Luck runs out for the Irish; Latest ETMR

Luck runs out for the Irish (government, that is ...)

The IPKat has had problems accessing the Curia website of late, but he has finally got hold of the European Court of Justice ruling in Case C-175/05 Commission v Ireland, in which the Republic - the Land of Saints and Scholars - is held responsible for a failure to implement in full the windily-named Council Directive 92/100/EEC of 19 November 1992 on rental right and lending right and on certain rights related to copyright in the field of intellectual property. What did the Irish do? They had exempted all categories of public lending establishments from the obligation to remunerate authors for any lending carried out by them, that's what they did.

The IPKat, who has long enjoyed Irish literature, welcomes this ruling.

Some celebrated Irish writers here, here, here and here


Latest ETMR

Sweet & Maxwell are keeping up their remarkable record for getting the monthly European Trade Mark Reports (details here) ahead of time. It's only half way through January and already IPKat co-bloggie Jeremy, who edits it, has his February copy before him on his desk.

This is a special issue, dealing with trade marks that arguably should not be registered because their registration would be contrary to order or public morality because they are obscene, suggestive of something obscene, pro-violence or allusive to the consumption of unlawful substances. There are also some jolly good cases from non-English-speaking countries that are published in English for the first time:

* Adidas Salomon v Nike Europe (Court of the Hague), in which the three-striped juggernaut that is Adidas' atrade mark portfolio runs into a mountain that is Nike's two-striped embellishment;

* F... Sp. Z.o.o.'s application (District Administrative Court, Warsaw), in which the Poles get to grips with the issues relating to the registration of a single colour - in this case red - as a trade mark for confectionery.

As usual, if you come across a valuable case and think it should be reported in the ETMR, can you please email Jeremy here and let him know.