Eugene Volokh writes about a case in New Mexico that demonstrates the extent to which the right to decide who you do business with has been eroded in the name of so-called anti-discrimination laws:

Elaine Huguenin co-owns Elane Photography with her husband. The bulk of Elane’s work is done by Elaine, though she subcontracts some of [...]

It’s not often that America’s pastime and individual liberty cross paths, but it happened earlier this week when a Federal Appeals Court in Missouri rejected an argument by Major League Baseball and it’s players union that player names and statistics constitute intellectual property rights:
Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) — Companies that operate fantasy sports leagues have a [...]

I was checking in to see the latest news from Venezuela, and saw how Chavez is using the threat of nationalization to bring down steel prices:
Ternium SA, the only maker of flat- steel products in Venezuela, agreed to sell its goods at a discount in the South American country, warding off a threatened nationalization by [...]

Pete Wells of The New York Times writes today about what may well be one of the most inventive extensions of intellectual property law that I’ve ever seen:
Sometimes, Rebecca Charles wishes she were a little less influential.
She was, she asserts, the first chef in New York who took lobster rolls, fried clams and other sturdy [...]

In today’s New York Times, Mark Helprin argues in favor of what effectively amounts to an extension of copyrights for an indefinite period. And does so by making what is, at best, an imperfect analogy:
WHAT if, after you had paid the taxes on earnings with which you built a house, sales taxes on the materials, [...]

Because they stole my idea:
The competition requires significant energy and emissions goals (most importantly, fuel economy) with at least 100 mpg or its equivalent. The guidelines are replacing the outdated MPG with this new standard, MPGe, which takes into account energy equivalents, no matter what the energy source.
Production capability is another important requirement: Vehicles will [...]

Yesterday, Viacom filed a multi-billion dollar lawsuit against Google, the parent company of YouTube alleging massive violations of copyright law:
Viacom, the parent company of MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central, filed a wide-ranging lawsuit against Google on Tuesday, accusing it of “massive copyright infringement.” Viacom said it was seeking more than $1 billion in damages and [...]

Michael Crichton has an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times today about the life-and-death cost that patients may pay thanks to the fact that the United States Government has issued patents for human genes
YOU, or someone you love, may die because of a gene patent that should never have been granted in the first [...]

With the Democrats back in power, their friends in Hollywood are among the first in line to influence the policy debate in Washington:
WASHINGTON, Feb. 6 — Hollywood has often been a whipping boy here, but with a new Congress in session, the heads of the major movie studios converged on the capital Tuesday to pitch [...]

The Digital Millenium Copyright Act has seen many absurd applications since it became law, but none, I think, are quite as absurd as this one:
The inventor of the “Electric Slide,” an iconic dance created in 1976, is fighting back against what he believes are copyright violations and, more importantly, examples of bad dancing.
Kyle Machulis, an [...]

As you may have noticed, the National Football League guards it’s copyright over the Super Bowl very jealously. That’ s why you never see any retailer who isn’t an official sponsor or advertiser mention the Super Bowl in their ads for, say, big screen televisions, soda, or beer. Instead, they call it “the Big Game.”
Considering [...]

A Federal Judge in New York has ruled that a lawsuit by the music industy against XM Satellite Radio over a new XM radio that allows consumers to record songs played on XM onto an MP3 player can proceed forward:
A lawsuit in which record companies accuse XM Satellite Radio Holdings of cheating them by [...]

Are you a blogger? Then S. 1 may concern you.
From Of Arms and the Law:
S.1 has been introduced in the Senate as “lobbying reform” — which in this case means “First Amendment infringements.” An amendment has been attached, which requires registration of bloggers with more than 500 readers, and who comment on policy issues. Violation [...]

According to one U.S. District Court Judge in Texas, it’s against the law to hyperlink to copyrighted material if the copyright holder objects:
A federal judge in Texas has ruled that it is unlawful to provide a hyperlink to a Webcast if the copyright owner objects to it.
U.S. District Judge Sam Lindsay in the northern district [...]

New legislation currently pending before the Senate would greatly expand copyright law in an effort by the music industry to stifle yet another area of innovation:
Satellite and Internet radio services would be required to restrict listeners’ ability to record and play back individual songs, under new legislation introduced this week in the U.S. Senate.
The rules [...]

I’m no expert on this, so I’m offering it for your consumption. How do you define property rights for a virtual store, selling virtual wedding gowns, to virtual people, in exchange for virtual money?
Veronica Brown is a hot fashion designer, making a living off the virtual lingerie and formalwear she sells inside the online [...]

In a move that could send shock waves through the music industry, Britain is set to reject demands by the music industry to extend copyright protection on music from 50 years to 95 years:
LONDON, England (Reuters) — When British finance minister Gordon Brown stands up to make his pre-budget speech next week, aging rockers Cliff [...]