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New Media Lawyer Independent news and comment on legal technology and new media law from Legal News Media. Issue.94 - 25.10.2001
IN THIS ISSUE
LEFT SPEECHLESS - LERNOUT & HAUSPIE DECLARED BANKRUPT
The court has appointed five administrators to take over management of the firm and oversee the disposal of its assets, now estimated to be worth only $20 million. Its unclear what the effects of the Belgian court judgement will have on the Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection L&H has been given in the US, where its second headquarters are located. At its peak 18 months L&H, which includes the Dragon Systems business, was Europe's second biggest software company.
CRACKING RESULTS FROM ELITE
The company reported net income of $1.9 million for the third quarter, compared with income for the same quarter last year of $850,000, before write-off of the value of in-process research & development (IPR&D) associated with the Law Manager acquisition. For the first nine months of this year, the company's net profit of $2.9 million increased from a profit of $1.4 million, before the IPR&D write-off, in the comparable period of 2000.
WESTLAW TURNS THE NEXT PAGE AND MOVES INTO KM
Although NextPage is almost unheard of among UK firms, the deal will help international practices, such as Baker & McKenzie, and US firms with London offices who already use NextPage and now want to be able to run it in conjunction with the Westlaw UK service. NextPage supports various document formats including Microsoft Office, PDF and Lotus Notes as well as third party content from outside publishers.
PLANS TO STANDARDISE WEB ADVERTISING METRICS UNDERWAY
According to the IAB, new standards could go a long way to improve industry relations. Various systems count impressions at different points in a banner ad's path from the server to the site, causing discrepancies in reporting. Companies also have various means of factoring in when web crawlers request or servers cache a web page.
In its attempt to reconcile the differences, the IAB has hired PricewaterhouseCoopers, which is collecting information from the technical and sales staff at 11 major internet companies, including third party ad servers, portals and destination sites. The consultants are examining the processes for measuring ad impressions, page impressions, clicks, unique users and total visits. By looking at the most common practices, the industry group hopes to set standards called ad campaign measurement guidelines by mid-November.
A preliminary draft seen by CNET News.com service suggests that publishers may be forced to pay a steep price. Specifically, the draft recommends recording an impression "as late as possible in the process of delivery...to the user's browser." That means millions of ads that are interrupted before appearing on a browser window, for whatever reason, would not count. The draft recommends filtering out the effects of automated searches that inflate the total number of pages viewed and also hints at new rules for dealing with data-hosting techniques known as caching that have historically undercounted the total number of ads served.
LEGAL NEWS IN BRIEF
Campaigners had hoped MEPs sitting on the Committee on Citizens Freedoms and Rights, Justice & Home Affairs would have approved the alternative opt-in method, which would mean that users would only receive commercial email only if they requested it first. The move towards an opt-out approach represents a one hundred percent reversal of the committee's previous policy however there is still plenty of time for the MEPs to change their minds again as this week's vote is only the fifth stage (first reading) of seven before the Telecoms Data Protection Directive becomes EU law.
DATA PROTECTION ACT NOW IN FORCE - In case you missed it but the first transitional period for the UK's Data Protection Act (1998) ended earlier this week and the second started on Wednesday 24 October. What this basically means is that citizens now have far greater rights to require businesses to hand over whatever personal data they possess on someone - whether electronically or on paper - for a fee of no more than £10 and within 40 days.
MICROSOFT: THE JUDGE PLAYS FAIR - In a move designed to avoid any allegations of undue influence, the new trial judge in the Microsoft versus US Department of Justice antitrust lawsuit - Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly - has sold all her shareholdings in companies whose share values could be affected by her decision in the case.
AUSTRALIAN PC CHARITY HEAD WANTED - Colin Bayes, the founder of the Australian charity PCs for Kids, has been issued with an arrest warrant after failing to turn up to a court hearing in Victoria, Australia over a fraud related offence of "obtaining property by deception". There is also the threat of two summonses against Bayes on another two counts of obtaining property by deception. All charges relate to bank accounts run under the PCs for Kids name and amount to Au$60,000 although a car belonging to the charity also appears to be missing. The charity's treasurer said Bayes had been dismissed as president as soon as he was charged with the offence last month.
TECHNOLOGY IN THE POST SEPTEMBER 11 WORLD
"The events of September 11 have shown how vulnerable businesses' IT and communications are, and how necessary it is to have disaster recovery plans and effective back-ups of data," says Andrew Rigby, Head of e-business & banking technology at Tarlo Lyons. "Many businesses are now inevitably reviewing and testing their plans and strategies. From this, some businesses will need to review their contractual relationships, assess their liability risks and put in place new procurement contracts related to such issues."
