Recent Articles

School Uses Laptop Cameras to Spy on Students at Home

February 19, 2010 16:46

Class Action Lawsuit In a case that just gets weirder every day, high school students have now sued the Lower Merion School District in Philadelphia in a class action lawsuit for using webcams to spy on students at home. The District stands accused of remotely activating the iSight cameras on the...

Google Buzz Kill

February 15, 2010 13:57

Google Buzz Google just released its new social media platform. Google Buzz allows you to share pictures, thoughts and even your location with your friends. If you already have a Gmail, all you have to do is click the Google Buzz button to get started. But wait! Security Concerns Industry insiders...

The Latest Online Scams

February 02, 2010 19:29

Not Your Father’s Online Scam By now, everyone is familiar with the Nigerian scam. You receive an e-mail for an offer you cannot refuse. The sender alleges he or she is trustee of a large sum of unclaimed money. If you will agree to take the money into the United States, you will receive half...

Top Ten African American Inventors

January 20, 2010 22:08

Black history month is just around the corner. Once again I have compiled a list of my top ten African-American inventors of all time. While no blog post could do these ten great inventors justice, I have included a brief synopsis of each inventor’s accomplishments along with a representative...

Monsanto wins first round in “nasty” patent fight with Pioneer

January 19, 2010 20:01

The Lawsuit Last year, Monsanto sued Iowa-based Pioneer and its parent company DuPont in federal court alleging, among other things, for patent infringement and breach of contract. In the lawsuit, Monsanto alleges Pioneer developed glyphosate (Roundup)-tolerant genetics called Optimum GAT....

How Do I Patent My Idea?

January 13, 2010 18:59

What is a Patent? Patents are documents that protect inventions. Good patents describe the invention in broad terms, making it more difficult to design around the patent or challenge a claim of infringement. Good patents are hard to draft. If they are drafted too broadly, broadly enough to cover...

SWAT: Sieze the Accomplishment

January 08, 2010 23:22

As the legal futurist Richard Susskind notes in The End of Lawyers?, “I cannot imagine according to what scale it is cooler to be, say, a project manager than a lawyer (with all due respect to project managers).” But when you get right down to it, the practice of law, like many other...

Virtual Parenting

December 11, 2009 23:45

What the Fork? Video games harbor potential dangers to children. So do forks. The reason forks do not grab as many headlines is two-fold. First, all adults understand forks and ridicule those who use them to self-inflict injury. Second, parents, at least responsible parents, do not allow their...

Write Reviews on Your Blog? Better Read Up.

November 29, 2009 18:16

Fines for Blog Reviews? The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued new guidelines (16 CFR Part 255) which have put advertisers, bloggers and other online publishers into a panic. The new guidelines, take effect December 1, 2009 and prohibit blog reviews which fail to disclose material...

Luddite Patent Attorneys Are More Expensive Than You Think

November 17, 2009 15:22

Is Your Attorney as Tech Savvy as You Are? You go to great lengths to protect your computer from hackers. But does your attorney? Hackers know all of your most important documents reside on your attorney’s computer. If your attorney is not as tech savvy as your company, who is a seasoned...