The Forest and the Trees: Drafting The Optimal Arbitration Clause
by Andrew Flake
I participated recently in a discussion on alternative dispute resolution in IP disputes -- mediating and arbitrating trademark and patent infringement cases, and particular challenges that can arise. One of the topics we took up, which...
When Tech Meets Tact: Envisioning the Mediation of the Future
by Andrew Flake
It was New Year's Day last year when I first wrote about ChatGPT and the advent of widely-available AI. Since then, even for a time when intertwined technology and new advances are a commonplace, things have...
The Lawyer’s Creed and Successful Mediation: Some Holiday Reflections
by Andrew Flake
It's 11:50 p.m. You're preparing to hit send on an email to opposing counsel, a lengthy and powerful epistle that will surely send them scrambling. Suddenly, you feel a chill. A wind whistles through your office. Was...
Management and Process in the Mass Arbitration: From Concepcion and Beyond
by Andrew Flake
It was this very week, in November 2020, that counsel argued AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, a case that, when decided the following year, would end up refashioning the management and resolution of collective disputes in...
The View from Overhead: Garage Doors, Trademark, and Crafting Our Settlements, Part II
by Andrew Flake
An expensive piece of business litigation, particularly in the IP world and with companies interacting on an ongoing basis, always provides us some useful reflection. In our last post, we looked at a protracted piece of...
The View from Overhead: Garage Doors, Trademark, and Crafting Our Settlements, Part I
by Andrew Flake
What's in a name? In the world of garage doors, apparently quite a bit. For this week's blog, we examine a protracted piece of litigation between two national garage-door companies that itself spawned further litigation. The case is interesting...
Moving the Conversation Forward: Early Mediation and EDR
by Andrew Flake
We take for granted that mediation is an available option for our cases. Mediation, at least the concept of a trained neutral retained to work with the parties to bridge differences and resolve disputes outside of litigation, is...
The Hourglass and the Ocean: Making Time for Resolution
by Andrew Flake
In the litigation practice, we deal in time. Schedules, deadlines, fees and invoicing -- they are all ways to divide and parcel out a scarce resource. I have an hourglass in my office I received as a...
Cards, Cookies, and the Supreme Court’s Coinbase v. Bielski Opinion: Mandatory Stay Now Required on Appeal of Denied Motion to Compel
by Andrew Flake
Summer is beach season, and when my family travels, we'll usually bring a few decks of cards with us. When my children were younger, that meant we played a lot of "War." You know the game --...
Arbitration Roundup: Independence Day Edition
by Andrew Flake
We have some recent arbitration-related decisions to review in today's blog, a group we might describe, coming out of the Fourth of July holiday, as a few Georgia sparklers and, from the Eleventh Circuit, one firework of first...