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At the end of 2014 and beginning of 2015, the Pompidou Museum organized a retrospective of the work of Jeff Koons, which attracted thousands of visitors but gave rise to several lawsuits. We commented on this blog on a decision rendered by the Paris District Court on March 9, 2017 in which the Court found that for one of his Banality sculptures, Jeff Koons had reproduced the original features of a French photograph created…
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The general rule of thumb for trademarks in the U.S. – and everywhere else, for that matter – is “the earlier, the better.”  It’s almost always the right move to file a trademark application as early as possible, and well in advance of a product or service announcement, both to (a) minimize the possibility of conflicting marks and filings; and (b) mitigate the potential for attempted trademark and domain name “squatting” that inevitably follows a…
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Is copyright registration required before you can bring a copyright infringement suit?  Everyone agrees that the answer is yes.  But not everyone agrees on the definition of “registration.” That’s the question that will be under consideration by the Supreme Court at oral argument on January 8, 2019, in Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corporation v. Wall-Street.com, LLC. Registration is not required for valid copyright ownership, but it is required if you want to bring an…
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Is copyright registration required before you can bring a copyright infringement suit?  Everyone agrees that the answer is yes.  But not everyone agrees on the definition of “registration.” That’s the question that will be under consideration by the Supreme Court at oral argument on January 8, 2019, in Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corporation v. Wall-Street.com, LLC. Registration is not required for valid copyright ownership, but it is required if you want to bring an…
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While scholars and pundits are busy listing the most important copyright rulings of 2018, a development that arguably beats them all is about to occur just as 2018 turns into 2019. On January 1, 2019, copyrighted works will start to age into the public domain for the first time in twenty years, beginning with works published in 1923. Why did we go twenty years without anything aging into the public domain? Under the 1976 Copyright…
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While scholars and pundits are busy listing the most important copyright rulings of 2018, a development that arguably beats them all is about to occur just as 2018 turns into 2019. On January 1, 2019, copyrighted works will start to age into the public domain for the first time in twenty years, beginning with works published in 1923. Why did we go twenty years without anything aging into the public domain? Under the 1976 Copyright…
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A copyright owner’s exclusive rights, codified at Section 106 of the Copyright Act, include the right to control both the reproduction and the distribution of a work. The exclusive distribution right is tempered by the “first sale doctrine,” codified at Section 109 which provides that, once you lawfully obtain a copy of something, you usually can resell the physical object (e.g., a used book) containing that copy. So how does the first sale doctrine affect…
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A copyright owner’s exclusive rights, codified at Section 106 of the Copyright Act, include the right to control both the reproduction and the distribution of a work. The exclusive distribution right is tempered by the “first sale doctrine,” codified at Section 109 which provides that, once you lawfully obtain a copy of something, you usually can resell the physical object (e.g., a used book) containing that copy. So how does the first sale doctrine affect…
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The use of a bird’s furcula, or “wishbone,” for divination purposes dates back to the ancient Etruscans, and the ritual of two people pulling on the furcula to determine who would get married first has its origins in late medieval Europe. From there, some version of the custom likely was brought to America by the pilgrims, who would have referred to the bone as a “merrythought.” Given all that history, the modern tradition…
Co-Hosted by Foley Hoag LLP and ACC – Northeast Social media platforms present countless opportunities for companies looking to connect to consumers and clients in real time. But, like so much else in our connected age, these opportunities come with a host of risks ranging from minor public relations blips to unpleasant regulatory run-ins with government agencies, and from DMCA takedowns to right of publicity lawsuits. Foley Hoag, in partnership with the Association of Corporate …

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Trademark & Copyright Law