Those who have hailed a taxi or used public transportation can attest to the downsides of urban transportation including dirtiness, crowdedness, and unreliability. Since its founding in 2010, San Francisco-based startup Uber has aimed to appease the unsatisfied market of urban dwellers that desire easier, cleaner, and more dependable transportation than has been available. [More]

On September 16, 2011, President Obama signed into law the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (“AIA”), the most substantial change to patent law in the United States since the Patent Act of 1952 [More]

Soon, entrepreneurs may be able offer their Facebook “friends” and Twitter “followers” more than just virtual friendship and updates on what they had for breakfast. They may soon be able to offer equity stakes in their business. In an increasingly rare instance of bipartisanship, last Thursday (Nov. 3) the House passed both the Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act (“Entrepreneur Act”) and the Small Company Capital Formation Act (“Small Company Act”), each aimed at spurring small business growth through the method of “crowdfunding,” “a form of capital raising whereby groups of people pool money, typically comprised of very small individual contributions, to support an effort by others to accomplish a specific goal.” If approved by the Senate, the bills would allow entrepreneurs to use online social networks to solicit small equity investments in enterprises, a capital raising strategy that is illegal under current securities law. However, some warn that, if passed, the legislation will increase the risk of securities fraud and speculative risk to investors among other things. [More]

It’s been several months now since my first article on the general subject of data and information in the law. Normally, I could attribute the delay to typical publishing delays, an overbooked 2L year, and an overly inquisitive (read: easily distractible) mind. But, in this case, I am writing about perhaps the most visible aspect of the topic: the privacy of personal information in an increasingly connected society. Given the increasing focus on the topic in academia, government, and media, it has been difficult to keep up with all of the recent developments. Even the turn of the New Year – often a good time for a retrospective look – hasn’t slowed the pace. There have been some significant developments in the legal and regulatory world. A small selection of some of the most significant news includes: [More]

From September 2009 to September 2010, Google’s share of the U.S. mobile phone OS market has risen a staggering 18.9 percent, going from 2.5 percent to 21.4 percent, while Microsoft has seen its share of the mobile OS market decline from 19 to 10 percent. Although such a loss in market share suggests that Microsoft’s lawsuit against Motorola, alleging that several of Motorola’s Android based phones violate Microsoft patents, is in direct response to the pummeling Microsoft has taken at the hands of Google. It is more likely that Microsoft is signaling to its current partners the consequence of abandoning the Window Phone 7 platform. [More]

Facebook has become a fixture in pop culture, with over 500 million users to date. Its creator Mark Zukerburg has been thrust into the spotlight, seemingly not by choice, with the publication of such works such as Ben Mezrich’s “The Accidental Billionaires” and Aaron Sorkin’s The Social Network. While creating one of the most widely recognized social networking platforms in the last decade, Zukerburg always attempted to put his product in the headlines, not himself or his story. The unwelcome push of Zukerburg’s personal story by The Social Network was intended to portray him, according to Sorkin, as being a part of “a very angry and deeply misogynistic group of people…[not] the cuddly nerds in the 80′s…[people who are] very angry that the cheerleader still wants to go out with the quarterback instead of the men (boys) who are running the universe right now.” The dramatic change in the amount of privacy allotted to a person, and the liberty with which third parties can take, begs the question of what recourse is available, if any, to protect our name and our image. [More]

The practice of law has changed substantially with the advent of computers, the Internet, and the “Information Age.” In many ways, these changes in the legal landscape are not surprising, as they roughly parallel those in the personal and commercial worlds. Much of the technology that has made its way into widespread use has focused on improving and streamlining existing methods. Though we certainly interact now in ways that we could not have 30 years ago, this has largely been within a scheme of roughly incremental changes – the word processor can act as a much more efficient typewriter, and hard drives can act as a very large file cabinet (or library). Court filings, collaboration, and record keeping, among many other tasks, have been streamlined; previously inaccessible sources of information are available even to those with the smallest budget; young law students may seem “dependent” on online services for their research, but they, in turn, don’t shudder instinctively at hearing the name “Shepard.” However, there is a deeper level of change occurring in virtually every area of commercial and academic pursuit. Some of the literally unprecedented advancement in data gathering, storage, and analysis is moving from behind the scenes into the forefront, and the potential pitfalls faced by the legal system in accommodating this already pose a risk of becoming a significant problem. [More]

A value-added tax (VAT) has been attacked by liberals as being regressive and by conservatives as a way to grow government. This article examines these criticisms of a VAT and concludes that both these criticisms are to heavily relied on by opponents of a VAT. [More]

For years the music industry commanded a virtual stranglehold on the dissemination of music to the consumer. The median which gave birth to the record industry, the gramophone record, was relatively difficult and expensive to duplicate. That stranglehold began to loosen as many consumer products that could record or copy audio recordings were introduced into the market. Following the landmark decision in the “Betamax case” the music industry became quite concerned about home recording undercutting their profits. The introduction of digital recording fueled these fears because digital copies, unlike their analog counterparts, do not from degradation. Eventually the Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA) was passed to address these fears and control this dissemination, while still protecting the privileges afforded under the “Betamax case.” However, recent technological advances have led the development of home recording methods beyond the Court decided scope of the AHRA. Coupled with the rise of the Internet these new methods represent a drastic change which creates a more hostile environment to consumers and the music industry alike. It is posited here that the scope of the AHRA should be reexamined in order to protect the competing interests of the music industry and the consumer alike. [More]

I. Introduction

Rising gas prices and an increasing awareness of the environmental consequences associated with the use of fossil fuels have spurred the development of the biofuel industry. “From being merely an interest of marginal innovators, it has become a multi-million dollar business – transforming economies – thanks to rising attention and support from governments and the public.”[1] With the US consuming nearly 20.8 billion barrels of oil per day, and with OPEC officials claiming they will not be able to meet the projected western oil demands in 10 to 15 years, the prospect of meeting our energy needs through homegrown and renewable resources is becoming more appealing.[2],[3] But this seemingly cut and dry solution to the US dependency on fossil fuels is not as simple as it appears. The actual economic and environmental benefits realized by relying more heavily on biofuels is hotly debated, and due to the fluid nature and unpredictability of the world market, concrete answers are hard to come by. Before considering the impact of a switch to biofuels, it is important to understand the true costs of our current oil dependency. [More]