Customer Reviews

The Secret Circuit: The Little-Known Court Where the Rules of the Information Age Unfold

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I read this book before entering law school, and I had little previous knowledge regarding the federal circuit or anything in the field of Intellectual Property (IP). I had heard from others that the field was, well kind of dry, but this book really changed my mind.

This book basically gives an intro into the current challenges facing the world of IP. IP is an exploding field, where new decisions with dramatic affects are being made everyday. The author shows why Microsoft, Cisco, and the entire software industry battled it out with Johnson and Johnson and the whole biotech industry over a patent on break pedals. He showed that how one defines words, whether from a dictionary or a technical journal rather than in a way regarding the specific fact situation, decides the fates of multiple patents. The author explains the outrage behind 'patent trolls' and how one patent can legally shut down every blackberry in America (after reading this book, I found myself on the side of the trolls).

If you want an interesting read or if you just want to sounds smart when talking to an IP attorney or IP law professor, this book is a good read. However, if your looking for something for pure entertainment or intellectual value, some chapters are better than others (so I would skip around). Similarly, I haven't read many other books regarding the current state of IP in the U.S., so consider that when reading this review.

This book is an argument, but presents the facts dispassionately, enough to let you make up your own mind. This balance may be wasted: I cannot imagine anyone who does not have lots of interest in the topic--hence pre-formed opinions--to engage this book (though the title suggests a thriller...) This is too bad, in a way, as the author makes clear this court is one that ordinary citizens should care about, a lot.

In short, read this book. If you don't know much when you start, you will when you are done. If you are knowledgeable a priori, read it for the pleasure of talking a long walk with a smart guy.

I give this (five) thumbs up

PS If I have to earn my critical bona fides by finding some fault, I would point out the slight hyperbole that sometimes creeps into the text (eg p 28, America will not be a lawless society, adrift, if the supreme court (seemingly capriciously) overturns its prior decisions... (and I can earn my bona fides as a name dropping intellectual empty suit by citing Heraclitus" "No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.")

This has been, for me, a perplexing book to review. I find it well researched and generally well written, particularly given the complexity of its subject. For certain niche audiences, the work will prove very valuable. However, I must question a number of important decisions made by the author in organizing it, and wonder precisely for which audience the work is intended. Another flaw with the work is that it was, I feel, in part sold under false colors. The sub-title as well as the colorful cover of the work with its background of digital numerals behind a classical balance scale, all implies that the work will deal quite directly with the information age. The work as a whole seems to me to be cluttered with the author's continually idiosyncratic intellectual digressions. At the end I think it potentially valuable for a number of discrete audiences, but question the authorial decision to attempt to lump such a broad grouping of topics together, despite their focus in the work of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

For a full review see interface, Volume 8, Issue 1.