Posts under ‘Intellectual Property’

Intellectual property is the cornerstone of many modern businesses, and the law offers various mechanisms to safeguard know how, creativity, ingenuity and investment in reputation and marketing.  A significant complexity when it comes to securing rights is deciding which means of protection is/are appropriate.  An important factor in such a decision is the nature of [...]

The Pirate Bay has been thrown into the limelight a number of times, not least following a legal battle over copyright infringement which resulted in jail sentences for the four site operators in April 2009 (though at the time of writing, the website is still operational).  Recently two of its founders announced their decision to [...]

Further progress was made in the Newzbin saga last week when the High Court ordered BT to prevent its subscribers from accessing the website.  You may recall that the site had hopped abroad to the Seychelles, escaping the reach of the UK courts (or so it thought).  However, despite its emigration, the Motion Picture Association [...]

The United Kingdom’s Supreme Court recently rendered its decision in the first Intellectual Property case heard since it opened for business in October 2009.  The case, Lucasfilm v Ainsworth, concerned infringement of copyright subsisting in Stormtrooper helmets, which had in the past been produced by Andrew Ainsworth for the Star Wars films. Under ss.51 and [...]

Apple has recently filed a patent for an infra red device, which can disable your iphone from taking pictures or recording footage during a concert. This is an interesting development for digital rights management. It may be another move by Apple to build up kudos with the music industry, as the industry’s cooperation is necessary [...]

The internet revolutionised the way people could discover and share information, but as technology has developed, the volume of information which can be shared online, and the variety of its application have broadened significantly.  When the bandwidth available to typical internet users was sufficient, there was an explosion in online sharing of music through services [...]

The Hargreaves report was published on Wednesday. The report responds to the government’s instruction last autumn to look at whether current copyright laws are hindering innovation in this country. The short answer is, as Hargreaves succinctly puts it, ‘yes’; reform is needed (p1). The reaction to this report has been varied (for a list of [...]

We have been keeping an eye on developments in the dispute over the APP STORE mark.  A new chapter in this interesting saga has begun. The challenge against Apple is bringing in more supporters and expanding to other jurisdictions. To recap, in our first blog we explained how Microsoft applied to the US Patent and [...]

The IPKat, reporting from the Fordham IP Conference, recently noted the upbeat tone of the keynote delivered by Victoria Espinel, White House IP Enforcement Coordinator.  While new technology may have rendered effective copyright enforcement a daunting prospect, and in the minds of some a losing battle, Espinel’s keynote at the conference, and the Obama Administration’s [...]

Google and YouTube have decided to launch a YouTube Copyright School as a way to strengthen their copyright position. The copyright schools has been set up in order to teach users who infringe copyright laws the basics of copyright law. ‘Because copyright law can be complicated, education is critical to ensure that our users understand [...]