Can a patent lawyer hold a patent or is that a conflict of interest? Is there a law that prevents a patent lawyer from using his position to modify failed patents he hears about and create a successful patents for himself? I can see that being a conflict of interest.
If the patent lawyer &quot;hears about&quot; such failed patents from clients, and then uses the client's work and modifies them into successful patent filings, that would seem to be a clear conflict of interest, just as a business lawyer cannot use info learned from a client to make his own business deals, unless the client grants an OK. But if the patent lawyer just hears through shoptalk, or through communication by, perhaps, patent examiners that the lawyer works with, I don't see any conflict of interest, although as the comment by Eugene Styer suggests, there is likely to be enough prior art to make the patent invalid.
Issues of strategy rest with counsel, not the client. Thus, in the situation you posit, the lawyer is not required to follow the client's desires. One might observe, however, that a competent lawyer will avoid the conflict entirely by addressing the issue before accepting the client. If the client is firm in wanting to direct the lawyer's negotiation or litigation strategy, and the lawyer is unwilling to do so, the lawyer should decline to take on the case. When I practiced, prospective clients who wanted to run things were very politely declined and shown the door. I don't see anything unethical about accepting such conditions from a prospective client, but the attorney isn't required to do so, and can decline the employment.
Admission of copying proves one of the elements that the plaintiffs would normally need to prove in an infringement suit, making a law suit less risky from their perspective. This may very well invite lawsuits that would otherwise not be filed. But, this is pure speculation. Your legal rights are the same, independent of how much you choose to reveal in advance of a lawsuit. If your copying doesn't amount to a substantial taking, then it isn't infringement, whether you admit to copying or not.
The solicitor is allowed not to accept a case. If your ex-wife asked him to prepare papers, and he feels that she is getting ripped off, it is absolutely understandable that he won't prepare these papers for her, because he doesn't want to be sued or badmouthed when the deal goes wrong. "We would also reserve the right to take our own professional advice as to our efforts on your behalf." means simply he is not specialised in some subject, and will prefer to ask someone who is. Like a medical doctor asking for a second opinion before going ahead and cutting your leg off. Now I would have preferred if the solicitor had said concretely what exactly is wrong with the contract. Also, it would be obvious that you would be very comfortable with anything that he would advice her against. If he thinks that it is a good deal for you but not for her, he should advice against it. (Your comment to another question seems to indicate that she should be paid a lot more than you offered, so her solicitor seems to have been perfectly right).
A patent grants the holder exclusive rights to make, use and sell the patented item. As such, you can look at the patented object, you can document it, you can study it, you can draw up plans for it. A patent cannot be granted unless the applicant discloses what exactly is being patented. So you can get all the details of a patent from the USPTO (US Patent and Trademark Office). You cannot, however, make one without infringement unless you have permission, usually a license, from the patent holder. Now I am not in any way recommending this but as a practical matter, if you, as an individual, were to make such a piece of furniture incorporating a patented feature for your use, how would they know? There are no &quot;patent police&quot; going from door-to-door looking for infringers. On the other hand if you were to begin selling copies of this piece at your small shop, that might come to the patent holder's attention and they might take action against you.
Yes. The lawyer can use this information. The privilege is a privilege against involuntary disclosure to third-parties. There is a parallel duty of confidentiality not to disclose information revealed to the lawyer to third parties. But, the lawyer is not revealing the information to third-parties in a collection capacity. And, there are exceptions to both the privilege and to the duty of confidentiality that apply in the case of disputes between lawyers and clients.
Basically, statement 3 above is correct. The owner of the copyright in a work may release that work unmder different, even incompatible, licenses, as many times as s/he chooses to do. None of these releases cancels or invalidates any other. A person who obtains a work from a site where it is listed under a particular license, may rely on that license grant. The owner may (if the site allows) modify the license or remove the posted work, but this does not invalidate the license granted to those who obtained the work before any modification or removal. An incorrect or incomplete copyright notice does not, under current law. invalidate the copyright, and to the best of my understanding will not invalidate either of the license mentioen in the question.
To answer the specific questions you asked: Can I use the publication to perform ECC without being under patent protection? Can an academic publication be under patent protection? The answers are: No, that academic paper does not provide any protection from patent litigation. Yes, an academic paper can publish the details of an invention, and that in no way voids the patent. The issue is the timing of the publication; the patent was filed in 1998; the academic paper was published in 2002. Once a patent is filed, the inventors (or anyone else, for that matter) can publish the patent, and that in no way invalidates the patent. To provide any protection against a patent, the prior art needs to be "prior", that is, earlier than the filing date of the patent. Now, this particular issue is made a bit tricky because there does appear to be prior citations of this invention. The whole reason this invention is called the "Montgomery ladder" (not Montgomery multiplication - that's something else) was because it was first published by Peter Montgomery in 1987. One would think that would invalidate the patent. However, I'm not an attorney; I cannot advise you to proceed under that assumption. Instead, I would suggest you follow the advice of Joao; there are plenty of elliptic curve routines out there; use one of them.