malackowski.

• David Callahan is an IP litigator and partner at Kirkland & Ellis.  As I have mentioned before, I had the opportunity to work with Callahan early in my career.  So, I can confirm that he is a top notch litigator.  Here is what IP Law & Business said about Callahan:

A political science major from the University of Chicago, David Callahan learned electronic warfare, including cryptography, as a U.S. Army Reserve captain. The military discipline has served him well. A University of Michigan Law School grad, Callahan has commanded the defense in key patent infringement wins for 3M, Amazon.com, and Gast Manufacturing in cases covering everything from one-click Internet payment systems to chewing gum additives and dental compounds. He has excelled at big-ticket defense cases involving multiple patents and parties, where his leadership and organizational skills-to say nothing of his legal marksmanship-force plaintiffs to duck.

• James Malackowski is the President, CEO and founder of  Ocean Tomo, a Chicago-based and IP-focused merchant banc.  Here is what IP Law & Business said about Malackowski:

This University of Notre Dame-trained CPA has made a name as a patent market-maker. Twenty years ago he cofounded a firm that did patent valuations. In 2003 Ocean Tomo started offering investment banking services, and it broke new ground in 2006 with the first live auction for IP. The company has conducted six so far-the most recent in April in San Francisco-that have generated $70 million in transactions, including the $15 million sale of guitarist Jimi Hendrix's catalog and the $6 million sale of patents related to digital systems media and management. The latest innovation from Malackowski? He is trying to market insurance that would lessen the cost to companies of patent troll attacks.

Congratulations to both Callahan and Malackowski.  The honor is well deserved for both men.

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Judge Darrah is seeking  a law clerk to begin June 2, 2008 for an unspecified term.  Email your application to DarrahLawClerk_ILND <at> ilnd.uscourts.gov  Judge Darrah requests that you send a resume, law school transcript (but not undergraduate transcript), three reference letters and a writing sample, preferably a full document, not just an excerpt.  Also, do not call chambers about your application.

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I am a little backed up posting Blawg Reviews, but that is no reflection on the quality of the reviews.  Check out last week's Blawg Review #158 hosted by the Mommy Blawg.  And this week's Blawg Review #159 hosted by the LaBovick law firm's Whistleblower Law Blog.

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The Chicago Sun-Times has begun live blogging the R. Kelly trial in Cook County state court at its new blog the Kelly Chronicles.  As with the Chicago Tribune's Rezko trial blog, Rezko Gavel to Gavel, the Kelly Chronicles is not IP-related.  But regardless of the legal claims, trial blogs are a great way to get a non-legal perspective on a trial from start to finish.  Fortunately for Chicago-area litigators and litigants, the Chicago papers have begun actively live-blogging local trials which should provide a wealth of this kind of information. 

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The Northern District of Illinois and Chicago's Federal Bar Association chapter are hosting their Ninth Annual Awards for Excellence in Pro Bono and Public Interest Service awards program this Tuesday, May 13 beginning at 3:30 pm in the James Benton Parsons Memorial Courtroom (2525) of the Dirksen United States Courthouse at 219 South Dearborn Street. The program is open to everyone and is free of charge.

The keynote speaker will be William Neukom, the President of the ABA and partner in K&L Gates.  Prior to his private practice, Neukom was executive vice president of Law and Corporate Affairs for
Microsoft, where he managed Microsoft’s legal, government affairs and philanthropic
activities.

Seven “Awards for Excellence in Pro Bono and Public Interest Service” and one “Special
Recognition Award for Public Interest Service” will be presented to the following Chicago-area lawyers for their pro bono and public interest work before the Northern District:

• Sara C. Arroyo and Rosa M. Tumialán, of Dykema Gossett PLLC (presented by the Judge Coar);
  
• Anthony J. Masciopinto, of Kulwin, Masciopinto & Kulwin, LLP (presented by Judge Manning);
  
• Myron Mackoff, of Richardson & Mackoff (presented by the Chief Judge Holderman and Magistrate Judge Valdez);
  
• Joshua D. Lee and Amy M. Rubenstein, of Schiff Hardin LLP (presented by the
  Judge Brown);
  
• Catherine Caporusso and Margot Klein, of the Federal District Court's Self-Help Assistance Program (presented by Judge Hibbler);
  
• David A. Gordon, Michael B. Nadler, and Kristen R. Seeger, of Sidley Austin LLP (presented
  by Magistrate Judge Schenkier);
  
• Lisa R. Kane, of Lisa Kane & Associates, PC (presented by Chief Judge Holderman); and
  
• Richard J. Gonzales, Clinical Professor of Law, Chicago-Kent (presented by Chief Judge Holderman).

