On a conjecture of Gluck

Let $F(G)$ and $b(G)$ respectively denote the Fitting subgroup and the largest degree of an irreducible complex character of a finite group $G$. A well-known conjecture of D. Gluck claims that if $G$ is solvable then $|G:F(G)|\leq b(G)^{2}$. We confirm this conjecture in the case where $|F(G)|$ is coprime to 6. We also extend the problem to arbitrary finite groups and prove several results showing that the largest irreducible character degree of a finite group strongly controls the group structure.Comment: 16 page

Acting Like an Administrative Agency: The Federal Circuit En Banc

When Congress created the Federal Circuit in 1982, it thought it was creating a court of appeals. Little did it know that it was also creating a quasi-administrative agency that would engage in substantive rulemaking and set policy in a manner substantially similar to administrative agencies. In this Article, I examine the Federal Circuit\u27s practices when it orders a case to be heard en banc and illustrate how these practices cause the Federal Circuit to look very much like an administrative agency engaging in substantive rulemaking. The number and breadth of questions the Federal Circuit agrees to hear en banc and the means by which it hears them goes beyond the limited role of a court – to decide the case before it. Instead of exercising restraint and addressing only what it must, the Federal Circuit raises wide-ranging questions and makes broad pronouncements of law that sets or changes patent policy. This role has traditionally been delegated to administrative agencies that must comply with the Administrative Procedure Act, particularly the notice and comment provisions. Despite being an appellate court and not being subject to the notice and comment requirements, the Federal Circuit seems to comply with these requirements when it orders cases to be heard en banc. And although there are strong objections as to why the en banc Federal Circuit should refrain from acting like an administrative agency by engaging in substantive rulemaking and policy setting, I argue that the Federal Circuit is probably in the best position to do so, although other governmental bodies can or should play a larger role in shaping patent policy

Patent Reform and Best Mode: A Signal to the Patent Office or a Step Toward Elimination?

On September 16, 2011, President Obama signed the America Invents Act (AIA), the first major overhaul of the patent system in nearly sixty years. This article analyzes the recent change to patent law\u27s best mode requirement under the AIA. Before the AIA, patent applicants were required, at the time of submitting their application, to disclose the best mode of carrying out the invention as contemplated by the inventor. A failure to disclose the best mode was a basis for a finding of invalidity of the relevant claims or could render the entire patent unenforceable under the doctrine of inequitable conduct. The AIA still requires patent applicants to disclose the best mode, but has removed the traditional enforcement mechanisms – declarations of invalidity and unenforceability – as defenses to patent infringement. In this article, I propose and explore a couple innovative techniques that could be used to add teeth to the seemingly toothless best mode requirement. Ultimately, I reject these proposals as not being workable solutions and suggest that Congress\u27s resolution of the best mode problem is nonsensical and that it should completely eliminate the requirement rather than sending mixed signals to the Patent Office and patent practitioners

Is the World After All Just a Dream?

DocPerform is a multi and interdisciplinary research project based at City, University of London. Led by members of the Department of Library & Information Science, it comprises scholars and practitioners from the fields of performing arts and library & information science. The project concerns conceptual, methodological and technological innovations in the documentation of performance, and the extent to which performance may itself be considered to be a document. The collection of papers in this special issue of Proceedings from the Document Academy are selected from the second DocPerform Symposium, held at City, University of London, 6–7 November 2017. This editorial introduces those papers and provides disciplinary and historical context for DocPerform

Remedies Symposium, Remedial Discretion in Constitutional Adjudication: A Codicil

This symposium paper elaborates on two questions raised by the author’s prior work, Remedial Discretion in Constitutional Adjudication. That paper disagreed with calls for a revival of non-retroactive judicial rulings to facilitate more constitutional innovation and argued that the Supreme Court’s practice of developing doctrines that withhold remedies for constitutional violations—e.g., qualified immunity, exceptions to the exclusionary rule, and harmless-error rules— is both sufficient to facilitate constitutional innovation and preferable to reviving non-retroactivity. Of necessity, the paper also developed a theory of when courts may withhold remedies for constitutional violations and when they may not: courts may withhold remedies responsive to claims for the sub-constitutional remedies that function as substitutes for constitutional interests irretrievably lost as a result of wholly-concluded rights violations, but must provide relief when faced with justiciable, properly raised, and meritorious claims for specific relief from ongoing violations. This follow-on paper addresses whether there is a correct way to define constitutional violations as “ongoing” or “wholly-concluded,” and whether the argument that remedies for ongoing violations are mandatory can be reconciled with cases where the Supreme Court did not provide the plaintiffs with immediate relief from systematic constitutional violations. It argues that while there is no ontological line between ongoing and wholly-concluded violations, it is reasonable to understand the doctrines mentioned above as rules that withhold substitutionary remedies for wholly-concluded constitutional wrongs, and that reasonable premises are all that is required for a descriptive theory to be persuasive. It further argues that there is a constitutionally significant difference between declaring unconstitutional a government policy or custom that is causing a claimant ongoing harm and the provision of relief designed to ameliorate the present and future effects of an invasion of rights. Only the former is constitutionally required; courts retain remedial discretion to engage in public-interest balancing with respect to the latter

What\u27s the Harm of Trademark Infringement?

