Guy Fawkes’ Patent Bombshell
In England the 5th November commemorates the anniversary of the foiling of the infamous Gunpowder Plot of 1605 when a shady group of conspirators came ever so close to assassinating King James I of England along with much of Parliament. As the man caught red handed in the act of stacking the gunpowder under the House of Lords in Westminster, Guy Fawkes’ effigy is burned every year on bonfires across the country for various reasons, many of which are now forgotten to firework toting revellers. Perhaps one of the lesser appreciated reasons to be thankful for the failure of the plot is that less than twenty years later that same Parliament went on to draft the Statute of Monopolies which formed the basis of patent laws for the UK, the European Patent Convention, as well as for many countries with historical links to Britain’s Imperial past including the USA, Australia, Canada, India, South Africa, New Zealand and much of the Commonwealth.
These aren’t just any sausages, these are Newmarket sausages
Sausages made in Newmarket, Suffolk have been awarded the Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) status from the European Commission. The Suffolk sausages join the ranks of protected foods such as Stilton blue cheese and Melton Mowbray pork pies.
The PGI status means that only products actually originating in the specific town, region or country in question may be identified as such (for example, only sausages produced in the town of Newmarket and a very specific surrounding region may be named ‘Newmarket sausages’). Generally, the products in question have very specific flavours or characteristics and so strict rules also govern the manufacture of products marketed under the PGI status. For example, Newmarket sausages must be made from prime cuts of pork from the whole carcass (no offal) and must have a minimum meat content of 70%.
A brand-free zone
Guest contributor Annette Freeman writes:
When I visited Havana, Cuba back in the late 1990s, there were a lot of surprises. For a trade marks attorney, one of the most shocking was the brand-free atmosphere. Billboards displayed only public service announcements about saving water and so on, or the occasional “Vive la revolución!” Pharmacy shelves were lined with glass jars and plain white packages – not a brand to be seen. The only branded products I saw were Bacardi® rum, a local concoction called “Cuban Cola” (from Mexico), and a few venerable Cuban cigar brands.
Now, in Australia, cigarette producers and consumers are going to enter a similar Twilight Zone for trade marks, with Australia’s plain packaging legislation for tobacco products surviving a High Court challenge. This final route of appeal in the Australian legal system was always something of a last-ditch stand for the tobacco companies, as they had to reply on a constitutional argument – that the Australian government was depriving them of their property by banning use of their trademarks on the packs. Unsurprisingly, the Court held that no property was being taken, merely its use regulated.
European Union Unitary Patent is a Few Centimetres Closer
With the relentless momentum of a rundown mobility scooter, the EU’s various legislative organs appear to be making progress in agreeing the final terms for a Regulation on the unitary patent and unified patent court. Compromises have been brokered and the word in Brussels is that the offending Articles 6-8 may be removed or replaced with something non-substantive. It appears that if the European Parliament adopts the Regulation in Mid-November then the Council may approve it in December or early January 2013. This could allow for the Regulation to come into force in the enhanced cooperation states of the EU (i.e. the EU less Italy and Spain) in late Spring of 2014.
Too Late to Gangnam?
IPcopyrich is currently at AIPPI 2012 and sends this piece about “Gangnam Style”
Koreans are understandably proud of the worldwide success of “Gangnam Style” by PSY, carried on the back of the viral success of the song’s video parodying the opulent consumer culture of Gangnam in Seoul. So much so, that at the opening ceremony of AIPPI2012 (one of the most important intellectual property conferences of the year) in Gangnam, the Korean AIPPI president broke off in the middle of his opening address to launch into the Gangnam “horseriding dance” – it was quite a sight, though as neither we nor anyone else has preserved this for you on YouTube, you’ll have to take our word for it. You could ask the Prime Minister of Korea, who was in the audience.
A light touch
It’s your turn to get the coffee.
Guest contributor Annette Freeman writes:
When it comes to enforcing your hard-won trade mark rights, there’s the right way to do it and the wrong way to do it. As the old cliché says, it is wise to choose your battles; and it is also wise to carefully consider your weapons. To mix a few more metaphors, too often trade mark owners use a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
How to avoid ‘Swiss-Cheese’ Registered Design Coverage in Europe
The European Union covers twenty seven member states at present. A single IP right for Registered Designs can be obtained relatively easily for low cost that will cover this whole area. However, if you take a look at the map of the EU it is apparent that there are several ‘holes’ in coverage for the non-EU countries in Europe. Key non-EU states includes Switzerland, Norway, Turkey and much of the former Yugoslavia, especially Croatia and Serbia. These countries can act as a source of parallel (so-called grey) imports into the EU and can be troublesome for IP holders who have rights limited to the EU. However, filling in these holes is actually a fairly straightforward matter and involves using the Hague System for International Design Registration.
Colour Me Blue
IPcopy welcomes guest contributor Annette Freeman:
Colour me red…or blue.
I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom, for me and for you
And I think to myself – what a wonderful world.
So sang Louis Armstrong, going on to croon about “Skies of blue, clouds of white” and ‘“the colours of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky”. But when it comes to trade marks, colours may not be there “for me and you”. A high-profile trade mark legal battle recently illustrated the difficulties of protecting and enforcing colour as a trade mark.
Is standardisation always a good thing in patents?
The EPO and USPTO have announced triumphantly that they have completed the Herculean task of creating a consolidated patent classification scheme that provides up to 250,000 individual definitions for areas of science and technology. This project has been the result of several years’ work to harmonise the previously divergent technical classification systems used in the US and Europe to assist patent examiners in prior art searching and examination of patent applications. In essence, every patent application filed is assessed by an examiner and allocated one or often several classifications that cover the technologies used in the invention. Until now different classification strategies were used by the US and Europe often resulting in divergence in the outcomes of patent prior art searching. The intention of the project, called the cooperative patent classification scheme (CPC), according to EPO President Benoit Battistelli, is to “…align our patent procedures more closely and deliver major efficiency gains”. The Director of the USPTO, David Kappos, is perhaps a little more pragmatic about the benefits stating the new scheme is needed to “…eliminate duplication of work between the two Offices”. In fact it represents another step towards global harmonisation of the patent system which would allow applicants to avoid the current process of prosecuting patent applications according to divergent standards in different countries. Surely from a cost perspective this has to be a good thing, right?
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