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Joe Mullin, an IP Law & Business reporter, has an excellent series of posts on his The Prior Art blog discussing the Harris v. Fish & Richardson case and the Patent Troll Tracker -- click here for this blog's coverage of the Harris case.  Mullin has three posts with lots of details and has promised a fourth:

1. Harris has dropped his subpoena for a deposition of Rick Frenkel, the previously anonymous creator and author of the Patent Troll Tracker -- click here for the post.  The post includes detailed analysis of each party's declaratioins and allegations about the other. 
   
   
2. Frenkel, in a declaration related to the subpoena for his deposition, stated that his Patent Troll Tracker blog will return -- click here for the post.  Unfortunately, Frenkel did not give a date for his blog's return.  While I have not always agreed with the Troll Tracker (for example, I  am not a fan of the "Troll" name), Frenkel researches and writes very well and it will be good to have his voice back as part of the blog conversation.
   
   
3. Mullin's third post is a detailed analysis of whether Frenkel is a reporter, including an analysis of Harris's arguments, through the Niro Scavone firm, that he is not -- click here for Mullin's post.  Mullin concludes that Frenkel is a reporter.  The facts that he wrote anonymously, did not reveal his sources and was advocating a position (which Harris argued meant Frenkel was not a reporter) do not mean Frenkel could not be reporting.  Mullin explains that there is a long history of both advocacy in reporting and anonymous reporting, and that reporters generally do not reveal anonymous sources.
   
   
4. Mullin promised a fourth post this week about anonymous blogging, a subject I have weighed in on several times -- click here for the Blog's anonymous blogging posts.  I will likely comment on Mullin's post once it is up.  But I think he previewed his position when he posted over the weekend that he was discontinuing moderation of comments and welcomed anonymous comments.

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Chicago-Kent Professor Graeme B. Dinwoodie, an associate dean and director of the program in Intellectual Property Law, is receiving the 2008 Pattishall Medal for Teaching Excellence from the International Trademark Association ("INTA").  Professor Dinwoodie will also receive the 2008 Ladas Memorial Award for his  law review article with University of Iowa Professor Mark D. Janis, Confusion Over Use: Contextualism in Trademark Law, published last year in the Iowa Law Review. The awards will be presented May 17 at INTA’s 130th Annual Meeting in Berlin.

Congratulations on both honors Professor Dinwoodie.

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Since writing my May Carnival of Trust post (click here for the post), several others have commented on Web Strategy by Jeremiah's post suggesting that people do not trust bloggers.  Of course, the real point of the studies Owyang cites is that people do not trust an unspecified blogger as much as their family or other unspecified news sources.  As I said before, that should be an expected result and it shows good judgment.  But it is easy to get caught up in the survey and miss the fact that people trust "their" bloggers -- those that they have entered a conversation with, read regularly and, therefore, have developed a trust with.  Several others have picked up on Owyang's post and the surveys, with similar comments.  I am posting them in an Addendum to avoid breaking the Carnival of Trust ten post rule (although I will update that post with a link to this one).  Here are some of the commentaries:

• Kevin O'Keefe at LexBlog and Real Lawyers Have Blogs says that he must be trusted, there is no explanation for his site traffic and speaking engagements except trust -- click here for Kevin's post:

People put their butts on the line at least once a month asking me to speak in front of large groups. Just received invites to speak at the Texas Bar Annual Conference and to keynote at a Wisconsin Bar Association Conference. I don't know any of the people who invite me. They're reading my blog. If they didn't trust what I was writing, would I get an invite?

