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Intellectual Property Law in Canada: Cases and Commentary

January 12th, 2013

I am pleased to announce the publication of the second edition of my IP casebook Intellectual Property Law in Canada: Cases and Commentary.

Written in collaboration with my partners Steven Mason and Dan Glover, this book  will be of particular interest to private practitioners, in-house lawyers, law students, law professors and librarians. It includes selections from important cases in intellectual property law including very recent cases from the Supreme Court of Canada and other appellant courts to provide the most up to date and instructive set of materials on IP law in Canada. We use it in the IP course we jointly teach at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto.

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Posted in Copyright, IP Book, Patents, Trade Marks

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Most popular intellectual property and technology law blogs

January 3rd, 2013

One of the best ways to stay on top of IP/Tech legal developments is by subscribing to blogs. In the IP/Tech field, there are many very good ones to choose from. Justia’s BlawgSearch lists and ranks many of them. I subscribe to over 90. Over the holidays, and with the help of McCarthy Tetrault articling student Addison Cameron-Huff, I ranked them by popularity.

There is no perfect tool for conducting this type of evaluation. I relied on RSS subscriber counts using the RSS subscriber base of Google Reader, iGoogle and Google Desktop as a proxy.[i] I also reviewed each site’s Google PaegRank and Alexa rank which were somewhat helpful in confirming or determining popularity.[ii]

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Posted in best blogs, Copyright, Patents, Trade Marks

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Viagra patent declared invalid by Supreme Court of Canada

November 8th, 2012

In an important case released today, Teva Canada Ltd. v. Pfizer Canada Inc. 2012 SCC 60, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that Pfizer’s patent for its popular drug Viagra used for treating erectile dysfunction  was void for not meeting the disclosure requirements in s. 27(3) of the Patent Act.

To satisfy the disclosure requirements, the inventor must disclose his/her invention and describe how it works in the specification. In addition, the inventor must disclose in the specification  how “to make the same successful use of the invention as the inventor could at the time of his application”. These disclosure obligations are the quid pro quo for obtaining the monopoly right to make, use and sell the invention for the term of the patent.

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Social media, intellectual property and the workplace, is there a gap in the law?

April 25th, 2012

I gave a speech earlier today at the Law Society Special Lectures on Employment Law and the New Workplace in the Social Media Age. My talk was entitled,  ”Is There a Gap in Intellectual Property Law?”  My slides are shown below.

Sookman law society IP in social media

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Posted in Copyright, Patents, Presentations, social media, Trade Marks

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Canadian Patent Office allows Amazon.com’s “one-click” patent

December 31st, 2011

Last month the Federal Court of Appeal issued its reasons in the Amazon.com “one-click” patent case. Since the Court of Appeal directed the Commissioner to revisit Amazon.com’s application, it was not clear whether or not the patent was eligible subject matter.[1] The decision of the Court of Appeal left many questions unanswered.

It appears that the Patent Office has now determined that Amazon.com’s patent application,  “Method and System For Placing A Purchase Order Via A Communication Network” (Canadian Patent Application No. 2,246,933), is eligible subject matter. Patent Office records show that following an amendment made on December 22, 2011 a Notice of Allowance was issued on December 23, 2011. The records also show that the Final Fee was paid on December 28, 2011.

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Developments in Computer, Internet and E-Commerce Law (2010-2011)

June 15th, 2011

Here are the slides used in my presentation to the Toronto Computer Lawyers Group earlier today, The Year in Review: Developments in Computer, Internet and E-Commerce Law (2010-2011). It covers significant developements since my talk last spring.

The slides include a summary of the following cases and statutory materials:

Privacy:

Cite Cards Canada Inc. v. Pleasance, 2011 ONCA 3

Leon’s Furniture Limited v. Alberta (Information and Privacy Commissioner), 2011 ABCA 94

State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company v. Privacy Commissioner of Canada, 2010 FC 736

Nammo v. TransUnion of Canada Inc., 2010 FC 1284

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Posted in authorization, communication to the public, Computer Misuse, conflicts of laws, contributory infringement, Copyright, data protection, E-commerce, Fair Dealing, FISA, Google Book Scanning, idea expression dichotomy, intellectual property, ISP Liability, IT Contracts, Limitations of liability, Outsourcing, Patents, Piracy, Presentations, Privacy, spam, Trade Marks

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Amazon files brief to Federal Court of Appeal in the one-click patent case

April 6th, 2011

Amazon filed its responding brief in the “one click” patent appeal. As Amazon notes, “The Appeal  raises  issues  fundamental  to  the  Canadian  patent  system:  (i)  the  proper approach to patent claims construction, and (ii) the scope of  patentable subject matter in Canada.”

The appeal arises out of Amazon’s application for a patent for an invention entitled “Method and System  for  Placing  a  Purchase  Order  Via  a  Communications  Network”. The  application  relates  to  a  communications network based method and  system for  placing an  order and, more particularly, to  a method and system for purchasing and ordering items over the Internet.

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Amazon.com going to the Federal Court of Appeal

November 15th, 2010

The AG of Canada and the Commissioner of Patents have filed a  Notice of Appeal to the Federal Court of Appeal in the Amazon.com case. In the notice, the government argues that the decision of the Federal Court of Canada released on October 14, 2010, Amazon.com, Inc. v. Attorney General of Canada was wrong and that Amazon’s one click patent is not patentable subject matter in Canada.

The Patent Appeal Board rejected Amazon’s “One-Click” patent application. Re Patent Application No. 2,246,933 (March 5, 2009) for three principal reasons:

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With “One Click”, Business Methods Are Patentable in Canada

October 15th, 2010

In a decision of the Federal Court of Canada released on October 14, 2010, Amazon.com, Inc. v. Attorney General of Canada, the Court allowed an appeal from a ruling by the Commissioner of Patents (“Commissioner”) that had originally denied a patent application by Amazon.com Inc. (“Amazon”) for its pervasively successful one click online ordering technology. The Commissioner had held that the subject matter of Amazon’s application did not qualify as patent-eligible subject matter the Patent Act. In overturning this finding, the Court instead held that the Commissioner applied wrong legal tests in rejecting Amazon’s patent application, and articulated a new test that does not preclude computer-implemented innovations and business methods from being patented in Canada if they are directed to subject matter that meets the general test of what may constitute an “invention” under section 2 of thePatent Act.

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Are business methods patentable under Bilski in the US?

July 2nd, 2010

Earlier this week, the US Supreme Court released its opinion in the BILSKI ET AL. v. KAPPOS case. The Court affirmed the decision of the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals that the invention in issue, a method of hedging risk, was not-patentable. However, there appears to be some significant disagreement in deciding exactly what the Court decided, as relates to the question of the patentability of business methods. On my reading of judgment, by a majority of 5 to 4, the Court was of the view that pure business methods are not patentable subject matter in the US.

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