Most businesses use music in some capacity to create the right ambiance, draw a crowd or even to pacify holding telephone customers. The right music can influence purchasing decisions, how fast patrons at a restaurant eat and how satisfied customers feel in their dealings with your business. For these reasons, music is a valuable asset to your business. However, it is also a valuable asset to those that create it.
To expand the scope of their business – either geographically or into additional product categories – many companies license their trademarks. Company "A" sells milk, for instance, and shipping milk far from its source of production may not make economic sense. A restaurateur wishes to open restaurants in other states. Another company has expertise in selling men's clothes, but would like to expand to men's shoes.
Specifics about copyright and fair use can be complicated. In this easy-to-navigate chart, we clarify 10 of the most common misconceptions regarding copyright and fair use.
Just like the students who head back to school in August and the birds that start their journey south for the winter, legislators began their migration to Columbus in September. And your U. S. senators and congressmen are back at work in Washington.
The domain world as we know it is about to change. Currently, there are about 24 top-level domains (tld). These are the portion of a web address that appears after the "dot" such as .com or .org. However, there are 1,409 new possibilities on the horizon and an infinite number of future tlds.
On Sunday evening, Governor John Kasich signed House Bill 59, the state's two-year, $62 billion budget into law, just in time for the beginning of the new state fiscal year on July 1, 2013.
Last night on a 4-2 party line vote the Conference Committee on House Bill 59, led by the chairmen of the House and Senate Finance Committees, Rep. Ron Amstutz (R-Wooster) and Sen. Scott Oelslager (R-Canton), reported a compromise version of the state’s biennial budget bill that will now head to the House and Senate floor for a final vote to accept the changes.
Yesterday afternoon the Senate Finance Committee unveiled a substitute version of House Bill 59, the state biennial budget bill. The substitute legislation incorporates many changes, significant among which is the replacement of an across-the-board 7% income tax cut proposed in the House-passed version of the bill with a tax cut package specifically targeted at helping small businesses in Ohio.
“Use” of a trademark or service mark under U.S. trademark law is often misunderstood. Even the best-intended trademark owners encounter unexpected, sometimes fatal, barriers in their attempts to register their marks and maintain their registrations.
Raymond Pinkham, an associate in the Vorys Washington, D.C. office, authored a column for the Spring 2013 American Bar Association Professional Liability Litigation E-Newsletter.
The Ohio House Finance and Appropriations Committee accepted a substitute version of House Bill 59, the state’s biennial budget bill, at a hearing yesterday afternoon. Among numerous significant changes in the bill, the substitute legislation removes Governor Kasich’s proposed tax reforms and replaces them with an across the board 7% income tax reduction, and removes the proposed expansion of Medicaid that was projected to leverage $2.4 billion in federal funds to provide coverage for uninsured Ohioans over the next two years.
On December 20, 2012 Governor John Kasich signed into law Amended Substitute House Bill 510 to change the way Ohio taxes financial institutions. Beginning January 1, 2014, Ohio imposes a new business privilege tax on financial institutions doing business in Ohio.
On January 10, 2013, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a number of mortgage-related rules, including its long-awaited qualified mortgage (QM) rules in an 804-page set of complex guidelines for residential real estate lending mandated by the Dodd-Frank Act. The rules take effect in January 2014.
On March 16, 2013, the First-to-File provisions of the American Invents Act (AIA) take effect, thus moving the United States from a First-to-Invent patent system to a First-to-File patent system. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) rules and examination guidelines for the First-to-File provisions will apply to all patent applications having an effective filing date on or after March 16, 2013.
Bankers will recall that certain mortgage servicing organizations, many affiliated with large banking organizations, agreed to a comprehensive settlement process with regard to a variety of claims relating to residential mortgages generated in the 2009-2010 timeframe as part of enforcement actions commenced in 2011.
The banking world has been rocked in recent weeks by news of very significant settlements between banks and federal regulators for alleged violations of laws and regulations pertaining to bank secrecy and money laundering. The level of these settlements should serve to remind bankers that the regulatory agencies take compliance with those laws and regulations very seriously.
As all bankers know, the FDIC as receiver has "ramped up" it’s efforts to bring actions against directors, officers and "institution-affiliated parties" (IAPs) of failed institutions during the current banking challenges. The FDIC may elect to bring suit against former IAPs and others based upon simple negligence or gross negligence, and actions for both are often included in the complaint.
On Thursday, the Ohio General Assembly concluded its business for the 2011-2012 legislative session. The House and Senate debated a number of important measures during the fast-paced "Lame Duck"session following the November general election.
