Posts in Podcasts

So, your patent application got rejected. Now what? In this month’s episode of Patently Strategic, we’re talking about rejection. Specifically, the type that comes from the patent office in the form of an intimidating-sounding three-digit number when your application gets denied by an examiner.

This week we discuss what to expect for the patent world during President Trump’s second term, what to specifically expect from the Patent Office, what to expect in Congress relating to the patent reform bills that we can expect to be reintroduced, namely, PREVAIL, which relates to reforming the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), the Patent Eligibility Restoration Act (PERA), which relates to reforming the law on patent eligibility to make it easier to patent software—including artificial intelligence—and to make medical diagnostics patentable again, and RESTORE, which relates to overruling the Supreme Court’s 2006 decision in eBay v. MercExchange, which has made it virtually impossible to obtain injunctive relief even when patent owners win and prove ongoing infringement.

How did the World Wrestling Federation become World Wrestling Entertainment? And what lessons can we learn from this iconic trademark clash? Check out the latest episode of No Infringement Intended to find out.

On the current episode of Understanding IP Matters (UIPM), Andrei Iancu, who served as Director of the USPTO, 2018-2021, discusses how the government should regulate AI, how President Trump may think about IP rights in his second term, and how the current congressional bills could impact the patent landscape.

This week we speak with Scott McKeown, who is a shareholder at Wolf Greenfield and one of the leading U.S. PTAB practitioners. Our conversation was wide ranging but was dominated by discussion of patent reform efforts and whether the PTAB is working as intended. We discuss bad patents, PTAB reform and more.

The focus of our conversation was entrepreneurship, particularly the trials and tribulations of entrepreneurs looking to dive into the startup world with an innovative product. The road to building and monetizing a better mouse trap requires ingenuity and the identification of opportunity, but it requires funding.

My conversation this week with John White was much like any number of conversations we have had over the years over dinner or drinks. What prompted me to ask John to speak with us this week was an article he recently wrote, which we published on IPWatchdog. It was styled as an open letter to Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, the incoming co-leaders of the soon-to-be Department of Government Efficiency. In that article John explains that “the patent system is currently foundered”, but that it can be fixed with “focus and ongoing commitment to see the fixes through to results.” So, that is where we start our conversation, like so many we have had over the last 26 years—what is wrong with the patent system and how should it be fixed.

Stakeholders in U.S. patents no longer have certainty about their rights and it is affecting licensing and transaction activity and impeding innovation. On the current episode of Understanding IP Matters (UIPM), Louis Carbonneau discusses the weakening of the U.S. patent system and why he is hopeful for a future where patent enforcement is more viable but less necessary. 

My conversation this week with John White was much like any number of conversations we have had over the years over dinner or drinks. What prompted me to ask John to speak with us this week was an article he recently wrote, which we published on IPWatchdog. It was styled as an open letter to Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, the incoming co-leaders of the soon-to-be Department of Government Efficiency. In that article John explains that “the patent system is currently foundered”, but that it can be fixed with “focus and ongoing commitment to see the fixes through to results.” So, that is where we start our conversation, like so many we have had over the last 26 years—what is wrong with the patent system and how should it be fixed.

Taylor Swift: TIME’s 2023 Person of the Year, Billboard’s second greatest pop star of the 21st century, and a global icon. Yet even she isn’t immune to the constraints of copyright law. What inspired Taylor Swift to re-record her first six albums? To understand this saga and her motivations, on this inaugural episode of No Infringement Intended, we’re diving into the intricacies of music copyright law and the business realities of the entertainment industry.

This week on IPWatchdog Unleashed we speak with Heath Hoglund, President of Via Licensing Alliance. The conversation takes us deep into the world of audio, video, standard essential patents, patent pools, patent licensing, patent dealmaking, inevitable patent litigation that is often necessary when so much money is at stake, and much more.

This week on IPWatchdog Unleashed we go back in time for a historical conversation about the role patents have played with respect to innovation, and push back on the myth that patents were not necessary for the innovations that took place during the Industrial Revolution. In fact, virtually every invention of consequence during the Industrial Revolution was patented, and patents played a major role in encouraging investment and innovations actually making it to market, just as patents continue to play a similar vital role in the virtuous cycle of innovation. We speak with Arthur Daemrich about the invention of the video game by Ralph Baer, Samuel Colt and his mass produced, fully interchangeable six-shooter, which revolutionized manufacturing. We also discuss Henry Ford, Elon Musk, George Washington, and much more.

Our conversation this week focuses on Spaceport Technologies, which is a technology company that enables brand owners to monetize their IP and game platforms to offer content creators the ability to license the use of those brands within their game environment. To provide these licensed in-game experiences Spaceport uses innovative technology that reduces transaction costs and allows for the monetization of intellectual property assets. In fact, through the use of Spaceport protocols and apps the acquisition of rights and payment for those rights through numerous small dollar value transactions is not just faster and easier, the deals actually become possible.

This week my conversation is with Carlo Cotrone, who is a Chief IP Counsel and frequent contributor to IPWatchdog, both our online publication and at our in-person programs. During our conversation we discuss taking a holistic view that focuses on the IP strategy, the people, and the operational aspects of building and managing a team, which includes both in-house employees, outside law firms and service providers, all working together in coordination to deliver high impact for the company. We also discuss the need to guard against your in-house team falling into doing commoditized work, which gets in the way of your in-house team really partnering with the business and maximizing value for the company.

Transparency of source or “provenance” of digital content like images is becoming essential for credibility and, to some extent, the future of artificial intelligence (AI). On the current episode of Understanding IP Matters (UIPM), Santiago Lyon discusses the importance of provenance in copyrighted content as it exists in an AI-driven world. As the role of AI has grown in the handling, manipulation and distribution of digital media, Lyon talks about how consumers will know when digital media they view is generated wholly by human creators, wholly by AI, or if there is a blend of creation.