Friday fantasies

A special bonus for visitors to the IPKat's Forthcoming Events list is that there are actually fewer events to check out than there were last week. This means less interruption to a work-week which is already under pressure from commitments to Wimbledon fortnight, meaningless little skirmishes between the Australian and English cricketers and the World Cup.

The European Patent Office is looking for middle-aged lawyers to staff its Boards of Appeal. According to this advertisement, candidates must have an excellent knowledge of one of the EPO's three official languages [four, says Merpel, if you include the somewhat robotic dialect of Legalese in which many Board decisions are drafted], and an ability to understand the other two.

Right: The EPO's HR department had an ideal candidate in mind, but were anguished at being unable to express the job spec in dull enough terms

Candidates should also have worked in the field of patent law, and have practical experience as judges, patent agents, or legal or technical advisers in public administration or industry. They should preferably be between 45 and 55 years of age, but they must act quickly: they have until only 30 June 2010 to apply and the advert doesn't say anything about getting an extension.

Why are cats more important than chocolate? Well, they may not be -- but the Australians, having given Cadbury's merry hell in their attempts to monopolise the colour purple in respect of their popular chocolate confectionery products (see earlier post on "Chocs Away!", here), have awarded the coveted status of registered trade mark to the manufacturers of Whiskas cat food in respect of a colour now known as 'Whiskas purple' [shouldn't that be 'purr-ple'?]. You can listen to the IPKat's valued friend Tim Golder (Allens Arthur Robinson) discussing this exciting development here [IPKat advisory: contains Australian accents ...].

Boyle's Law. Professor James Boyle (billed by the Open Rights Group as "the world's most influential copyright scholar") is set to deliver the keynote address at the UK's first ever digital rights conference, ORGCon, on 24 July. Says Boyle, who is described as being "famed for arguing that our current copyright laws are failing to reward artists and encourage creativity" -- an argument supported by establishment and rebels alike -- says:

"We have chosen to lock up the vast majority of the last century's culture, to make it inaccessible and in most cases, done so with no benefit to anyone.

"Why has legal freedom decreased at the moment that technological openness has flourished And what can we do to save the incredible shrinking public domain?"

The conference, ORGCon, is a low-cost conference where campaigners can find out about and take action in support of their digital rights. Other speakers confirmed for the conference include Tom Watson MP, "the vociferous critic of the Digital Economy Act" [not to be confused with Tom Watson the golfer, who may well be a bit tee'd off by digital economy issues for all we know], and the Canadian Craphound, activist and author Cory Doctorow.