While listening to the radio last week I had cause to feel old when the presenter introduced the next track as celebrating 19 years of airplay. The track in question? Britney Spears’ “Hit Me Baby One More Time”. Unbelievably this was released in 1998 and even more unbelievably it was almost considered for the group Five….

Another  “where has the time gone?” moment came later in the week when our blog notification alert went off to note that IPcopy is five years old. This got us thinking about our most viewed posts and so here are our top 10 patent, trade mark and IP posts from our first five years.

1) New to IP? Here’s 10 facts about Intellectual Property – our top viewed post is this introductory article to intellectual property. An oldie but a goldie this post still gets good views even three years after it was first published.

2) Why Malta could inadvertently block your unitary patent – the first entry in our top ten that relates to the unitary patent system. The unitary patent and unified patent court may currently be stalled while the twin challenges of Brexit and the German court challenge play out but back in 2013 this post highlighted the impact that Malta’s relatively recent sign up to the EPC (1/3/2007) would cause.

3) European Patent Litigation Certificate (& other appropriate qualifications) – this post from 2014  looked at the developing conditions surrounding the European Patent Litigation Certificate. The latest version of the EPLC can be found here and IPcopy also notes that the CIPA Newsletter dated September 2017 recently stated that Fellows of CIPA will receive individual Intellectual Property Litigation Certificates in the next week or so. This PDF certificate will be needed for anyone wanting to apply to be a UPC representative under the grandfathering provisions of Rule 12.

4) Unitary Patent Package – The Ratification Game – Back in 2013 we thought it would be a good idea to represent the countries ratifying the UPC Agreement via an infographic based on a football pitch. Four and a half years later and we’re still edging our way towards the required number of ratified states with the UK and Germany now holding up proceedings. To be honest we never expected to still be updating that infographic….

5) Can I patent it? A quick-guide flow chart for inventors – This post is a slightly tongue in cheek flow chart to help inventors work out if they’ve got a patentable invention or if it’s “Game over, man. Game over.”

6) The proposal to delete the requirement of graphical representation of a trade mark registered in the European Union – one of our first posts from 2014 this looked at some proposed changes to trade mark protection in the EU.

7) Unitary patent package – Q&A – we’ve done a few question and answer posts about the unitary patent and unified patent court over the years. This post is now a little out of date as more countries have now ratified the UPC Agreement and things like the level of court fees and renewal fees are known. Our recent series of articles on the CIPA UPC seminar series provides a more up to date assessment of the UPC –

8) UK changes divisional deadline rules – a short post from early 2014 this looked at some tinkering to the UK’s divisional rules. This one can probably be filed under “niche”…

9) USPTO starts lobbing objections from Room 101 – an early post-Alice article looking at changes in the US following the Alice v CLS Bank decision.

10) Disappearing brands – but what becomes of the trade marks? – rounding out our top 10 most read posts is this look at what happens to a trade mark when the associated trading entity goes out of business.

Mark Richardson 3 October 2017