Tech Legal Week: Apple, Psystar; Verizon; RIM, Motorola; Psion and Netbooks; More

Apple and Psystar tousle gets weirder — If you don’t take the commotion too seriously, Apple’s suit against Mac clone manufacturer Psystar and the latter’s attempts at counteractions are pretty amusing and worthy in some cases of minor conspiracy theories. Psystar is claiming that Apple doesn’t own a registered copyright for its current OS and manual versions, which is a stretch, but certainly not beyond the realm of possibilities, as many companies forget to file. The second and stranger-sounding exchange was spurred by Apple’s claiming that a number of unnamed companies and individuals were colluding with Psystar. The cloner’s answer? It denies “that there exists a concerted effort to commit infringement of Apple’s intellectual property rights, to breach or induce the breach of Apple’s otherwise unenforceable license agreements, and to violate state and common law unfair competition laws.” [Source: AppleInsider, Computerworld]

Software company exec pleads guilty to hacking — Jay E. Leonard, president of petroleum exploration software company Platte River Associates, pleaded guilty to stealing password-protected files from a computer. [Source: InfoWorld]

DoJ goes after Microsemi — The Department of Justice got a restraining order preventing Microsemi from any activities that might affect the value of its recent acquisition, Semicoa. [Source: InfoWorld]

Verizon wins $33.15 million in cybersquatting case — Verizon won a record judgment against OnlineNIC for cybersquatting by registering domain names that could be confused with Verizon as a way to attract people trying to get to the telecommunication company’s site. [Source: InternetNews.com]

Patent suit threatens Sprint and Clearwire — Sprint and Clearwire have partnered to deliver WiMAX services. But they could run into trouble if ADAPTIX has its way in a patent infringement suit it has brought against the two companies. [Source: Ars Technica]

Someone sues Google, Apple, and Microsoft for patent infringement — Networking company Cygnus Systems is suing Google, Apple, and Microsoft for infringing on its document preview icon patent. [Source: CNET]

RIM sues Motorola over employees — RIM is suing Motorola for trying to restrain RIM from hiring former and current employees of the latter, claiming that a February 2008 agreement between the two makes it a contract breach. [Source: InternetNews.com]

Psion sues many over use of netbook term — It seems that PC-manufacturer Psion may have a trademark on the term ”netbook” and is actively sending cease-and-desist letters to a number of company, blogs, and smaller web sites. [Source: GigaOM]