The Insular World of Intellectual Property

Even the global village has its cliques, as news from the Indian subcontinent and our nation’s capital reminds us.

The Times of India reports today on a visit of representatives of the US–based Intellectual Property Owners’ Association with officials of the Intellectual Property Office, the Intellectual Property Appellate Board, and the Supreme Court of India. (Imagine a reciprocal visit by an Indian IP trade group to the PTO, the Federal Circuit, and the Supreme Court.)  The Times quotes one commentator questioning the propriety of such a visit, given that members of the IPOA have pending matters before some of these tribunals, which presents at least the possibility that they are not disinterested parties.

Closer to home, this month witnessed the latest chapter in the saga of the ill–fated email sent by former Chief Judge Randall R. Rader to Edward Reines, an attorney with Weil, Gotshal & Manges, LLP. In a per curiam order of the eleven sitting judges of the Federal Circuit, that court publicly reprimanded Mr. Reines for using an effusive email from Judge Rader to promote Mr. Reines’ Federal Circuit practice. In the email, Judge Rader referred to Mr. Reines as a “friend for life,” and “encouraged [him] to let others see this message,” in which the judge reported praise for Mr. Reines from other members of the court. Despite acknowledging Judge Rader’s prompting to share the message, the Federal Circuit found that Mr. Reines had overstepped the bounds of propriety by forwarding a private communication that “implied a special relationship between [Mr. Reines] and then–Chief Judge Rader.”

Now we have word of President Obama’s nominee to take the seat vacated by Judge Rader: Kara Farnandez Stoll, a one–time patent examiner and law clerk to a Federal Circuit judge who is currently a patent litigator with Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett and Dunner, LLP and co–chair of the Rules Committee of the Federal Circuit Bar Association. Ms. Stoll’s qualifications speak for themselves, and may well presage a quick confirmation—if that is possible in this political climate.