For decades, the concept of actionable trademark infringement has been expanding. Source confusion, reverse confusion, approval/affiliation confusion, initial interest confusion, post-sale confusion, endorsement confusion, and so on, all have won cases for plaintiffs. Whether or not the confusion cost the plaintiff any sales, or was in any way material to consumers, our concept of trademark infringement now encompasses it. These expansions occurred for reasons that seemed sufficient to courts at the time, when advocates offered theories about how all these kinds of confusion could cause harm to the trademark owner. Primarily, courts feared that non-competing uses would preclude trademark owners from expanding into natural markets or tarnish its reputation among its existing consumers

Expanding Preferential Treatment Under the Record Rental Amendment Beyond the Music Industry

In January 2007, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals decided Brilliance Audio, Inc. v. Haights Cross Communications, Inc. and answered a lingering question concerning the Copyright Act that had persisted for over twenty years. The court decided whether the protections offered to the music industry under the poorly drafted Record Rental Amendment of 1984 also extended to audiobooks and other non-musical works. This Act deprives owners of items such as tapes and compact discs from renting those items to others without the consent of the copyright owners of the recorded song and the written lyrics and music - a right historically granted to consumers under the first sale doctrine. Ultimately, the court held that the special protections granted by the Record Rental Amendment were limited to the music industry. However, both the majority and vigorous dissenting opinions highlighted the differing interpretations of the Act\u27s applicability and set the stage for a circuit split. This article first explores the text and historical developments of copyright law\u27s first sale doctrine and the Record Rental Amendment and the Sixth Circuit\u27s interpretation thereof. Next, it examines whether the Record Rental Amendment should be amended to include audiobooks and other non-musical works and ultimately suggests two alternative amendments Congress should adopt to resolve future conflicts and avoid a split amongst the circuits

Food for Thought: Genetically Modified Seeds as De Facto Standard Essential Patents

For several years, courts have been improperly calculating damages in cases involving the unlicensed use of genetically-modified (GM) seed technology. In particular, when courts determine patent damages based on the hypothetical negotiation method, they err in exaggerating these damages to a point where no rational negotiator would agree. In response, we propose a limited affirmative defense of an implied license due to the patent’s status as a de facto standard essential patent. To be classified as a de facto standard essential patent, the farmer must prove three elements that reflect the peculiarities of GM seeds used in farming: (1) dominance, (2) impracticability, and (3) necessary to fulfill a basic need. Based on the approaches used by courts and standard setting organizations in licensing standard essential patents in technological fields such as cell phones and software, designation of some GM seeds as standard essential patents allows the courts to imply a license from patentees to farmers on reasonable and non-discriminatory (RAND) terms. Doing so shifts the case from a tort-based patent infringement suit to a breach of contract dispute and alters the damages regime from one based in compensation, deterrence, and punishment (a tort approach) to one based solely in compensation (a contractual approach). As a result of this novel proposal, the damages calculations in these suits return to economic reality

The fate of quasiparticles in the superconducting state

Quasiparticle properties in the superconducting state are masked by the superfluid and are not directly accessible to infrared spectroscopy. We show how one can use a Kramers--Kronig transformation to separate the quasiparticle from superfluid response and extract intrinsic quasiparticle properties in the superconducting state. We also address the issue of a narrow quasiparticle peak observed in microwave measurements, and demonstrate how it can be combined with infrared measurements to obtain unified picture of electrodynamic properties of cuprate superconductors

Work Made for Hire – Analyzing the Multifactor Balancing Test

Authorship, and hence, initial ownership of copyrighted works is oftentimes controlled by the 1976 Copyright Act’s work made for hire doctrine. This doctrine states that works created by employees within the scope of their employment result in the employer owning the copyright. One key determination in this analysis is whether the hired party is an employee or independent contractor. In 1989, the U.S. Supreme Court, in CCNV v. Reid, answered the question of how employees are distinguished from independent contractors by setting forth a list of factors courts should consider. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court did not give further guidance on how to balance these factors. Three years later, in 1992, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit decided Aymes v. Bonelli and noted that not all factors are equally weighted and that five of the factors would “be significant in virtually every situation.” This analysis was supported by looking at all the work made for hire cases decided in the three year period since Reid – six cases in total. This Article expands in both scope and time what the Second Circuit did in Aymes and systematically analyzes how courts have utilized the factors in the twenty-five years since Reid. In particular, this study has identified the universe of cases where the courts have decided whether a hired party was an employee or independent contractor and uses the data from these cases to describe what factors appear to be the most and least important in reaching these conclusions. Based on the results of this study, this Article proposes a continuum of importance, which graphically illustrates the relative importance of each factor