Sweepstakes Scams. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has settled with several operators of a sweepstakes scam. The scam bilked consumers out of millions of dollars. Included in the settlement agreement, the scammers are permanently banned from operating sweepstakes...
Incapacity Planning. Incapacity is an unexpected wrinkle in your estate plan. I am a planner. I make plans, I like making plans, and sometimes my plans go awry. Despite any prudent effort on my part, I cannot prepare for every contingency AND neither can you....
Publishing contracts The publishing contract is an agreement that defines the relationship between an author and her publisher. Publishing contracts typically contain elements that speak to territory, rights, ownership, financial issues, delivery of the manuscript,...
Common Contract Mistake #1. Not Having Written Agreements with EVERYONE You Do Business With. Common contract mistake. Without question, the most common contract mistake is not having the terms of an agreement memorialized in a written document. I am often taken...
AI and Patents. Understanding Patent Law in the Age of AI. Patents, along with Copyrights, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, and Rights of Publicity, are one of the five areas of practice that we call intellectual property law. It protects inventions, systems, methods,...
Beware of companies that say they will indemnify AI use, that they will pay ALL the legal costs incurred by customers using Generative AI services (like ChatGPT, CoPilot, or Bard). Why? Because there are so many variables at play. For example, covering customers with...
How to Trademark a Name A trademark can be a word, phrase, design, logo, color, sound, or a combination of those things that identifies the source of a product or service. Surnames can be also used as trademarks, but only under certain circumstances. Primarily...
The Ongoing AI Authorship Debate. Artificial Intelligence (“AI”), while not new, has become the new darling of the technology world. AI-generated works of art have ignited a firestorm among legal professionals. Why? Because traditionally copyright protected works of...
Everyday in the world of technology there are new AI buzzwords being used. Are you confused by what they all mean? For example, what is the “metaverse?” What is meant by ChatGPT, OpenAI, Midjourney, DALL-E, and Bard? In fact, what is AI? This blog post is a quick...