Podcast: The Briefing by the IP Law Blog - Fox Wins Another Copyright Lawsuit Over ‘Empire’ Character
The Briefing by the IP Law Blog: Fox Wins Another Copyright Lawsuit Over ‘Empire’ Character
On January 9, 2026, the USPTO designated four decisions as precedential and nine decisions as informative. And soon after, on January 12, 2026, the USPTO designated one more decision as precedential and another as...more
In one of the most anticipated cases of 2025, the Texas Supreme Court’s decision in Cactus Water Services, LLC v. COG Operating, LLC, No. 23-0676, resolves—on its face—a straightforward question of first impression: who owns...more
Let’s begin with the bottom line: “In sum, we conclude that email service on the Chinese defendants is prohibited by the Hague Service Convention, and thus improper under Rule 4(f)(3).” Smart Study Co., LTD. v. Acuteye-US,...more
After the U.S. Supreme Court in Roman Catholic Archdiocese of San Juan v. Acevedo Feliciano, 589 U.S. 57 (2020) ("RCA"), circumscribed the use of nunc pro tunc ("now for then") orders that make relief ordered by a court apply...more
Sedgwick Claims Mgmt. Services v. Thompson, Fla. 1st DCA, No. 1D2023-0193, Sept. 3, 2025 - In this matter of first impression, Florida’s First District Court of Appeal addressed whether Florida Statutes Section 440.25(4)(d)...more
On November 19, 2025, the Appellate Division, Second Department reversed the trial court’s denial of defendant’s motion to dismiss claims alleging violations of the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA) for lack of...more
On July 25, 2025, Superior Court Business Litigation Session Judge Debra A. Squires-Lee issued a significant decision regarding the attorney-client privilege and clarifying the contours of the work product doctrine in...more
In separate high-profile actions brought by authors against Anthropic and Meta, two California federal judges ruled that the reproduction of copyright-protected books to train large language models (LLMs) was fair use that...more
On April 28, 2025, the Minnesota Court of Appeals issued its opinion in In re Estate of Bogren. The court addressed a matter of first impression in Minnesota – whether a disclaimer of property must clearly state the value of...more
The Federal Circuit's recent decision in Recentive Analytics, Inc. v. Fox Corp. (April 18, 2025) has garnered a lot of attention. This is not surprising: It hits on hot topics such as machine learning, artificial intelligence...more
On April 18, 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) decided a case of first impression regarding the intersection of patent claims directed to machine learning training and patentable subject matter...more
Smith v. Commissioner, a pending research credit case in the United States Tax Court, presents an issue of first impression: Is a partner’s self-employment income in a partnership allowable as a qualified research expense...more
You’re spending your day off on Luna Pier beach in Monroe County, Michigan. You’ll swim in the morning, get lunch at Gander’s Family Restaurant, and rent jet skis in the afternoon. That morning, however, you wake up and...more
On December 4, 2024, the United States District Court for the Western District of New York, as a matter of first impression, denied pro se plaintiff’s motion to remand claims against a national bank for violations of the...more
FirstCash, a national pawnshop chain, cannot use the “bona-fide error defense” in its defense of a Military Lending Act (MLA) suit filed by the CFPB against the company, a federal judge has ruled in a case of first...more
In a question of first impression, the Seventh Circuit joined the Second, Third, Fourth, Sixth and Ninth Circuits—and disagreed with the Fifth Circuit—and held that a party seeking certification of an issue class under Rule...more
The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia recently found, in what it described as a “question of first impression,” that Section 5(b)(3) of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), a provision requiring public...more
On July 16, 2024, the Court of Federal Claims (“COFC” or “Court”) published an opinion, Independent Rough Terrain Center, LLC v. United States, exercising jurisdiction to consider a bid protest involving Other Transaction...more
The Litigation Byte is the new name and format for McGlinchey’s Commercial Law Bulletin. Our new format will reflect McGlinchey’s national coverage and our expanded footprint while still serving up the digestible, insightful...more
In April 2024, the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts held in a matter of first impression that a borrower must allege actual damages to qualify for relief under the Real Estate Settlement...more
Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) Jurisdiction. The Fifth Circuit held as a matter of first impression that the term “principal injuries” in the CAFA’s local controversy exception “qualitatively and comparatively evaluates the...more
Addressing an issue of first impression, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit concluded that two medications that contain the same ingredients but are packaged in different forms constitute separate markets for...more
A California state court of appeals, applying California law, has held that, as a matter of first impression, a provision in the California insurance code excluding insurance coverage for loss caused by an insured’s willful...more
In Briskin v. Shopify, Inc., No. 22-15815, 2023 WL 8225346 (9th Cir. Nov. 28, 2023), the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that the Canada-based company Shopify, Inc. (“Shopify”), which provides a...more
Welcome to the first edition of The Leisure Law Insider, brought to you by Akerman's Chambers ranked Hospitality Sector Team! It will be released quarterly, covering the latest news and developments in leisure and hospitality...more