November 2005 Articles

    • House of Lords ends Durant's data protection saga

      30 Nov 2005

      Michael Durant's long battle with the English judicial system ended yesterday when he was refused leave to appeal to the House of Lords. The result confirms the Court of Appeal judgment in the ground-breaking data protection case as the law of the land....

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    • Dutch firm launches alternative domain name system

      30 Nov 2005

      Dutch firm UnitedRoot has launched an alternative domain name system that it says will allow companies to replace existing top-level domain (TLD) suffixes such as .com or .uk with more logical, easy-to-remember domain names, such as .airport or .company....

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    • Pop Idol format lawsuit settles

      30 Nov 2005

      A dispute between pop impresarios Simon Cowell and Simon Fuller over the X Factor TV series has settled, according to reports. Fuller had sued Cowell last year, alleging that the X Factor was a rip-off of his Pop Idol series.

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    • ICANN and VeriSign face antitrust lawsuits

      30 Nov 2005

      ICANN and VeriSign are facing antitrust lawsuits over a proposed agreement between the two that settles an ongoing legal dispute and gives VeriSign control of the .com domain registry until 2012.

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    • Premium-rate prize promo stopped by OFT

      30 Nov 2005

      A Chester-based firm that distributed 1.7 million misleading ads, encouraging consumers to call a premium rate number to collect a prize, has agreed not to use misleading adverts in future, following action by the UK Office of Fair Trading (OFT).

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    • Supreme Court to hear eBay patent appeal

      29 Nov 2005

      The US Supreme Court yesterday agreed to hear eBay’s appeal against an injunction imposed on the auction service in the course of a patent dispute over eBay’s fixed price and “Buy it Now” sales services.

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    • Diversity is good for business, says EU survey

      29 Nov 2005

      Eighty-three percent of companies who have adopted diversity policies – tackling various forms of discrimination – believe that they make good business sense, according to a European Commission survey published today.

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    • Cross-border mergers Directive adopted

      29 Nov 2005

      A Directive has been adopted and published that enables cross-border mergers of limited-liability companies in the European Union, which until now had been impossible or very difficult and expensive.

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    • How to search for prior art with US Patent Office

      29 Nov 2005

      The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is developing a library of search templates that will help applicants, patent practitioners and examiners check whether a particular invention is already in the public domain.

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    • UN adopts Electronic Communications Convention

      29 Nov 2005

      The UN General Assembly on Wednesday adopted the Convention on the Use of Electronic Communications in International Contracting, which should make it easier to conclude international business-to-business contracts electronically.

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