Law firms, from solo's to the largest in the country, call me for advise on blogging. The same firms subscribe to LexBlog's blog service. No other way those folks know me than my blogging.

And for the record, Kevin is wrong, he is pretty funny.  But he is correct in that the legal community would not keep reading his blog for the humor alone, it is for his insights coupled with his delivery.

• Kevin also cited Bill Ives at the Fast Foward Blog who had similar comments, arguing that blogs (as opposed to MSM sources) require more work on the part of readers to determine whether they should trust the blogger and on the part of the blogger to cultivate and earn that trust -- click here for the post:

Blogs are conversations and they do put more responsibility on the reader to judge the material than say, the New York Times, with its army of fact checkers. But even the NYT gets it wrong some times and everyone has some type of bias. Blogs are also a medium. The NYT also has many of them. Do you trust a magazine article more than television? In each case, the answer would be it depends on the person. This is not say that communication channels do not have their own properties. Naturally, seeing someone on TV gives you more information than a magazine article. Blogs are usually the voice of a single person or a group of individuals and not an editorial board. However, a blogger has to build the trust of his or her audience by being consistent and transparent as the first commenter wrote above.

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Welcome to the May 2008 Carnival of Trust.  For regular Blog readers, this will be a slight departure from the case analysis format you have come to expect.  But I promise you the trust-related links will still be valuable reading for IP litigators and IP litigants.  And in the spirit of the Carnival, I will now proceed to build your trust in me by following through on that promise.

The Carnival of Trust is a monthly, traveling review of ten of the last month's best posts related to various aspects of trust in the business world.  It is much like the weekly Blawg Reviews that I post links to and have hosted, but those generally contain far more than ten links.  My job this month was to pick those ten posts for you and provide an introduction to each post that makes you want to click through and read more. 

Do you trust me?  Jeremiah Owyang at Web Strategy by Jeremiah says you do not , unless you are related to me.  But the real point of Owyang's post and the studies he cites is that people do not trust an unspecified blogger as much as their family or other unspecified news sources.  That is not surprising and even shows good judgment.  As Anne Reed at the Deliberations blog points out, choosing blogs is about developing trust.  You find a few that you like and trust, trust developed by entering that blogger's conversation and developing confidence in that person's posts, and based on your trust in those blogs, you begin to find other quality blogs:

I learned the territory one or two blogs at a time, first coming to like and trust a few blogs (and bloggers) and then following their links and blogrolls to others. 

Continue Reading...

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In addition to the new regional IP blogs, here are several new legal resources:

• Startup guru Guy Kawasaki has started the Alltop project which categorizes blogs by subject matter and aggregates blog content  for each subject on a single page.  The law Alltop site is excellent, although I would suggest adding the Chicago IP Litigation Blog.  It is like having someone else set up and update feed readers for you.  This is how Alltop describes itself:

We help you explore your passions by collecting stories from “all the top” sites on the web. We’ve grouped these collections — ”aggregations” — into individual Alltop sites based on topics such as environment, photography, science, celebrity gossip, fashion, gaming, sports, politics, automobiles, and Macintosh. At each Alltop site, we display the latest five stories from thirty or more sites on a single page — we call this “single-page aggregation.”

• The Patent Appeal Tracer follows patent cases from filing of a Federal Circuit appeal, after many of the regional IP blogs stop following them, until an opinion issues, when Patently-O and others take over.  It is an interesting idea and a well written blog.  As an example of what they do, check out this recent post on the Federal Circuit appeal of Northern District case Ball Aerosol and Specialty Container, Inc. v. Limited Brands, Inc., No. 05 C 3684 (N.D. Ill.) (Der-Yeghiayan, J.) -- click here or here for coverage of the case in the Blog's archives.

[UPDATE]:  The Chicago IP Litigation Blog has been added to Alltop's law page.  Thanks Guy.  Now, if I could just get Kawasakied.

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On Monday, the Blog will host the May Carnival of Trust.  The Carnival of Trust is a monthly compendium of blog postings related to trust in business, trust in selling, trust in society at large.  It is kept interesting by the vibrant and varied commentary of each month's host, and by the ten post limit for each month.  Click here to submit your trust-related posts for the Carnival.

