Recently in Intellectual Property Category

Many attorneys in technology-based practices know a big hurdle in winning cases lies in people clueless about tech. Judges can be particularly hard to win over because of this barrier. But not the judge presiding over the Oracle v. Google copyright infringement case. He learned computer code.

Judge William Alsup has an undergraduate degree in mathematics. And as he revealed in previous trials, his knowledge extends beyond the law. He's also quite an adept computer programmer and he even learned Java for the Oracle-Google battle.

But as David Boies (Oracle's attorney) has learned, a tech-savvy judge isn't always a good thing.

Lawyers for a Thailand native will try an eBay copyright case before the U.S. Supreme Court.

The high court has agreed to hear the case of Supap Kirtsaeng, a University of Southern California PhD mathematics candidate, Reuters reports. Kirtsaeng has been accused by publisher John Wiley & Sons of reselling its textbooks on eBay in violation of U.S. copyright law.

Depending on where the Supreme Court falls in this case, the things users can sell on eBay could change forever.

Some of the most prolific examples of digital piracy can be traced not to hackers, but to universities and college professors, a series of lawsuits seems to assert.

In each case, the schools and professors claim that fair use applies to their alleged copyright infringement, The Wall Street Journal reports. But critics say "fair use" is going too far.

One case involving Georgia State University's "e-reserve" service -- where professors can post excerpts from copyrighted textbooks for students to read -- may soon be decided by an Atlanta federal judge, who described her legal predicament in court:

Could 3D printing make 3D piracy the new norm? You probably never envisioned the day when you could "print" out a three-dimensional object. It certainly seems futuristic.

Well, brace yourself. The future has arrived.

Infamous torrent site The Pirate Bay recently blogged about 3D printing. The site's writers believe that the next step in sharing and copying won't center on copyrighted movies or music. The next frontier? Downloading actual, physical objects via torrent files called "physibles."

This idea would have been considered ludicrous in past decades. But in the 21st century, there are 3D printers currently capable of processing files and reproducing 3D objects. Is this the next frontier of digital piracy?

Federal prosecutors have secured the extradition of Richard O'Dwyer, a British college student accused of criminal copyright infringement. The 23-year-old ran TVShack, a linking site that directed users to copyrighted TV shows and movies found elsewhere on the web.

The decision to go after the British citizen has been called both strange and rare. TV Shack was operated and hosted abroad, and the only apparent connection to the U.S. was the material it linked to.

Pinterest. If you don't use it, you've probably heard of it. It's causing a lot of concern.

Kristen Kowalski, a Georgia attorney, recently wrote about the controversy on her photography blog. Pinterest allows millions of users to pin -- or add -- photos to digital bulletin boards. They can then share those boards and images with their friends and so on.

In simpler terms, Pinterest is a hotbed of copyright infringement, and unbeknownst to many, its users are on the hook.

In the wake of the FBI's takedown of Megaupload, FileSonic, a popular cyberlocker site, has disabled its "sharing" feature.

FileSonic users are now only able to download files they personally uploaded.

And it seems that other sites may soon follow. Another cyberlocker site, FileServe, has also recently taken down its sharing services, as Ars Technica reports. Yet the recent crackdown on Megaupload has some critics wondering about the future of file sharing.

The Justice Department's Megaupload shutdown raises questions about a pair of anti-Internet piracy bills being considered by Congress: Do the feds even need SOPA or PIPA to combat piracy by foreign websites?

Federal prosecutors pulled the plug on the website Megaupload on Thursday, and charged its executives with violating Internet piracy laws, the Associated Press reports. Megaupload is a foreign file-sharing website with more than 150 million registered users.

The feds' Megaupload shutdown followed a widespread Internet "blackout" campaign to protest the House of Representatives' Stop Online Piracy Act and a companion bill in the Senate, the Protect Intellectual Property Act.

But the shutdown seems to suggest SOPA and PIPA may not be as necessary as its supporters claim. Here are arguments on both sides:

Game maker EA's Battlefield is now a court -- instead of a virtual warzone. The company has filed for declaratory relief. It wants a California court to rule that their depiction of military helicopters in their popular war game Battlefield is protected by the First Amendment.

EA says that it "has a reasonable and strong apprehension" that Textron will soon file a trademark action. Textron manufactures real-life military helicopters.

Perhaps EA's fear is grounded in reality. Textron has sued in the past. In December 2006, EA faced a suit from Textron over trademark infringement. The case eventually settled for an undisclosed amount, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

About a month before its 2009 theatrical release, Gilberto Sanchez uploaded a bootleg copy of X-Men Origins: Wolverine to popular download site Megaupload. The industry was in a tizzy -- how would this affect sales?

The film went on to gross $373 million worldwide, but Fox still vowed to prosecute the Wolverine pirate to the fullest. Sanchez ended up pleading guilty in March, and has now been sentenced.

He will serve 1 year in a federal prison and 1 year of supervised release during which his computer use will be restricted.