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Home / / DECISON THAT OPENS DOORS

DECISON THAT OPENS DOORS


A bit of a belated story from the IPKat. CE Pro reports that the US Supreme Court has turned down an appeal from Chamberlain Group, the makers of garage door openers. Chamberlain Group brought an action against Skylink, the makers of universal garage door transmitters, claiming that Skylink had infringed its rights under the DMCA which protected the copyrighted software that operated its transmitter. Chamberlain’s claim was dismissed by both the Illinois District Court and the Federal Circuit and by refusing to hear an appeal, the Supreme Court has made it clear that it has nothing to add to the lower courts’ decisions.

The IPKat thinks this is quite right. Software to operate machinery isn’t the sort of copyright material that the DMCA is prepared to protect.

More doors of note here and here
DECISON THAT OPENS DOORS DECISON THAT OPENS DOORS Reviewed by Anonymous on Monday, May 02, 2005 Rating: 5

2 comments:

  1. AnonymousTuesday, 3 May 2005 at 19:59:00 GMT+1

    Ilanah,

    Your comment
    "by refusing to hear an appeal, the Supreme Court has made it clear that it has nothing to add to the lower courts’ decisions" is not exactly accurate.

    The US Supreme Court adds no legal reasoning to a case when it denies a case for review. It does not mean that the lower court is "correct" and it does not mean that there is nothing to add. Rather, due to the high volume of cases that get appealed to the court, a denial is more like a signal that the lower courts opinions are not going to cause a rift in the courts or in the nation.

    A case is ripe for the Sup. Ct. when there is a significant split on the same issue between several Circuit Courts.

    For an example from the world of trademarks, the Sup. Ct. accepted the Mosely v V. Secret case because of the split between the 6th, 4th and 2nd circuits.

    See also, http://supreme.courttv.findlaw.com/supreme_court/guides/ifpcases/ifpcases02.html

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousMonday, 31 October 2005 at 03:49:00 GMT

    display your RSS feeds on their web sites for content.

    ReplyDelete

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