Click here to check out the April Carnival at the True Colors Consulting Blog, and click here for the March edition at Duncan Bucknell's IP Thinktank Blog.

Read more about the Carnival of Trust here at Charles Green's Trust Matters Blog.

And while I am discussing blog carnivals, do not miss this week's Blawg Review #157 hosted by Thoughts from a Management Lawyer.

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Shortly after my Friday post updating the list of regional IP blogs, Mark Walters, of the Washington State Patent Law Blog, pointed out that I had left him off the list.  The mistake was unintentional and I have remedied it in the original post and the list that follows this paragraph.  In the process of gathering links to revise my list, I came across the Georgia Patent Law Blog in the Washington State Patent Law Blog's blogroll.  So, now I have two blogs to update:

Australian Trademarks Law Blog*

Canadian Trademark Blog

Delaware IP Law Blog

E. D. Texas Blog

Florida IP Blog*

Georgia Patent Law Blog (N.D. Georgia)

Illinois Trial Pratice Weblog (okay, it is not IP specific, but it is regional and provides excellent content)

IP Dragon(China) 

IP Legal Lounge

Las Vegas Trademark Attorney

Los Angeles Intellectual Property Trademark Attorney Blog

Maryland Intellectual Property Law Blog*

Patent Trademark Blog(some Orange County focus) 

Seattle Trademark Lawyer Blog

Tech Law Forum Blog (N.D. Cal.)

Washington State Patent Law Blog

If you know of other regional IP blogs, post a comment or send me an email and I will add them to the list. 

*These are blogs developed and hosted by LexBlog just like this Blog.

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Magistrate Judges Geraldine Soat Brown and P. Michael Mahoney were each reappointed for an additional eight year term -- click here for the Northern District's press release.*    Judge Brown's reappointment was for her second 8-year term. 

Judge Mahoney will serve his fifth 8-year term.  He began as a part-time magistrate judge in 1976, and was appointed full-time in 1992. Judge Mahoney is the longest sitting magistrate judge serving in the Seventh Circuit.

*  Unlike Article III judges (such as district judges), magistrate judges are appointed to serve for eight year terms.

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Since my last post listing the Blog's "cousin" blogs -- regional IP blogs – another has joined the family. The Los Angeles Intellectual Property Trademark Attorney Blog, published by Milord & Associates.  Welcome to the family. Here is the revised list:

 

Australian Trademarks Law Blog*

Canadian Trademark Blog

Delaware IP Law Blog

E. D. Texas Blog

Florida IP Blog*

Georgia Patent Law Blog (N.D. Georgia)

Illinois Trial Pratice Weblog (okay, it is not IP specific, but it is regional and provides excellent content)

IP Dragon(China) 

IP Legal Lounge

Las Vegas Trademark Attorney

Los Angeles Intellectual Property Trademark Attorney Blog

Maryland Intellectual Property Law Blog*

Patent Trademark Blog(some Orange County focus) 

Seattle Trademark Lawyer Blog

Tech Law Forum Blog (N.D. Cal.)

Washington State Patent Law Blog

[UPDATE]:  I was quickly reminded that I forgot the excellent Washington State Patent Law Blog, which has been added to this post, and in that process I discovered the Georgia Patent Law Blog, also added, thanks to Mark Walter's (Washington State Patent Law Blog) blog roll.

If you know of other regional IP blogs, post a comment or send me an email and I will add them to the list.  A hat tip to Mike Atkins for pointing out the new blog at his Seattle Trademark Lawyer blog.

*These are blogs developed and hosted by LexBlog just like this Blog.

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I have several smaller IP-related items today, none of which warranted a single post:

• The Wall Street Journal reported last Friday that the Patent Reform Act (S. 1145) will likely not reach the Senate floor -- click here for the story.  It was widely reported throughout the first quarter that the bill was expected to be brought to the full Senate by March or April of this year.  The WSJ reported that the Act's move out of the Judiciary Committee stalled because of a stalemate over the Act's controversial damages provision.
  
• Virtually Blind hosts a Blawg Review #156 focused on, no surprise, all thinks virtual and Second Life.
  
