South Carolina Business Law Blog

The ABA's Litigation News recently described an opinion from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania refusing to apply the community-of-interest privilege, and provided an overview of the history of the privilege and its application by various federal circuits and courts. The community-of-interest privilege (in the 3rd Circuit) allows attorneys "representing different clients with similar legal interests to share information without having to disclose it to others."  In re Teleglobe Communc'ns Corp. ,  493 F.3d 345, 364 (3d Cir. 2007).  "Alleged members of the community of interest must at least share a 'substantially similar legal interest,' that is not solely commercial.  Id. at 365.  In King Drug Co. of Florence, Inc. v. Cephalon, Inc. , Plaintiffs in a putative class action alleging violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act sought to compel discovery of certain communications between Defendant Barr Laboratories, Inc. (...

I heard the above on a Wired Storybook Podcast interview with Ryan Singel , who is returning as an editor of Wired's Threat Level blog.  One origin for that insight into the price of online services is found here . The knowledge that Facebook and Google and other companies gather and share information about individuals in exchange for their "free" services raises the question again of what kind of privacy we can expect or demand in the information age. In the United States there is no general constitutional right to privacy for personal information. The federal (and to a lesser extent, state) statutory frameworks designed to protect personal information are largely industry-based. For example, HIPAA covers protected health information, Gramm-Leach-Bliley protects consumer financial information, and the Fair Credit Reporting Act and FACTA protect personal credit information. The South Carolina General Assembly recently recognized the value of personal inform...

The South Carolina Supreme Court recently considered the limited liability company (LLC) as a "disregarded entity" for tax purposes. In CRFE v. Greenville County Assessor issued on August 29th, the Court determined that S.C. Code Ann. Section 12-43-220(c) does not prevent a single-member limited liability company (LLC) owning residential property from obtaining the 4% legal residence property tax ratio. Sherry Ray bought residential property in Greenville County in her name and lived there, and as a result the property was taxed at the 4% legal residence ratio. She formed CFRE as a single-member LLC with herself as the sole member. (She did not have the LLC taxed as a corporation, and CFRE did no business and was formed only for asset protection/estate planning purposes). In 2006 Ray transferred title to her residence into the LLC. Because that transfer is considered an "assessable transfer of interest" per S.C. Code Ann. Section 12-37-3150 , the Assessor ...

You may recall this post in April of last year about Robinson v. Wix Filtration Corp. , in which the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals determined computer problems in the Appellant's office resulting in the failure to receive notice of a motion for summary judgment did not warrant relief under either Rule 59 or Rule 60. Recently the 4th Circuit again had the opportunity to address a missed filing deadline where computer technology played a role. Symbionics v. Ortlieb  reversed a District Court determination that "a quirk in the functionality of counsel's computer calendar caused counsel to miscalculate the deadline to appeal" a judgment constituted "excusable neglect" under Rule 4(a)(5)(A) of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure . Symbionics filed a notice of appeal one day after the expiration of the 30-day time limit, and then filed a motion for extension of time to extend that deadline by one day. According to the opinion, counsel calendared the inco...

By Jack Pringle Patents provide important intellectual property (IP) protection for inventors. Determining whether something you create is considered a patentable invention, and obtaining a patent through the USPTO is a complicated process. The University of South Carolina Office of Intellectual Property offers some Resources for Inventors that may be helpful in understanding the patent process and the way IP is licensed. I read from time to time about patent infringement litigation, and particularly those cases where a "non-practicing entity" (a company that owns a patent but has not developed a product that actually uses it) seeks damages from a company who (not coincidentally) has substantial revenues and market capitalization. Perhaps the most famous of these cases to date was NTP's action against Research In Motion , the maker of the Blackberry. Like many who follow these cases, I am interested in the legal and policy rationales for allowing an entity tha...

Mobile Applications ("Apps") are suddenly everywhere. Many businesses and software developers, having observed the success of these apps, are eager to join (i.e. cash) in. Often lost in the rush to bring these apps to market are the privacy and security concerns that go along with them. Friend of this Blog John Heitmann at Kelley Drye has a good post on this topic on the Ad Law Access Blog . This post even has a link to a webinar entitled Mobile Applications: Privacy and Data Security Implications .

Explaining these issues is currently beyond the ken of this blog. But not for the folks on the Lawyer2Lawyer Podcast on the Legal Talk Network . I have discussed the benefits of podcasts for attorneys here and here over at the Practice and Productivity Blog , and Lswyer2Lawyer is an excellent example. This podcast episode features Mike Koehler , Assistant Professor of Business Law at Butler University and Jane E. Kirtley , the Silha Professor of Media Ethics and Law at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Minnesota . Along with co-host, Bob Ambrogi , these professors discuss "the legal issues including charges, privacy rights, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act , the scandal’s impact on journalism and the fate of the Murdoch news empire." Worth a listen, as are many of the podcast epidodes these folks do.