Friday fantasies
Hamish the Town Cat has his own Facebook page |
If Scotland is too cold, or too independent, for your liking, you may find Nottingham more to your taste. If so, you will be thrilled to discover that Katfriend Estelle Derclaye has the funding to support two PhDs in copyright law. Full details of these two exciting prospects can be found on the 1709 Blog here. Nottingham is famous for being the zone of activity of Robin Hood, one of the best-loved villains in folk history, whose celebrity was founded in the principle of stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. Merpel innocently asks where we might see the same principle put into action today, within the IP context?
How far does the copyright in a photo or digital image extend? The 1709 Blog is hosting a seminar on exactly this question, following the controversial ruling by Judge Birss QC in the "Red Bus" case (see links to blogposts here, here and here, plus readers' multifarious comments). Details of the seminar, which takes place on Tuesday 21 February, can be found on the 1709 Blog here. If you want to attend, you'd better not delay too long: the event was only launched yesterday but already has over 30 registrants signed up.
Meanwhile, the University of Sheffield is hosting a forum, “Governance and Intellectual Property of Biotechnology: Developed and Developing Countries Perspectives” on 2 March 2012. This, says Carlos Conde, is the first 2012 regional meeting founded by the Postgraduate Forum on Genetics and Society (PFGS) and organised by University of Sheffield postgrads. Calls for papers and all sorts of other details can be obtained from the PFGS website here.
Tallinn Airport: sadly, this lovely design was rejected for the main terminal, though the city planners found another use for it ... |
[Note: since this item was posted, the publishers appear to have taken all their product information offline. All attempts to reach their titles are directed to a product navigation page that, as of 29 January, does not work for any of their titles] It's big, it's black and it's back! The 7th edition of that great classic, The C.I.P.A. Guide to the Patents Acts, is now published. You can get all the details from the publisher's website here. The book is only £250, which isn't very much when you consider that it's compiled by a team of no fewer than 34 authors, each of whom is more expert than the rest. A review of this mighty tome will follow, once the IPKat has had his letterbox surgically stretched. Meanwhile, readers of this weblog have the chance to spot -- before publishers Sweet & Maxwell correct it -- a whopper of a mistake in the book's description. Just look here!