Today's [7/27] Cases

Trois. Tre. 三. 


1. Najm v. Auburn Audio Technologies - 5:11-cv-03639

• Feheem Najm, AKAed as T-Pain, is the hip-hop artist probably most closely associated with trending the use of autotune. Antares Audio Technologies, the company that invented AutoTune, has been accused with "misappropriating T-Pain's right of publicity, committing unfair competition, and violating the Lanham Act". T-Pain's single "I'm Sprung" ('05) was known for the use of autotune and has "reportedly endorsed the software". However, last month, T-Pain announced his departure from AutoTune endorsement; this month, he revealed his competing product, The T-Pain Effect. "The T-Pain Effect, which the artist is developing with the digital audio processor iZotope Inc., is billed as a way for amateur and professional musicians to create beats and record vocals that sound like its eponymous star"



(from the Antares website: http://www.antarestech.com/images/tpain_295.jpg)

• This makes me wonder if/when Antares is going to file suit against T-Pain for patent infrigement (if any exists after the T-Pain Effect technology is released).
•  T-Pain is accusing Antares of continuing to use his image to promote its product "even after their business collaboration hit a sour note". T-Pain alleges that Antares pulled in an approximate $1 million from the "alleged unfair competition". (http://www.law360.com/ip/articles/260413)

2. In re: Borders Group Inc. et al - 1:11-bk-10614

• Borders Group has lost its good samaritan and last hope of preservation--Books-A-Million was unable to reach an agreement that satisfied Borders' terms. The 1,000 or so jobs that could have been saved by the Books-A-Million initially-proposed-30-store-saving-deal shall, after all, be lost. Going-out-of-business sales have now begun at all Borders locations. "Borders' intellectual property and much of its real estate are carved out from the current liquidation deal, which only covers physical assets at the stores. Borders and its creditors will look for buyers for the intellectual property and real estate separately", said Borders' attorney Andrew Glenn. (http://www.law360.com/topnews/articles/260337)

3. Ceglia v. Zuckerberg et al - 1:10-cv-00569





(http://sickfacebook.com/images/mark_zuckerberg.jpg)


• As if Mark Zuckerberg didn't have enough on his plate--dealing with the the Winklevoss brothers and Narendra ongoing attempts to claim the stake in the company that is, arguably, theirs, as well as running the most popular social networking site in the world--he's being hit with yet another suit. Paul Ceglia is suing for what he claims to be is his 50% of the social phenomenon. He claims that back in 2003, he and Zuckerberg signed a contract that would allot him 50% interest in the software and assets of Facebook (the version at the time). Ceglia is hoping to obtain e-mails and documents of Zuckerberg's handwriting to aide in evidencing his claim.
  "Ceglia's suit contends that the 2003 agreement created a general partnership between Ceglia, who provided the capital, and Zuckerberg, who provided the technical know-how, to run The Face Book, the predecessor to the now-ubiquitous Facebook.
  The social networking company has acknowledged that Zuckerberg agreed to help develop a now-defunct website known as StreetFax.com, but maintains that the Facebook founder never signed a deal with Ceglia concerning Facebook or any similar social networking service.
  In late June, Ceglia's previous counsel...dropped him as a client without explanation, though Facebook said in a later court filing that one of the attorneys had made comments to reporters that 'addressed his efforts to get to the bottom of whether his client was fabricating documents'". (http://www.law360.com/ip/articles/260483)