Some of the intimated proposals in the Bill which could impact upon IT and communications include:
"It is likely that those businesses in the transport and financial services sectors and internet service providers, will face the brunt of the new anti-terrorist laws in their technological environments," says Rigby.
A broad legal framework currently exists in these areas, but clearly amendments to current legislation will be required to meet changing demands and the new emphasis on intelligence gathering and surveillance. For example, money laundering laws place some obligations to report suspected transactions aimed at laundering the proceeds of crime, but do not provide for ongoing monitoring.
In addition, current Data Protection and Telecommunications legislation prohibits the use of covert technology for the monitoring, tracking and collection of general data, but only allows communications service providers to retain data for billing. Some of the proposed measures may also alter current laws in the fields of data protection and interception of communications, and raise issues regarding human rights. Current information on proposed changes to anti-terrorism laws is still scant, but as an aide to compliance, there are measures which businesses can and should be taking now.
Tarlo Lyrons recommend businesses should:
MORE SPONSORED TLDS ON THE WAY ?
The new .museum TLD is unlikely to be of as much interest as .biz or .info however it does provide a useful pointer for the way future niche domain name extensions may be introduced by ICANN. Sponsored TLDs differ from unsponsored TLDs (.com etc) in that they are targeted at a much more specific niche. On this basis policy development relating to the sponsored TLD is delegated by ICANN to the sponsor that will operate as a mini-ICANN, relieving the organisation to concentrate on regulating the broader appeal TLDs. A key issue here, therefore, will be the accountability of these new registries under the ICANN structure - presumably on all matters other than the broadest policy matters it is the sponsor who you will have to look to.
Registration will involve validation of information provided in order to confirm that strict criteria have been met. In the case of .museum, the requirement for registering a domain will comply with criteria defined by MuseDoma, the TLD's sponsor. These include (a) being a museum conforming to the definition of a museum according to the International Council of Museums - on the MuseDoma's founding members (the other is the J Paul Getty Trust) (b) being a professional working in a museum, or (c) being an organisation working closely with museums.
Where second and third level names are generic (e.g. a town or exhibit category) these will be set up for use by multiple registrants. An example domain would be VandA.art.london.museum, where other domains ending in .art.London.museum would still be available, such as The Tate Gallery.
There will be no reservation period for intellectual property owners and since all applications will be checked and validated prior to the registration of a domain, IP abuse should be limited. There is also a dispute resolution process called the CEDRP (Charter Eligibility Dispute Resolution Policy), which can be used to challenge those you think do not qualify. Otherwise it's first come first served.
INDUSTRY & PROFESSIONAL NEWS IN BRIEF
NEW PATENT JUDGE - The recent appointment of Michael Fysh QC, who last week was appointed a judge for the Patents County Court, has been warmly welcomed by the Chartered Institute of Patent Agents as a sign that the court will continue its reputation for the speedy and efficient resolution of patent disputes. Judge Fysh is a former editor of the Reports of Patent Cases and Fleet Street Reports series.
SOME FIRMS ARE STILL HIRING - Sinan Utku has just joined the technology & IP group of the London offices of the US-based firm Covington & Burling. He is one of seven new lawyers joining the London office, a point worth noting as this seems to be one of the few firms still hiring staff at the present time. The firm also pays US-style salaries - newly qualifieds earn £85,000. Only US firm Skadden Arps in London pays more to its newly qualifieds, at £92,000 per annum. Magic circle firms pay an average of £55,000 pa. Incidentally, the firm was also one of the earliest to get onto the web hence its enviable www.cov.com domain name.
CHANGES AT LEGALVOICE - LegalVoice, the US marketing and PR agency that specialises in the law firms and legal IT sector, has promoted two well known industry players to key posts. Molly George, whose track record goes back to Quorum, is the new president, while Matt Lafata, a former executive vice president at Sage and Timeslips, becomes, the new executive vice president of LegalVoice. www.legalvoice.com
INTO THE WIDE BLUE YONDER - Following his recent departure from iManageUK, Tom Bird and his new company Blue Tree Partnership has put together a legal focused workshop programme. Called "Winning Legal Business in an Economic Downturn - Getting the Pitch
Right" it is designed to provide in-house communications development training to assist legal firms in successfully pitching for business. For more information, contact Bird at tom@bluetreepartnership.com or visit www.bluetreepartnership.com
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