Something to read ...
In "Are performers a special case?" (IPKat, 23 December 08), this weblog hosted a guest post from Amanda Harcourt in favour of an extension of the term of legal protection for the rights of performers in their performances. This post generated some thoughtful comments from (in alphabetical order) Mr Justice Arnold, Ben Challis and William Patry. Another thoughtful commentator is Antony Taubman (Head of WIPO's Traditional Knowledge (Global Intellectual Property Issues) Division) who, writing in his own name and not on behalf of WIPO, penned a 75-page article, "Nobility of Interpretation: Equity, Retrospectivity and Collectivity in Implementing New Norms for Performers' Rights", which was published in 2005 in volume 12 of the Journal of Intellectual Property Law, pp 351-425. For those readers who would like to peruse his thoughts at their leisure, the IPKat is pleased to acknowledge with thanks the publisher's agreement to let him upload the article in full: now you can read it here.
The IPKat's friend Jordan S. Hatcher has recently written a piece for the IP Finance weblog, "Open innovation in the business world". Since it takes a positive and constructive view of the IP lawyer's role in new business models based on open innovation, the Kat thought it would be a good idea to give it a wider airing. You can read it here.
The sixth and final issue of Sweet & Maxwell's European Commercial Cases for 2008 contains, as usual, a smattering of intellectual property decisions, in English, from around Europe. This issue gives full-text reports on P Handelsgesmbh v P GmbH, an Austrian Supreme Court decision on the balance between questions of law and questions of fact in relation to the determination of whether an unregistered mark has obtained a certain degree of recognition in the course of trade, and Re Alcatel trade mark, a German Bundespatentgericht decision on the assessment of the overall impression of composite marks where a producer's name was the dominant element of its trade mark. The ECC's website is here.
The sixth and final issue of Sweet & Maxwell's European Commercial Cases for 2008 contains, as usual, a smattering of intellectual property decisions, in English, from around Europe. This issue gives full-text reports on P Handelsgesmbh v P GmbH, an Austrian Supreme Court decision on the balance between questions of law and questions of fact in relation to the determination of whether an unregistered mark has obtained a certain degree of recognition in the course of trade, and Re Alcatel trade mark, a German Bundespatentgericht decision on the assessment of the overall impression of composite marks where a producer's name was the dominant element of its trade mark. The ECC's website is here.