• The John Marshall Law School is hosting a free presentation by Southern Methodist University Law School Professor Shubha Ghosh tited IP as CP:  Competition Policy Norms in Intellectual Property Law.  Click here for registration information.
  
• The final edition of the 2008 Chicago IP Colloquium is this afternoon from 4:10 - 5:50 pm.  The presentation will be by Professor Mark McKenna of the Saint Louis University School of Law about his paper Testing Modern Trademark Law's Theory of Harm.  It looks like it will be another excellent IP discussion.
  
• The Lewis & Clark Law School has a new podcast up with Chicago-Kent College of Law's Associate Dean and Director of the Program in Intellectual Property Law Graeme B. Dinwoodie. Professor Dinwoodie speaks about developing trademark defenses.

 

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Blawg Review #155 is up at the California Blog of Appeal.  It focuses on (bad) poetry in honor of National Poetry Month and takes a look at stress in the legal profession.

Also, the excellent Las Vegas Trademark Attorney has a detailed post -- click here for the post -- about the Roscoe's v. Rosscoe's Chicago chicken and waffle restaurant trademark suit that I posted about last week -- click here for the post.

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Blawg Review #154 is up at the Health Blawg, which covers health care law.  The Review's theme this week is World Health Day, but it also points to an interesting story related to anonymous blog comments.  SCOTUS Blog eliminated its comments feature -- click here for the SCOTUS post explaining their reasoning.  This is especially interesting because in October 2006, SCOTUS began requiring that commenters provide their full names before posting.  They hoped that this would stop "silly sniping" by anonymous commenters.  Unfortunately, after eighteen months, the sniping had not stopped.  So, they closed comments completely, although you can still email them comments and they will consider adding the best directly to the posts.

Unfortunately, the SCOTUS experiment suggests that civility may not be enforceable on the internet.  Perhaps the social constructs that maintain civility in real world conversations -- knowing that you will have to work with the target of your words the next day, watching your target's reaction in real time, or bystanders acting as civility referees -- cannot be duplicated online. 

Below is Crime & Consequences' take on the SCOTUS comments decision:

I, for one, enjoy exchanging ideas with people who can remain civil while disagreeing. Regrettably, commenting on blogs too often involves opening oneself to ad hominem attacks and choosing between letting a public attack go unanswered or wasting time responding. The choices for a blog that has this problem are to (1) let it go uncorrected; (2) police the comments, an expenditure of time that few sponsors wish to make; or (3) turn off the comments, as SCOTUSblog has now done. If the sponsor chooses to let the problem go uncorrected, what typically happens is that thoughtful people stop or greatly reduce commenting, and the insult slingers come to dominate the comments. Choices (1) and (3) lead to the same result, then, that a useful medium is eliminated either de facto or de jure.

So the decline in civility of our society claims another victim. The SCOTUSblog experiment shows that uncivil behavior is reduced when people have to show themselves in public, but it is not eliminated. I suppose the result was to be expected, but it is sad nonetheless.

Continue Reading...

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I have missed the first few presenters in the Chicago-Kent & Loyola University Chicago IP Colloquium, but the next presentation is set for tomorrow, Tuesday, April 8, in Room 305 at Kent at 4:10 pm.  Professor R. Polk Wagner of the University of Pennsylvania Law School will discuss his article Did Phillips Change Anything?  The article poses a question that should interest all patent litigators and I am sure there will be a lively discussion.

The Chicago Tribune ran three law-related, non-IP stories that are worth a read over the weekend:

• A profile of Jenner & Block's new managing partner Susan Levy -- click here for the story;
  
• A long story on the disparity in starting legal salaries and the consistency in law school tuition rates -- click here for the story; and
  
• An excerpt by Chicago attorney R. Eugene Pincham, who died Thursday, from Your Witness: Lessons on Cross-Examination and Life from Great Chicago Trial Lawyers, which goes on sale Monday at www.yourwitnessbook.com -- click here for the story.  The essay details how Pincham prepared for trial and is a must read for all trial attorneys.  Pincham's excerpt got my attention.  I will be getting a copy of the book and will post a review when I am done with it.  Here is how the Tribune described Pincham:

a pioneering African-American lawyer and champion of unpopular causes. His colorful oratory, which drew on personal history, made him a legend in Chicago courthouses.

