There was once a law firm called Hammonds, but now we have learned to call it Squire Sanders Hammonds: that's the name on the cover of E-Commerce and Convergence: A Guide to the Law of Digital Media, the 4th edition of which has recently been published by Bloomsbury Professional under the general editorship of Mike Butler, who heads the firm's media team. As a former in-houser at what used to be Sun Microsystems (now Oracle), he must know a few things about the topic -- particularly the convergence bits of it which, while often exhilarating for consumers and exciting for salesmen, can be a real pain for others. Just imagine how you'd feel, as a car manufacturer, if a maker of fridges came up with a new model that cruised at a comfortably 120 kph on the local Autobahn. That's the sort of thing makers of phones, cameras, computers, printers, scanners, televisions and more besides have had to worry about...

The book is a practical guide aimed at both commercial executives and in-house counsel. It highlights issues not always immediately familiar to those who work with digital content including in particular laws relating to data. However, it is also a useful guide for any business starting or growing its on-line presence, especially with chapters relating to on-line contracting and branding.

With thick paper plenty of charts and things, plus a useful glossary, you can actually get through this book much more quickly than the subject matter suggests. The text-in-boxes bits are sometimes too long to be elegant, since boxes in this Kat's opinion should never be allowed to stray over a page-turn. However the team, which includes the ever-insightful Chris McLeod, has done an admirable job. Well done!

Jeremy Phillips, IPKAT blog, 14 April 2011