The Supreme Court on Monday refused to weigh in on whether software, online-shopping techniques and medical diagnostic tests can be patented, saying only that inventors' request for protection of a method of hedging weather-related risk in energy prices cannot be granted.

The high court unanimously agreed with a lower court ruling that threw out Bernard Bilski and Rand Warsaw's patent, a decision many said could endanger patents in an increasingly high-tech world. But the high court said they did not need to make a broad sweeping decision about patents to dispose of Bilski and Warsaw's case.

"The patent application here can be rejected under our precedents on the unpatentability of abstract ideas," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the court. "The court, therefore, need not define further what constitutes a patentable process."

The Supreme Court has already said that abstract ideas, natural phenomena and laws of nature cannot be patented. But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit added that a process cannot be patented unless it is "tied to a particular machine or apparatus" or if it "transforms a particular article into a different state or thing."

Lamb McErlane PC, a full service law firm that has built a reputation on delivering the highest caliber of legal service in an environment focused on personal attention and results, has named Thomas P. Hogan as a partner at the firm. Hogan previously joined the firm after working as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania as well as an Assistant District Attorney in Chester County.

"We are thrilled to have Tom join our team of partners," states Managing Partner Joel L. Frank. "He brings tremendous experience as well as dedication and a focus on successful outcomes to his practice and to the firm as a whole."

Hogan's practice includes multiple aspects of corporate and internal investigations, government relations, and complex commercial litigation. He has successfully defended corporations and individuals in securities litigation, class actions, intellectual property disputes, civil rights claims, contract issues, product liability claims, private equity issues, and regulatory litigation. He also serves as coordinating counsel for larger clients dealing with recurring litigation issues on a broad scale. His clients include Fortune 500 companies, public and privately held entities, municipal and educational organizations, and individuals.

Lamb McErlane is a full service law firm, comprised of 30+ attorneys, that has built a reputation on delivering the highest caliber of legal service in an environment focused on personal attention and results. Bringing the sophistication and experience often equated with large, metropolitan firms, Lamb McErlane's effective and efficient approach produces work their clients respect at rates they can appreciate.

When clients call Washington attorney Sue Wang, the clock doesn't start ticking.

Phone calls aren't billed in six-minute intervals and each hour of work won't cost several hundred dollars.

Wang and the four other lawyers in Clarity Law Group aim to reconfigure the billable-hour business model at law firms that she said tends to shut out small and start-up companies with shallow pockets.

"People have been speaking about the death of the billable hour, but people had been saying that for years and they weren't really acting on it," said Wang, formerly of Latham & Watkins.

Clarity Law Group is designed like a timeshare, where clients pay a set fee for access to the entire firm, Wang said. The firm also reduces costs by forgoing the standard luxuries at big-name firms like secretaries, wall art and swanky office space.

The firm opened its Illinois office last October and secured its Washington license in April.

"The relationship between attorneys and clients is not a friendly one," said Kim Le, who works at Clarity. "They're worried all the time about getting billed for every little thing, and that doesn't build a good, trust[ing] relationship."

While other firms around the country are also trying to lower the barrier of entry to legal services, Wang said the idea for Clarity came to her and her former University of Michigan law school roommate, Leah Goodman, while on a recent vacation in Greece.

At Clarity, each client is assigned two attorneys who act as the primary counsel, but any of the lawyers may be called on depending on the legal needs. It's a hybrid model between big-firm contractors and in-house counsel, Wang said.

The Lanier Law Firm has maintained a prominent role in the BP litigation since filing one of the nations' first class-action lawsuits against BP following the April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico. BP has yet to stop the millions of gallons of crude oil currently spewing into the gulf.

"BP not only disregarded important safety rules, they also took unbelievably unnecessary risks, which is why people are facing one of the worst environmental and financial disasters in history," says attorney Evan Janush of The Lanier Law Firm. "There are laws designed to protect employees from the precise, devastating scenario facing a lot of workers at BP."

At the end of 2009, BP's U.S. Employee Savings Plan had more than $2 billion invested in BP stock. Since the explosion and eruption of oil, BP's stock price has fallen by approximately half, accounting for more than $100 billion in lost stock value. The retirement plans for many company employees are tied to the stock, costing them what is believed to be hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Lanier Law Firm founder Mark Lanier, who recently was named by The National Law Journal as one of the most influential attorneys in the nation during the past decade, says the people responsible for BP's 401(k) plan knew or should have known about the company's inability to provide a safe work environment on the Deepwater Horizon, as well as its inability to contain the massive release of oil -- two factors that have contributed heavily to the downturn in BP's stock price.

The law firm has identified several potential legal claims for participants in the BP Employee Savings Plan whose accounts included units from the BP stock fund. Learn more at www.lanierlawfirm.com.

About The Lanier Law Firm

With offices in Los Angeles, Palo Alto, Houston and New York, The Lanier Law Firm is committed to addressing client concerns with effective and innovative solutions in courtrooms across the country. The firm is composed of outstanding trial attorneys with decades of experience handling cases involving oil & gas law, maritime law and ERISA litigation.

The Ginsburgs celebrated their 56th wedding anniversary last week. They met on a blind date as undergraduates at Cornell University.

Martin Ginsburg was an expert in tax law and taught at New York University, Columbia University and Georgetown University over the course of his career.

Judy Areen, interim dean of Georgetown University Law Center, said Sunday: "Marty Ginsburg was not only one of the most innovative legal thinkers of our time, he was a gifted teacher and respected colleague. He will be deeply missed."