Monday miscellany

Around the weblogs 1. From Paul Tijam and Hidde Koenraad comes this penetrating Class 99 design law post on the sort of issues that might be encountered if one's Community design registration is marked out with dotted lines as well as the more solid variety, if the dots are not intended for disclaimers.  Class 99's sister blog, the MARQUES Class 46 European trade mark blog, has a post from Katfriend Laetitia Lagarde on a bit of a battle between Monster Energy and MoMo Monsters: would you be confused by goods bearing those marks?  On the 1709 Blog, Anita Molinero's successful quest for damages in respect of the incineration of her art work by Champagne house Vranken Pommery was clearly a burning issue, as FrenchKat Asim Singh explains. The same blog carries a fine account of the Battle of the Bed Linen by Andy Johnstone, this being yet another case which, with the benefit of hindsight, might better have been settled without the need to go to court -- and Ben Challis asks about the status of a copy of a parody, in the context of the events subsequent to the launch in 1991 of the parody-friendly movie Point Break.

Around the weblogs 2.  Writing on IP Draughts, Mark Anderson poses the question whether contracts might be better interpreted by computers than by judges: says Merpel. since so many contracts she sees look as though they have been drafted by computers in the first place, this may not be such a far-fetched notion.  Elsewhere, following the lead of the IPKat, the Aistemos IP strategy and analytics blog has taken to posting its equivalent of our "Never Too Late" feature, summarising each month's blogposts for busy readers: here's its list of October posts. 

Around the weblogs 3.  Last Wednesday the Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice (JIPLP) and GRUR shared their sixth joint event, this being a seminar on Google, search engines and the impact, if any, of European competition law upon the company's colossal and apparently unassailable monopoly.  There was some high-octane debate, fuelled by the positively inflammatory contribution of Torsten Körber (Chair of Civil Law, Antitrust Law, Insurance Law, Corporate Law and Regulation Law, University of Göttingen). Torsten, who has represented Google in competition-related issues, argued that the European Commission had not even begun to make out a case against Google, even there had been one.  The event is recorded in two posts on the jiplp weblog. here and here.

Swissreg: a hole lot of fun

TMView now includes the Swiss register. As if they had read the recent IPKat post on TMView that noted the absence of the Swiss register from the TMView database, the Swiss suddenly announced that, on Monday, 26 October 2015, Switzerland had finally joined TMView. This is a particular useful addition. Since the Swiss national register Swissreg does not contain international marks with protection in Switzerland, one always had to search both WIPO and the national register.

GI Gorgonzola

While on the subject of online search, this Kat has learned that a special highlight of the Geographical Names conference which INTA is running next month (mentioned on this weblog last week here) is that INTA will be launching a new online searchable guide on Geographical Indications, Certification Marks and Collective Marks to coincide with this event.  Planned as a new online member resource, this search facility is aimed at assisting attorneys in determining how geographical indications, certification marks, and collective marks are protected in selected jurisdictions, whether by sui generis laws or other types of law.

The Agnietenkapel 

Heart warming? No, patent warming! On Friday 18 December 2015 (1.00 pm – 2.00 pm), Lodewijk Pessers defends his dissertation ‘The Evolution of the Inventiveness Requirement’, which he wrote under the supervision of Bernt Hugenholtz (University of Amsterdam) and Sven Bostyn (Universities of Amsterda and Liverpool). This defence will take place in the Great Hall of the University of Amsterdam (Old Lutheran Church, Singel 411, 1012 XM Amsterdam). All are welcome. The next day (that's Saturday 19 if you can't work it out), the Institute for Information Law (IViR, University of Amsterdam) is holding an international symposium on the inventiveness requirement in patent law and its relationship with the global growth in patent grants. Speakers include Professor Rochelle Dreyfuss (NYU) and Professor Theo Bodewig (Humboldt University, Berlin). The symposium, bearing the title “Patent warming – is the inventive step analysis to blame?”, runs from 11.00 am – 4.30 pm at the Agnietenkapel (University of Amsterdam), Oudezijds Voorburgwal 231, Amsterdam. Entrance is free. Registration via ivir@ivir.nl is required. For more information click here.

"The Future of Fashion: Luxury, IP & Digital Technology" is the title of an event being held at Condé Nast College of Fashion & Design, London on Wednesday, 18 November 2015 from 18:30 to 20:30 under the aegis of Katfriend Tania Phipps-Rufus. If this is your scene, click here for the details.