Volume 2015 — Issue 1

In Japan, the services that maintain the television reception and recording device for the overseas viewers to watch the aired television programs over the Internet were accused of as infringing the copyrights of the broadcasting companies. The judgments of the Supreme Court of Japan in copyright infringement suits against these services holding them liable significantly expanded the scope of right of reproduction and right of public transmission. These judgments are surely a blessing for copyright holders. But there is a legitimate question whether such expansion would contribute to the further development of the cyberspace and development of culture. This article explores the copyright infringement issues these services presented, traces the history of the suits and examines the implications of the judgments of the Supreme Court of Japan for the protection of copyright over the Internet.

The Federal Circuit’s 2012 joint decision in Akamai Technologies, Inc. v. Limelight Networks, Inc. and McKesson Technologies, Inc. v. Epic Systems Corporation marked a pivotal moment in the federal courts’ development and application of joint patent infringement. In overruling the “single-entity” and “control or direction” rules and establishing a new “inducement-only” rule, the Federal Circuit case destroyed the backbone of joint infringement jurisprudence without a second thought. After being denied certiorari multiple times, the Supreme Court finally heard the appeal and ultimately overruled the Federal Circuit majority’s holding. Surprisingly, both the Federal Circuit’s en banc majority and the Supreme Court avoided several of the primary concerns that were the basis for the en banc rehearing in the first place, including whether or not direct infringement can occur through the joint actions of multiple entities. In contrast, Judge Newman’s dissenting opinion identified the shortcomings of both the previous law as well as the majority’s new rule and, taking the Supreme Court’s holding a step further, proposed an alternative approach which would bring a level of stability to the area of joint patent infringement that has not existed for decades.
This Article will first explain the historical development of joint patent infringement, the major judicial and legislative steps that lead to the present state of the law, including an examination of each of the Akamai Techs., Inc. v. Limelight Networks, Inc. opinions, the newly established “inducement-only” rule, and the Supreme Court’s holding and reasoning. This Article will then discuss the inadequacies that would have resulted from an adoption of either the majority’s opinion or Judge Linn’s dissenting opinion, as well as shortcomings of the Supreme Court’s limited holding. Finally, this Article will propose the implementation of Judge Newman’s recommendations and opinion and the benefits which it will entail in creating clarity and protection for method patent owners.

What do Match.com, Gold’s Gym, Time Magazine, and AOL all have in common with Internet hucksters? They’ve all been caught using automatically recurring transactions to squeeze every last dime out of unwilling customers. Using electronic payment systems, such as credit cards and debit cards, unscrupulous merchants are able to preauthorize deductions from a consumer’s account. In doing so, they can conduct “automatic selling,” or sales in which a consumer participates in a transaction as a default, and must act affirmatively to cancel the exchange. Automatic selling and preauthorized payment are dangerous for consumers, because they can easily lead to overpayment or ignorance of a transaction’s true cost, and incentivize the merchant to create obstacles to cancellation. This paper contains case studies demonstrating the spread of automatic selling throughout the modern economy, as it crops up in a diverse set of industries and contexts. It discusses the failures of current regulatory attempts to protect consumers from automatic selling; including efforts by the FTC, Congress, state government, and private regulation. Finally, it describes a simple, straightforward mechanism for reducing or eliminating the harms of automatic selling. This mechanism, called an “authorization catalogue,” functions much like a bank balance sheet, providing consumers with a standardized interface, which lists all current open authorizations on a particular bank account or credit card. It allows consumers to cancel any authorization at any time with the press of a single button.

This article examines the involvement of smartphones and social media in the execution of sexual assaults when perpetrators and their peers document rapes via handheld technology and then share these depictions using this technology and social media platforms. Particular attention is focused on the how the interactions among communicative technologies, social media, and acts of rape provide an opening to undermine rape culture, including pervasive myths about what constitutes “real” rape, within the U.S. legal system. At the reporting stage, social media depictions and exchanges may provide sufficient evidence to challenge local “rape tolerance” and push legal actors to investigate and prosecute alleged cases of sexual assault and rape. Similarly, at trial this evidence may inform prosecutorial and judicial decisions as well as juror deliberations. At the same time as they create openings to challenge hegemonic rape culture as it exists within the legal system, these technologies create new outlets for victim blaming and may complicate discussions about female and male responsibility and sexuality, both in rape cases and society more broadly. Ultimately, while social media simultaneously challenges and reinforces rape culture across social and legal environments, this article concludes that social media evidence introduces opportunities for victims seeking redress through the criminal justice system to challenge the dominant rape narratives including the “real” rape and “she is lying” myths as they function in the legal system.