Have you ever received heavily redacted records from a public agency? If something seems off about the redactions in a fulfilled request, don’t just sit on your hands. Sometimes, it is worth challenging them. In Monmouth County, NJ, a school district parent filed a...
How should you proceed if your city appears to be stonewalling public records requests? Is this a sign of corruption? Mismanagement? Overwhelmed public employees? Where public records accountability is concerned, there’s no single answer. For instance, in San Josè,...
Public records lawsuits—do they aid or undermine democracy? Sometimes government says public records plaintiffs “have an agenda.” Requestors say, yes, their agenda is to shed light on government operations and at times shed light on government malfeasance. ...
Do you know what matters more than the registration of your business’s trademark? Its usage. One major way that a business can lose a viable trademark is non-use for a period of three or more years -- it's called trademark non-use abandonment. The USPTO tries to keep...
Consider this from First Amendment history: In August 1977, Deborah Lipp won a First and Fourteenth Amendment case against the principal of her New Jersey public school and the state attorney general arising from her refusal to stand during the Pledge of...
For many artists, part of the intention for a piece of art is to live beyond its creator. Similarly, inventors and business owners are likely hoping to leave behind some kind of legacy. Yet, surprisingly, many neglect to make a posthumous plan for their works –...
If speech makes people uncomfortable, should it be restricted? Would such a restriction be a violation of First Amendment law? Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’s Individual Freedom Act (IFA), also known as the “Stop WOKE Act,” provoked these questions with its enactment...
This week, we are taking a diversion from copyrights and trademarks to the world of patents. We will talk about one of the simplest and most practical measures you can take once a patent is issued for a product of your business: constructive notice. The Importance...