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I recently posted that the Seventh Circuit upheld Judge St. Eve's decision in CLC v. Craigslist. In those decisions, Craigslist was found not liable for allegedly discriminatory housing want ads posted on its site because of the Good Samaritan clause of § 230 of the Communications Decency Act. University of Chicago Prof. Randy Picker authored a post at the University of Chicago Law School Facility Blog arguing that the Good Samaritan clause, which exempts ISPs from any filtering requirements, significantly disadvantages Craigslist's bricks and mortar competitor – newspapers. Newspapers, which are in dire financial straits, are required to filter discriminating adds.

Picker argues that Craigslist (or ISPs more broadly) and newspapers should be treated equally – either both or neither should have to filter. As a newspaper aficionado, this makes a lot of sense to me. The problem is that either extreme is problematic. Filtering, at least tailored filtering to avoid a large percentage of false positives, is impractical for ISPs because of the high volume of content and small work force. On the other hand, not filtering likely harms the Fair Housing Act. But there maybe a viable mid-ground. Both ISPs and newspapers could be exempted from filtering and a take down provision could be created, similar to the DMCA. Someone who finds a discriminatory ad could send a take down notice, causing the ISP or newspaper to remove the ad. The advertiser could then challenge the notice. A take down provision would allow entities like the CLC to protect the ideals of the Fair Housing Act. And it would allow newspapers and ISPs to compete on an even playing field.

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Blawg Review #153 or rather Blarrgh Review, it is written in pirate-speak, is up at George Wallace's Declarations & Exclusions.  Wallace also provided a supplemental April Fool's Day Appendix to Blawg Review #153 at his non-legal blog A Fool in the Forest.  The Appendix focuses on non-legal posts from law blogs and off-beat legal posts.  Enjoy the Review and happy April Fool's Day.  I hope your assistant is not in cahoots with The Lawyer's Right Hand.

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I thought I was done discussing anonymous blogging -- click here for my posts about Troll Tracker and anonymous blogging.  But the Legal Talk Network's Lawyer 2 Lawyer podcast has just published an edition about Troll Tracker and anonymous blogging featuring Ray Niro Sr. of Niro Scavone (who offered $15,000 for anyone who revealed Troll Tracker's identity) and Dennis Crouch of Patently-O.  It is a very interesting set of interviews.  I only wish that Niro and Crouch had been on together, instead of in separate interviews.  Here are some highlights:

• Niro stated that no one has claimed the $15,000 reward for identifying Troll Tracker.
  
• Niro emailed Troll Tracker and offered to donate the reward to charity (at that time it was $10,000) and fly Troll Tracker to Chicago to meet with Niro and see his firm.

Continue Reading...

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The Winter 2008 edition of the John Marshall Review of Intellectual Property Law has been published and is available online by clicking here.  It includes several interesting articles, including:

• An argument for making stage directions copyrightable, Jennifer J. Maxwell, Making a Federal Case for Copyrighting Stage Directions: Einhorn v. Mergatroyd Productions, 7 J. Marshall Rev. Intell. Prop. L. 393 (2008); and
  
• John W. Osborne, Justice Breyer's Bicycle and the Ignored Elephant of Patent Exhaustion: An Avoidable Collision in Quanta v. LGE, 7 J. Marshall Rev. Intell. Prop. L. 245 (2008), arguing that the Supreme Court should chart its own course regarding patent exhaustion, instead of adopting the parties' positions in Quanta v. LG (click here for more on the case in the Blog's archives):

The Federal Circuit held in LGE v. Bizcom that patent exhaustion could be disclaimed by contract.

The confusion regarding patent exhaustion evident in the Federal Circuit’s LGE v. Bizcom decision can be entirely eliminated by strict adherence to the Supreme Court’s Univis Lens decision. Univis Lens makes clear that the sale of an article embodying the essential features of a patent claim results in the exhaustion of that claim.

