Supreme Court Decisions and IP Law; Photographing the Eiffel Tower at Night; States Protect Internet Privacy

Here's a summary of interesting developments in intellectual property, technology, social media, and Internet law for the week ending July 6, 2018.

Recent Supreme Court Decisions Significantly Impact Intellectual Property Law

The United States Supreme Court has issued two decisions recently that have caused serious waves in the intellectual property law field. The two decisions specifically discuss e-commerce and privacy online, and as such, have created new precedents in intellectual property law. In South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. the Supreme Court held that state governments may impose sales taxes on online purchases made within their state lines even if the seller does not maintain an actual corporeal location within state borders. More specifically, even if there is no brick-and-mortar location of that retailer, or even if the retailer wholly operates online, sales tax may be levied upon their goods. Read more about the Supreme Court and IP Law.

Is it Legal to Photograph the Eiffel Tower at Night?

While many readers of this blog generally understand the federal copyright laws of the United States, some of the European Union’s copyright laws may come as a surprise. For example, while many countries have a “freedom of panorama” law that allows for the photographing of skylines and copyrighted buildings, the European Union actually allows countries to opt-out of these laws, which results in some of the most famous European landmarks being illegal to photograph. Typically, intellectual property law in the European Union, specifically copyright law, protects the work of an artist during the lifetime of a creator, plus an additional seventy years. Read more about photographing the Eiffel Tower.

States Lead the Charge in Protecting Internet Privacy

In light of recent changes to the federal Internet privacy law, state lawmakers have begun to draft and propose legislation aimed at creating broad protection and guidelines when it comes to protecting the personal data of consumers online. Earlier this month, Congress approved the rollback of certain protections in the “Protecting the Privacy of Customers of Broadband and Other Telecommunications Services” bill that would have protected consumers’ personal data (e.g., browsing history, app usage, etc.) online by making it more difficult for companies to collect, share, or sell such consumer data. Read more about Internet Law.

Click to read last week's Weekly IP Buzz.

For more posts, see more at our intellectual property law blog.

--------

Darin M. Klemchuk is founder of Klemchuk LLP, a litigation, intellectual property, and transactional law firm located in Dallas, Texas. He also co-founded Project K, a charitable movement devoted to changing the world one random act of kindness at a time, and publishes Thriving Attorney, a blog dedicated to exploring the business of the practice of law, productivity and performance for attorneys, and other topics such as law firm leadership and management, law firm culture, and business development for attorneys.

Click to learn more about Darin M. Klemchuk's law practice as an intellectual property lawyer.