Posts Tagged: "federal register"

U.S. Copyright Office Publishes Federal Register Notice Announcing State Sovereign Immunity Study

On June 3, the U.S. Copyright Office published a Federal Register notice regarding a study it is initiating to “evaluate the degree to which copyright owners are experiencing infringement by state entities without adequate remedies under state law, as well as the extent to which such infringements appear to be based on intentional or reckless conduct.” The Office requested public input in the form of written comments on or before August 3, 2020 to assist the Office in preparing a report to Congress on the study.

New DMCA Exemptions Including Use of Motion Picture Clips in Narrative Films for Parody or Historical Significance

One of the new exemptions for motion pictures includes the expansion of the exemption of TPMs protecting motion picture clips on DVDs, Blu-Rays and streaming services to include fictional films; the prior exemption only protected documentary filmmakers circumventing TPMs on those tech platforms to capture movie clips. Fictional filmmakers are now able to circumvent TPMs on the same platforms where the circumvention is intended to capture a clip for use in parody or where the clip is significant for biographical or historical reasons.

USPTO Announces Access to Relevant Prior Art Initiative to Import Prior Art Citations into Patent Applications

The USPTO recently announced the implementation of the first phase of the Access to Relevant Prior Art (RPA) Initiative. The initiative is being designed to reduce the burden placed upon patent applicants to comply with their duty of disclosure through the use of automated tools which import relevant prior art and other pertinent information into pending U.S. patent applications as quickly as possible.

USPTO Publishes Final Rule Adopting Phillips Standard at PTAB

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has published a final rule in the Federal Register changing the claim construction standard applied during inter partes review (IPR), post-grant review (PGR), and covered business method (CBM) review proceedings before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). This final rule replaces the broadest reasonable interpretation standard the USPTO has used to interpret claims since AIA administrative trial proceedings came online effective September 16, 2012 with the Phillips standard, which is the same claim construction standard used to construe patent claims in patent infringement litigation in federal district courts.

Patent Office amends PTAB Trial Practice Rules

Last week, on Friday, April 1, 2016, the United States Patent and Trademark Office published a final rules in the Federal Register. These newly minted final rules, which become effective on May 2, 2016, amend the existing trial practice rules pertaining to inter partes review (IPR), post-grant review (PGR), covered business method (CBM) review, and derivation proceedings brought into being by provisions of the America Invents Act (AIA). In a nutshell, these new rules change existing practice by allowing new testimonial evidence to be submitted with a patent owner’s preliminary response, adding a Rule 11-type certification for papers filed in a proceeding, allowing a claim construction approach that emulates the approach used by a district court following Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303 (Fed. Cir. 2005) for claims of patents that will expire before entry of a final written decision, and replacing the current page limit with a word count limit for major briefing.