But patent exhaustion is reflective of the scope of patent rights granted by statute. A statutory grant of rights should not be expandable by private contract. The Supreme Court should thus reverse in Quanta v. LGE. 261 This conclusion applies equally to any type of patent claim, i.e., component, apparatus, composition, system, combination, method, or process claims. Identifying the essential features of a patent claim, i.e., the patentably distinct features, clarifies the exhaustion analysis, results in predictability, and eliminates the confusion between the doctrines of exhaustion and implied license.

 

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Dennis Crouch at Patently-O is reporting that Cisco has amended its employee blogging policy to require that any Cisco employee blogging about issues involving or related to Cisco identify themselves as a Cisco employee and provide a disclaimer that the opinions are those of the employee alone and not necessarily Cisco.  This is a reasonable policy.  It provides Cisco's employees the freedom to blog while protecting both Cisco and its employees.  And it prevents future occurences of the mistake Troll Tracker made (anonymously commenting on cases his employer was involved in), as I discussed in my post on anonymous blogging last week, click here for the post.

Cisco also told Crouch that Troll Tracker would be free to continue blogging, presumably as long as he follows the policy.  Hopefully, that means that Troll Tracker will return to the patent litigation conversation soon, although it is easy to believe that this experience may have soured him on blogging or changed his voice substantially.  Here is Cisco's explanation of Troll Tracker's status from Cisco's official blog, The Platform:

As an employee, Rick is free to continue his personal blog, Patent Troll Tracker, in compliance with the revised policy. Rick has many fans who appreciate the information he collects and disseminates on patent litigation trends and recognize his blog as an important voice in the on-going national dialogue on patent issues.

Continue Reading...

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Blawg Review #152 can be found here.  TechnoLawyer hosts this edition, which is focused on law practice management and legal technology blogs.  It is a good read.

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Tomorrow I will be back to case analysis, but there is some Northern District news and some excellent IP and litigation blog posts worth reading, here they are:

• Ninth Annual Pro Bono and Public Interest Awards -- The Northern District and the Federal Bar Association are seeking nominations for excellence in pro bono and public interest work. Nominations should be based upon work performed in civil cases before the Northern District which are no longer pending. Send nominations by March 28 to:

Amy Rettberg, Executive Law Clerk
Email: amy_rettberg@ilnd.uscourts.gov
Chambers of the Chief Judge James F. Holderman
219 South Dearborn Street, Suite 2548
Chicago, Illinois 60604

• Patent Reform is Moving Forward -- The Senate is preparing to vote on the Patent Reform Act after its spring recess (yes, it is spring already in DC).  Here is some additional coverage of the Act's status:

271 Patent Blog -- looking at the latest amendments to the Act.

Maryland Intellectual Property Blog -- looking at the latest amendments and questioning whether proponents have the sixty votes necessary for cloture, thereby avoiding a filibuster.

Patent Docs -- taking sides, but asking you to call your Senators regardless of which side you take.

• Check out the newest entry to Chicago's law blog scene, the Lean & Mean Litigation Blog.  It is not IP-focused, but it is an interesting read for any commercial litigator or litigant.
  
• William Patry at Patry on Copyright has an interesting post about the difficulties of serving corporate entities based upon a District of the District of Columbia case involving a pro se plaintiff.  The best advice, of course, is to hire counsel because if you do not get the party served properly, you have no case.
  
• The Seventh Circuit affirmed Judge St. Eve's ground breaking opinion in the CLC v. Craigslist case.  The Seventh Circuit held that an ISP is exempt from cases based upon user content when the case attempts to treat the ISP as a publisher of the content.  This is considerably narrower than most of the other circuits, which have held that Section 230 exempts ISPs from essentially all suits based upon user content.  For more coverage, check out the WSJ Law Blog (which erroneously elevates Judge St. Eve to the Seventh Circuit), Internet Cases, and the Technology & Marketing Law Blog (very detailed analysis of Judge Easterbrook's opinion).
  

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Happy St. Patrick's Day!  In addition to a few verses of Danny Boy and some homemade shepard's pie, I am celebrating with Blawg Review #151.  The St. Patrick's Day edition comes from Dublin's Lex Ferenda blog.  Check out the Review and the Lex Ferenda blog, both are excellent.

