Archive for General

June 2023 Year End Social & Platinum Status

The Inn celebrated another successful Inn year—that provided several unique opportunities for our members, including a mock claim construction argument for young attorneys, an excellent presentation on copyright fair use, and a fireside chat with Chief ITC ALJ Clark S. Cheney and The Honorable James L. Robart—with a boat-cruise social on Lake Union and Lake Washington!  The Inn also received Platinum Status in the American Inn of Courts Achieving Excellence program. This is the highest status in the Achieving Excellence program and recognizes that the Inn has made excellent contributions to the five core competencies of the American Inns of Court: administration, communications, programming, mentoring, and outreach.  

September 2022 – Seattle Inn of Court Back in Full Swing!

On September 15, 2022, the Seattle IP Inn of Court held its first regular monthly meeting of the 2022-2023 Inn Year. The meeting was the Inn’s first in-person regular meeting since approximately January of 2020. Members got the chance to make new connections and rekindle old ones, while taking in an end of summer sunset; and pupilage teams also got the chance to meet and conduct in-person planning for their presentations this year. All in all, the meeting was a success and a great start to this Inn Year!

2022-23 Welcome Letter and Meetings Schedule

Please click the link below for the 2022 – 2023 Welcome Letter from President Kevin Zeck, which includes the tentative schedule of meetings for this year.

Welcome Letter – https://seattleipinn.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/2022-08-26-Welcome-Letter-Inn-Year-2022-2023.pdf

June 16, 2022 Year End Social & Platinum Status

The Seattle Intellectual Property American Inn of Court has been awarded the Achieving Excellence Platinum designation for the 2021-2022 Inn year. We also celebrated another wonderful year of meetings by finally hosting an in-person year-end social aboard a boat cruise around the Puget Sound!


Please Welcome the 2021-2022 Executive Committee Members

President – Duncan Macfarlane 

President-Elect – Kevin A. Zeck 

Secretary – Lori Tonnes 

Treasurer – Caroline Bercier 

Membership Chair – Dario Machleidt 

Program Chair – Charlie Zhao 

Achieving Excellence – Xiang “Shawn” Li 

Director (Website) – Catherine “Katie” Sutton 

Director (At Large) – Stephen McGrath 

Director (At Large) – Bill Harmon 

Director (At Large) – Jessica Kaempf 

Director (At Large) – Nicholas Kim

Executive Committee Membership Announcement

Please join us in thanking the outgoing Executive Committee Members!

2020-2021 Executive Committee Members

President – Gina Culbert

President Elect – Duncan Macfarlane

Secretary – Kevin A. Zeck

Treasurer – Lori Tonnes

Membership Chair – Dario Machleidt

Program Chair – Kristen Lange

Achieving Excellence and Inn Alliance Liaison – Caroline Bercier

Director (Website) – Catherine Sutton

Director (At Large) – Shannon Jost

Director (At Large) – Stephen McGrath

Director (At Large) – Bill Harmon

Director (At Large) – Charlie Zhao

[Ex Officio Directors e.g. former Presidents – Paul Leuzzi, Jerry A. Riedinger, Lawrence D. Graham, Isabella Fu, Brooke A.M. Taylor, Brian C. Park, Signe Naeve, Mark P. Walters, John D. Vandenberg, Warren Rheaume, Jonathan L. McFarland, Ben Byer]

October 2020 – IP Developments

The Seattle IP Inn of Court held its October 22, 2020, meeting in a virtual mixer format. The meeting included a overview presentation of recent developments in IP law.  A section on trademarks covered willful infringement, the ability to protect “generic.com” terms, and the need for likelihood of confusion in counterfeit cases.  A section on copyrights addresses the outstanding issues in the Google v Oracle case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.  This included the copyright eligibility of application programming interfaces and associated fair use defenses.  A section on patents covered recent developments in discretionary denials at the Patent Trial and Appeals Board (PTAB).  The patent segment also contained a discussion of the Arthrex case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court to resolve whether PTAB judges are principal officers, and, if so, whether the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals cured any defects in the statutory scheme creating these judgeships.

Thank you to all the participants!

2020-21 Welcome Letter & the Meetings Schedule

Please click the below links for the 2020 – 2021 Welcome Letter and the Schedule for Meetings.

Welcome Letter: https://seattleipinn.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Welcome-Letter-2020-21.pdf

Meeting Schedule: https://seattleipinn.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Schedule-of-meetings-2020-21-2.pdf

Seattle IP Inn of Court Virtual Mixer – June 18, 2020

The Seattle IP Inn of Court held its last event of the Inn year in virtual mixer format on June 18, 2020. The Board for the 2020 – 2021 year was elected. The new Board members on the call introduced themselves to the attendees. Thank you to the Board members leaving the Board! Welcome to the new Board members! Thank you to all Seattle IP Inn of Court members for their participation this year!

Seattle IP Inn of Court Virtual Mixer – April 23, 2020

The Seattle IP Inn of Court held its April 23, 2020 meeting in a virtual mixer format. Members joined the meeting from locations and with beverages of their choice. The attendees first discussed Inn business, then opened up the discussion to other topics, such as how members are staying connected to their firms, working from home adjustments attorneys, staff and clients are making, children schooling from home and changes they plan to make in their work lives after Washington’s stay at home order is lifted. Thank you to all the participants!