This past Tuesday Facebook agreed to a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission regarding its ever-controversial privacy policy. The complete settlement can he found here. The charge against Facebook was that that company deceived consumers “by telling them they could keep their information on Facebook private, and then repeatedly allowing […]
In June of this year, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) voted to allow a new program for the creation of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs), the end section of a web address, like .com, .org, and .net. These new gTLDs will offer new opportunities for brand […]
Gillespie Law Group head honcho Dave Gillespie gave a presentation this past week at the Startup Weekend event in Columbus, OH. The presentation was entitled “Bootstrapper’s Guide to Not Screwing Up–Too Badly”, and his slideshow can be viewed below. Questions? Post them in the comment section and we’ll try […]
After trying and failing to register the term “Tweet” with the USPTO, Twitter will likely soon acquire the trademark rights for the term. Twitter has been in negotiations with the owner of the mark, Twittad, for some time and the parties have finally settled on terms that will transfer the […]
Over the past year, the tech startup world has seen a significant increase in the number of incubators throughout the country. Incubators – sometimes called startup accelerators – are organizations that work with entrepreneurs to develop their startups. Often, in exchange for a small stake in the startup, an incubator’s […]
If you haven’t heard, IT Martini is a well-attended recurring event offering those in the information technology field an opportunity to relax and meet each other. They also feature startup companies, and provide them with space and time to demo their product. It’s good for the community, so I’m sharing […]
TechColumbus recently released its annual Central Ohio Innovation Capital Report which provides a comprehensive overview of funding trends within Central Ohio for 2010. The full 2010 Central Ohio Innovation Capital Report is available here. TechColumbus research indicates that over the past year (2009-2010), innovation capital increased nearly 73% to over […]
Guest Post: Thanks to copyright attorney David Valentine-Elam for preparing the informative piece below: Copyright registration in the United States is optional and protection exists whether you register your copyright or not. So why do I frequently advise my clients to register their code with the Copyright Office? Because there […]
Wikipedia defines a “social enterprise” as “any for-profit or non-profit organization that applies capitalistic strategies to achieving philanthropic goals.” The concept has been getting quite a bit of attention recently–without a doubt, for good reasons. Within the past few years, the Low Profit Limited Liability Company (“L3C”) and the Benefit […]
Startup and growing companies often use deferred compensation as an effective way to attract and retain important employees. Unfortunately, this process has been complicated by a recent tax change that significantly penalizes a broad range of “non-qualified” deferred compensation plans. Under Section 409A, deferred compensation which does not meet certain […]