En banc decisions from the Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals almost always mean big news for the IP bar. On Wednesday the court ruled in Cardiac Pacemaker v. St. Jude, which considers the issue of whether a 1970s federal law against encouraging patent infringement abroad applies to method patents. Much to the relief of the business community, the court ruled that it does not.

In the underlying case, Cardiac alleged that under a specific patent law provision known as 35 U.S.C. § 271(f), St. Jude was liable for exporting heart stimulators that allegedly infringed Cardiac's patent on a method for detecting heart arrhythmia. (Cardiac made other claims in the long history of this case, but the focus here is on the method patent allegations.)

On Wednesday, the Federal Circuit ruled that the provision applies only to apparatus patents, not method patents. The court concluded that Congress's intent in passing § 271(f) was to close a loophole that allowed companies to skirt U.S. patent laws by assembling a large percentage of a product in the U.S. and leaving the rest to be finished abroad. The judges then reasoned that because a patented method is not something that can be easily exported, Congress did not intend the provision to apply to method patents.

There has been an array of stories emanating from the nation's courtrooms about jurors causing havoc -- and often mistrials -- by using electronic devices to research issues pertaining to their cases or post information about deliberations on networking sites.

Frank Iannotti, president of the Connecticut Judges Association, said jurors have long been told to not do any research on their case, read stories in the newspaper or watch accounts on television.

Iannotti, who currently presides as a Superior Court judge in Waterbury but will move to Bridgeport next month, said sometimes he includes the word "Internet" in his instructions, and sometimes he does not.

"We have very intelligent jurors in the state of Connecticut," said Iannotti. "They understand what that means. I don't think you need to specifically use the word 'Internet.' Would it hurt to use it? No. But I don't think it's specifically necessary."

And what happens when one juror runs amok? Iannotti said that's why alternate jurors are chosen. The bigger problem comes when jurors who do their own independent research share their information with the others. In those cases, the judge has no choice but to declare a mistrial.