IPEC anagram competition: at long, long last -- a winner

The ethos of the IPEC:
every effort is being made to
accommodate small litigants

Rather a while ago, this Kat -- tickled by the renaming of the Patents County Court in England and Wales as the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court (the 'IPEC'), decided to run a little competition to find the best anagram of this sweet, good-natured and seemingly swift and cost-effective bit of the British legal machinery. It seemed like a good idea at the time but, like all good ideas, it didn't seem such a good one after the Kat remembered that he'd have to read through all the entries to the competition and decide which one was the winner.  The volume of entries rather suggested that the period immediately following the launch of the competition was either a period in which many blog readers were enjoying public holidays, or it might have been a time when there was just, well, a bit less work to do. Anyway, there were lots of entries, a small and no doubt unrepresentative batch of them are listed below.

The words 'Intellectual Property Enterprise Court' are promising material for anagrams, particularly when compared with other courts. 'Court of  Justice of the European Union' has lots of letters, but anyone who has ever had that frustrating experience of playing Scrabble and sitting there with a row of 'u's will instantly spot that the letter 'u' crops up a full four times there.  And as for 'Bundesgerichtshof', well, one can only despair.  But 'Intellectual Property Enterprise Court' is replete with possibilities. And yes, you can get the words "patent troll' out of it too.

So, which entries were most deserving of mention?

* Sean Gilday (Page Hargrave) started well, but ran into trouble at the end, with his "Elite Patents County Court: re perp, I'll rep". Merpel wonders whether he couldn't have made a bit more of the three 'p's, three 'r's, three 'e's and two 'l's as well as an 'i': words such as 'peril', 'leper', 'leer' and 'peer' are all there for the taking, if only something can be done with them.

* "Procure purely all-IP interest centre? OTT"  Suggests Christina Michalos (Barrister, 5RB), which is really good, though Merpel is concerned that some good folk might think that 'OTT' stood for something other than "over the top": "off their trolley", for example.

* "Let recurrences pollute patent priority" pronounces the IPKat's talented Portuguese friend Pedro Malaquias, the recurrences in question presumably referring to some item that keeps on being disclosed within the prior art.

* You'll know there are 35 letters -- and I got to 34 of these with "IPEC: cute pet? Lonely reptile? Or star turn?" So says trade mark attorney Sally Cooper, who ingeniously asks the Kats to consider "Impossibility Theorem" which she bravely and imaginative reframes as follows:

"(1) you take on a maths challenge for your PhD - you get to the end of the numbers - you get the PhD;
(2) you take on a maths challenge for your PhD - you fail to get to the end of the numbers - you don't get the PhD;
(3) you take on a maths challenge for your PhD - you fail to get to the end of the numbers - BUT you also prove that no-one else can get to the end of the particular set of numbers - so you get your PhD.
Maybe (1) or (3) ...?"

Good try, Sally, but Merpel -- who has recently learned to count using both paws -- says "no".

* "Cruel corrupt patent troll – yes, I repent!" is the offering from fellow blogger and highly transactional IP solicitor Mark Anderson, of the firm that bears his name.  Trolls can be cruel, indeed, but is not "cruel" itself an anagram of something else that trolls are noted for, and indeed motivated by: "lucre"?

* Another troll-based submission comes from Alex Robinson (Dehns), with "Troll, I? Play cute; I protect entrepreneurs".

* "Top entrepreneurial testicle curry plot" is the most exotic of a curious set of propositions from Brian Stevens (Senior IP Consultant, Danfoss), no doubt reflecting the testosterone-charged encounters between leading counsel for the litigant adversaries. Merpel, who has already found some recipes for testicle curry (here and here), has decided not to be so adventurous and to stick to fish balls ...

* "Court interprets pole picture eternally" is the somewhat cryptic offering from Rebecca E. Campbell, who will have endeared herself to fellow Kat Birgit by attaching the explanatory picture on the right.  But this entry is nowhere near as cryptic as ...

* ..."Proprise Lectually Entorter Plenitert" and "Enter Lectuour Prise in Pertel Procynil" from Iñaki Gil, who excuses himself on the basis that English is not his first language.  To this Kat, who has no science background, "pertel procynil" sounds the sort of thing that SPCs are made of, while "entorter plenitert" might be an obscure Latin tag.

* Ever competitive, Mary Smillie (Rouse) came up with "Ee, lone ruler pet can’t purr, copy?, its litter" (this works best with a Yorkshire accent, she explains [if your device is equipped for sound and people don't mind listening to you laugh, you can hear what Michael McIntyre has to say about Yorkshire accents here]). Other entries from the same source include "Rule: It’s one pet – copycat purr, leer ‘n letter", "In copy rule on letter, pelt ‘ere, cat purrs", "Tap, enter, copy little, precious rent ruler" (is this influenced by economists?) and the thoroughly cryptic "Clue: True IP interest or can tell top perry?"

* Alexandre Kampouris offers a medley of zany suggestions, including but not limited to "Nuttier patent trolls cry: Copier! entitle 'ur Rupee!", "Purple patentee ruttily cries: Cloner! Rot!" and "Truly purple IT-patentee cries: Cloner! Rot!" where, Alexandre explains, "IT" is pronounced "Eye-Tee", as in "Information Technology".

* "Otter-puller copy entertains IP lecturer" ("a presumptuous yet amusing patent case, concerning trawlers, m'Lud"), suggests patent and trade mark attorney Paul Wolff (Paul Wolff Consulting), no doubt appealing to this Kat's academic side.

* "Prior art letter clue, pretty uncle opines", announces Stephen R Postle (Executive Director, Intellectual Property Assets, Sun Chemical Corporation). Who is this pretty uncle, wonders Merpel, who has visions of those beautiful Thai ladies who, on closer inspection, turn out not to be ladies at all ...

* Back to reality, and looking at copyright rather than the registered rights, here comes "Retinue interpret all copy-protect rules", this being the suggestion of Nabil Asaad (Kempner & Partners).

* Combining the feline with the fictional, "Tell cat to purr ‘prosecute entire Renly IP" is the instruction given by Suzanne Bushnell-Watson (Head of Commercialisation & Assistant Director of Research, Innovation Services Research and Innovation Services, The University of Sheffield).  The IPKat was a bit baffled by this, but Merpel was able to explain to him that "Renly" was not a newly-minted adjective, as in "I didn't come to work today: I had ten pints of beer last night and when I woke up I was feeling quite renly".  Rather, this was a literary allusion to Renly Baratheon (one of the Baratheons of Game of Thrones fame).

* Finally, “A recently erupt toll procure interest” is an entry that comes all the way from Spain, or from Barcelona at any rate, courtesy of Guillermo Hinarejos (J. Isern Patentes y Marcas).

So who's the winner? It's a tough choice but, on balance, the prize goes to Mark Anderson, who will receive the prize -- a fresh copy of the 11th edition of the Butterworths Intellectual Property Law Handbook  -- some time early in the New Year when this Kat is back in his office and can pop it into the post.  Well done, Mark; well done, everybody!