Opinion
Civil Action No. 03-CV-6059.
April 12, 2004
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
This is a case for trademark infringement. Presently before this Court is a Stipulated Protective Order which the Court will not approve for the following two reasons:
1. The definition of "confidential materials" is merely anything that a party so designates "which contains confidential, technical, business or financial information." The Court concludes that this designation is entirely too open-ended, non-specific, and would allow the parties to keep from public view a great amount of information that is not truly confidential in the strict sense of the word, i.e., proprietary. There is no indication that the release of information designated as confidential would put another party's truly proprietary information at risk.
2. In paragraph 8 of the Stipulation, the parties purport to give themselves the right to designate "testimony elicited during hearings and other proceedings" as confidential, which would protect it from public view. This provision is in derogation of the fundamental concept that in-court proceedings are public.
The parties are free to have this Stipulated Protective Order binding between themselves, but the Court will not approve it and will not be bound by it. Therefore, for the foregoing reasons, the request for approval of Stipulated Protective Order filed with the Clerk on April 5, 2004 is DENIED.