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December 31, 2005 |
Volume 4, Number 1 |
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Smith & Hopen, P.A. IP Information: FIRM UPDATE: Anton Hopen will lecture on Trademarks for the Florida Bar January 26, 2006 in Miami and January 27, 2006 in Tampa.
RECENT PATENTS Clearwater Engineering: U.S. Pat. No. 6,979,033 issued Dec. 27, 2005 for a dual function bailer. Dubats: U.S. Pat. No. 6,968,845 issued Nov. 29, 2005 for an Ambulator. Hutchins: U.S. Pat. No. D512,004 issued Nov. 29, 2005 for a truck hood design. University of South Florida: U.S. Pat. No. 6,967,176 issued Nov. 22, 2005 for Silicon Dielectric Films. RECENT TRADEMARKS MANAGERASSISTANT® was granted U.S. Federal Trademark Registration No. 3,028,969 on Tuesday, December 13, 2005 for software for logging and tracking time off, training, reviews, performance, incidents, recruitment, and expenses. This trademark registration must be renewed no later than Tuesday, December 13, 2011. IFORMAPAK® was granted U.S. Federal Trademark Registration No. 3,028,256 on Tuesday, December 13, 2005 to Iformapak, Inc. for packaging articles to the order and specification of others. This trademark registration must be renewed no later than Tuesday, December 13, 2011. IT'S YOUR HEART® was granted U.S. Federal Trademark Registration No. 3,030,121 on Tuesday, December 13, 2005 to An Ounce of Prevention, Inc. for health services, namely performing health screenings with a focus on disease prevention and preventative care; health consultation regarding preventative care initiatives and disease prevention programs. This trademark registration must be renewed no later than Tuesday, December 13, 2011. PALM ISLAND RESORT® was granted U.S. Federal Trademark Registration No. 3,026,530 on Tuesday, December 13, 2005 to Island Harbor Beach Club, Ltd. for resort hotel services. This trademark registration must be renewed no later than Tuesday, December 13, 2011. SCANTALKER® was granted U.S. Federal Trademark
Registration No. 3,024,437 on Tuesday, December 06, 2005 to Freedom Scientific,
Inc. for computer software for audibly communicating information to a user from
a scanned bar code. This trademark registration must be renewed no later than
Tuesday, December 06, 2011. |
Top 10 Law Office Technologies for 2006
Our office just picked up a 50" Samsung plasma. We had previously used an LCD projector and a silver screen. However, natural sunlight would wash out the projector's image and the resolution on the projector was not as sharp as we wanted. The resolution on the new plasma is 1,366 by 768 pixels. By comparison DVD (NTSC) resolution is a mere 720 by 480. This translates into a crystal clear image - critical for reviewing documents, patent illustrations and trademark designs with our clients. With a wall-mount bracket, the monitor is elevated four feet so that it is easily viewable to attendees. A wireless keyboard and mouse in the conference room gives us freedom to let different staff members and our clients control the monitor output.
Blackberry is currently defending a patent infringement suit brought against it by NTP (a patent holding company). Although there is great uncertainty about the eventual outcome of this case, there is very little risk that a Blackberry shutdown will occur or that RIMM (the makers of the Blackberry devices and software) will go out of business. Plaintiff NTP is not a competitor and gains little if RIMM folds. While the patent infringement suit has undoubtedly delighted competitors Microsoft and Palm, the RIMM technology is highly reliable and practical for business use. Once the patent infringement litigation is behind them, expect RIMM to continue its enviable track record in the wireless field.
In our practice, clients frequently bring in computers to demonstrate new and inventive technologies. When Internet access is required, we have a spare Ethernet network connection in our conference room. However, for 2006, clients with wireless-capable notebook computers can simply access our WiFi access point. Using WPA encryption, we provide them with a password to gain Internet access without clumsy wires or plugs.
If you work in the legal field, you invariably produce and save hundreds of documents every year. If an attorney in our firm writes a persuasive, comprehensive motion shouldn't all the attorneys have access to it? Using Microsoft SharePoint anyone in our office can upload documents from a standard web browser. The documents are stored in a searchable database that indexes the entire content of the document, not just the title. Attorneys and staff may also "discuss" the document, pointing out certain issues or caveats. Uploaded documents may be held in a queue for review by a supervisor or managing attorney prior to becoming accessible to the firm. Set up an email address and any documents sent to that address automatically are archived on the Share Point site.
When the front desk receptionist goes to lunch do you know who is at your front desk? Network cameras make it easy to monitor a lobby or reception area from any computer in the office. Advanced models will even sound an alarm, page a staff member or email a designated employee when someone is present in the field of view. Inexpensive models are available from Linksys and D-Link. However, professional grade network cameras from Axis Communications offer better optics and more sophisticated features. The cameras usually require a 120V outlet and an Ethernet connection although some can be powered only by the network connection. Once online, any web browser in the firm network can view the video stream. Sensitive views can be locked down with encrypted passwords. Wireless network cameras are also available from virtually all manufacturers which facilitate installation.
As a law firm grows, so do the headaches of maintaining numerous computers. Security patches, software upgrades and hardware failures disrupt the office workflow. As most law office personnel concentrate on word processing and legal research, a thin client may be the perfect solution. These devices have no moving parts to break. A mouse, keyboard and monitor plug in the thin client but the actual programs are run on the server. To the employee, the experience is the same but numerous employees can run the same programs on a single server. In this manner the software only need be configured once. Thin clients are highly energy efficient and may be used at remote office locations or even at an attorney's home with the proper Internet connection.
XM Satellite Radio now offers a plan for businesses to receive commercial-free music including ASCAP, BMI and other commercial music licensing fees in one package. XM reports and pays all commercial licensing and royalty obligations to the artists. XM will also lock out channels inappropriate for broadcast at your firm.
We can only hope that the death of the venerable fax machine will come soon. Faxes have poor image quality, are cumbersome to store, utilize phone lines on both sides of the transmission and are slow to transmit. Digital senders, such as the HP 9200 pictured here scan at nearly 50 pages per minute, encode them as Adobe PDF documents and send the pages to one or more email recipients. Documents can even be scanned in color.
A little-known feature of many routers is content-blocking. Specific websites and keywords in those website addresses may be tagged as inappropriate for employees to visit during working hours. A firm member that attempts to navigate to that website receives an error message that the site is unavailable. Whether your firm permits online shopping, chatting, personal email or the like is up to your Internet usage policy. However, maintaining control of the content viewed at the office should be a concern of the firm manager.
An email distribution group allows you to have messages sent to a single email address be delivered to multiple employees. For example, messages to trademarks@<our domain> go to specific staff members and a supervising attorney specializing in federal trademark prosecution. Another benefit of using distribution groups is the ability to have generic designations for certain responsibilities. For example, email to accounting@<our domain> is copied to our office manager, bookkeeper and managing partner. Should any of these employees leave or move positions, the email still remains the same to the clients that use it.
* Note - these newsletters are only intended for members of the Florida Bar. They do not contain the requisite disclaimers required by the Florida Bar for submission to non-attorneys. If you received this newsletter in error, please inform reports@smithhopen.com.
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1.
Conference Room Plasma Monitor
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WiFi Access Point
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Microsoft SharePoint Server
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Network Cameras
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Thin Clients
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XM Radio for Business
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Digital Sender
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Router Content Blocking
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Email Distribution Groups