Patently-O Bits and Bytes No. 45 – Confidential Court Documents

• Prior Art Blog updates us on Orion IP's battle against online automobile retailers. [Spangenberg must pay $3.8 million in legal fees]
• Mullin – operator of the Prior Art Blog – may agree with the outcome of the case, but faults W.D.Wisc. Judge Crabb for keeping nearly every filed document under seal. "For three months now [Judge] Crabb has operated a secret, closed court; I've read through hundreds of patent dockets and I've never seen anything like it." [Updated June 20]
• A recent study by Federal Judicial Center researcher Robert Reagan found that settlements of patent litigation are five-times more likely to be kept sealed than are settlements in other civil cases. Robert Reagan, The Hunt for Sealed Settlement Agreements, 81 Chi.-Kent L. Rev. 439 (2006).
• Stanford v. Motorola (Fed. Cir. 2008)(Non-Precedential) ("we conclude that we cannot review the district court's order without an explanation of the basis of the court's decision.").