[Update]:  Blawg Review #151 has been updated to link to my post this morning about anonymous blogging and commenting -- click here for the post.  A tip o the hat to Lex Ferenda for the late inclusion.

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There has been a lot of coverage of Troll Tracker's recently disclosed identity.* Troll Tracker ended his anonymity a few weeks ago and now faces a libel law suit along with his employer, Cisco, based upon statements he made about a case involving Cisco -- this is one of the many reasons I do not write about cases that my firm or I are involved in.

I did not intend to weigh in on this story because there was not much to add (see below for links to some of the best coverage). But then I read Joe Hosteny's March 2008 IP Today article – click here for the article -- about anonymous blogging and anonymous commenting. Hosteny is a partner in the Niro Scavone firm, a firm that was often a focus of Troll Tracker's posts. I have not always seen eye to eye with Hosteny in the courtroom, but I found his article both very good and thought provoking.

Hosteny raises real concerns about how the anger surrounding the non-practicing entity dispute has gotten out of hand. Death threats over patent litigation (even assuming they are idle threats) cannot be tolerated. These threats make me question whether the patent litigation bar is maintaining the levels of civility and sanity required by our professional standards.

Violent threats and, more broadly, incivility have no more place in the realm of legal blogs than in the legal system. But it does not follow that anonymous blogging and commenting are inherently bad – the issue is more complex than that. Lots of electrons have been spilled over the pros and cons of anonymous blogging – blog guru Kevin O'Keefe is no fan of anonymous blogging, whereas the anonymous editor of Blawg Review provides a great service to both the legal and the blogging communities with the weekly Blawg Review, despite his anonymity.

Anonymous blogging is not the problem. The problem is with anonymous bloggers who believe that anonymity allows them to comment on cases involving themselves or their clients , or to post threatening comments (Troll Tracker, of course, never posted any threats that I am aware of). If Troll Tracker had not blogged about his client's case and if he had stuck to the verifiable facts, he likely would not have gotten sued.

Similarly, anonymous commenting is not the problem if legal bloggers, including Troll Tracker, monitored and approved comments before** they went live, the death threats against Niro never would have been published. I moderate the comments to this Blog and, as a result, angry rants against a judge or an attorney (none have been violent) do not make it on the Blog. And that anonymity may have provided the writer with false courage. But I prevent that, and so can any blogger, by acting as a gatekeeper.

Hosteny argued that anonymity is cowardly and not in the tradition of the First Amendment because the Declaration of Independence was signed by the Continental Congress. But he leaves out that the Federalist Papers were signed with aliases. Anonymity can be useful in that it can provide courage to voice ideas that otherwise might not be interjected into public discourse. For that reason, I think there is a place for anonymous blogging and commenting, as long as anonymous bloggers do not use anonymity as an excuse to avoid the rules of our profession and of common sense.

As promised above, for more coverage of Troll Tracker and the defamation suit, see:

E.D. Texas Blog

IP Law360 (subscription required, but a very thorough history)

Patently O -- discussing a related federal suit filed in the District of Arkansas, including a link to the complaint.

Prior Art Blog -- detailing the history of the suit and here and here on other aspects of the story as well.

WSJ Law Blog

[Update]:  Blawg Review #151 at Lex Ferenda was just updated discussing this post.

* There are no Troll Tracker links because the site is currently either down or subscriber only.

**  Troll Tracker did remove violent and offensive comments, but only after they were posted and he became aware of them.

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While Judge Filip heads to Washington as Deputy Attorney General, the Northern District has reassigned his cases — click here for the Executive Committee’s Order. At least the following IP cases have been reassigned:

Judge Andersen

1:07-cv-05666             Dicam, Inc. v. United States Cellular

Judge Dow

1:07-cv-02883             Kids Hope USA, Inc. v. Kids Hope United

Judge Kennelly

1:06-cv-05611             Liquid Dynamics Corporation v. Vaughn Co.

Judge Zagel

1:07-cv-03339             Borg Warner Inc. et al. v. Hilite International, Inc. et al.

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