Recent publications

The October 2007 issue of the European Trade Mark Reports, published monthly by Sweet & Maxwell, contains another bright and cheerful selection of reports of some of the most talked-about decisions on the crowded continent. This issue features, among others, the following choice rulings:

* Cofresco v Controller of Patents (High Court, Dublin), a lively case in which the owner of the TOPPITS Community trade mark for plastic kitchen storage containers failed to block a registration of TUB-ITS for the same goods after some rather closer analysis of the respective meanings of the two words than the average consumer with imperfect recall would ever indulge in (this dispute was decided the opposite way round in the Netherlands);

* Vortex v British Sky Broadcasting - an early .eu dispute ruling over the word "skyblog" that sensibly held that once the use of the word was settled by a coexistence agreement that had been upheld by the courts, the ADR Centre for .eu would respect that determination;

* Piper-Hiedsieck v Champagne Vranken (Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris), a case in which the complex arithmetical basis of calculation of damages for trade mark infringement is, unusually, laid open for all to see.

The September 2007 issue of the ETMR's companion reports, the bimonthly European Copyright and Design Reports, is also now available. Cases for the connoisseur include

* Marius Pedersen v KODA (Danish Supreme Court), on whether there is an act of public broadcasting when employees listen to music on TV, radio and CD players while at work or when in lorries;

Right: "It's been a hard day's night, and I've been working like a dog ..."

* Re Casio KKK, a ruling of the OHIM Third Board of Appeal on various issues, including that of whether an ex officio decision by OHIM to change the wording of a Community design product indication is a violation of the applicant's right to be heard;

* Retail Systems Software v McGuire, an important Irish High Court ruling on the assessment of damages where a damages claim embraces not just ordinary loss in respect of the copyright-protected product but also losses in respect of "convoyed goods".