DECEMBER 4, 2008

Don’t Mess With The Batman

Batman is not too happy with The Dark Knight and is contemplating a scheme to take back what is rightfully his. No, this isn’t the plot for another Caped Crusader movie, rather, it  seems that the Mayor Huseyin Kalkin of Batman, a small town in southeastern Turkey is crying foul because he never gave The Dark Knight director Christopher Nolan permission to use the name of his city.  According to the Mayor Kalkin:  

The royalty of the name ‘Batman’ belongs to us. There is only one Batman in the world. The American producers used the name of our city without informing us. 

It appears that Mayor Kalkan has plans to sue Nolan for trademark infringement for royalties from the 2008 mega blockbuster. According to The Escapist Magazine, Kalkan’s claims are based on the fictional Batman having a negative affect on the city, blaming the movie on the several unsolved murders in the city, as well as a high suicide rate amongst females in the city. 

Pause.

I’m sorry, but what?!  I realize that intellectual property issues are exploding these days, but this particular case falls into the “ridiculous” category.  Copyrighted music and patented medications have long been an issue, but it seems that the assertion of intellectual property is now showing up where we’d least expect it. Is it simply a matter of respect?  Is it about money?  Or is it that “ownership” is being redefined?  With individuals and companies now staking claim to virtually everything  - from words to images to products - it’s possible consumers have lost a sense of what that means.  

Moving forward, there’s no doubt that the IP arena will be one of the most fundamental challenges of the 21st century.  Big money is at stake; litigation and legislation will impact the definition.  And who will ultimately define the boundaries?  Jurors and consumers. At TMG, we believe that listening to the public – understanding how they think and what they value – is the best place to start when attempting to get a handle on the issue like ownership and IP.

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NOVEMBER 7, 2008

Googling The Jury Pool

I am big fan of internet snooping. It never ceases to amaze me, what I can learn about people through a simple Google search. I’ve tracked down wayward college classmates for our alumni website. I once planned a reunion for a summer journalism program I attended in 1986 and tracked down, online, almost 75% of the people who attended.  And that was all before Facebook and LinkedIn, two sites that have made internet snooping even richer.  It’s no surprise that it has been over two years since Merriam-Webster added the verb “to google” to the dictionary. Googling has become a way of life.

This week I came across an interesting angle on the Google culture.  Buried underneath all of the election news was this article in The Washington Post (and printed in various other papers) about litigation consultants using the internet to get information about potential jurors. For example, a trial consultant working for a client involved in a patent case learned via a potential juror’s website that she “had spent a lifetime marketing exclusive sequined gowns for beauty contestants, only to have them copied without compensation.” Clearly, she was a good jury candidate for a client bringing a patent suit, given her sympathy for intellectual property holders alleging infringement.

According to the article:

Now, with a wealth of information online - newspaper letters to the editor, petition signatures, club memberships, campaign contributions - retrievable with a couple of keystrokes, Internet surfing can produce a detailed picture of how an individual votes, spends money and sounds off on controversial issues.

For some reason, this development doesn’t sit right with me. I don’t fault the lawyers for using these tools to learn all they can about jurors - I wouldn’t expect them to shy away from a free resource that offers significant insight into the minds of the individuals in whose hands their clients’ fate rests. But I can’t shake a nagging feeling that this is not what the jury system was supposed to be built on. Jurors are basically supposed to be anonymous and seemingly impartial, and the Google effect basically makes that impossible.  Lawyers can now practically custom design their ideal jurors, based not just on demographic data and courtroom demeanor, but also on the jurors’ own thoughts, history, and actions.

Just another byproduct of the Information Age? A troubling intrusion into personal privacy? Or a fundamental flaw in our judicial system?

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