An Anthem for Intellectual Property: you decide

The IPKat received some brave and imaginative entries for his Intellectual Property Anthem competition, for which the winning prize is complimentary registration for CLT's conference, " "Ownership and Control of IP Rights", on Monday 10 May (conference details here). The IPKat is delighted to publish some of the best entries below.

From Mark Anderson (Anderson & Company) comes this offeing, to the tune of Cole Porter's Experiment (here):

Experiment,
Keep lab notebooks day and night;
Then draft your claims,
And they will lead you to the light.
Before you launch your product, you see
it’s best if you have some solid IP
To broaden your monopoly.
Experiment.

Be curious
about the current state of the art.
Get furious
if your invention falls apart.
If this advice you'll only employ,
the future can offer you infinite joy
and merriment.
Experiment,
and you'll see.

Sophie Ashcroft (Lapthorn Blake) hasn't actually written an anthem but instead nominates "Don't Copy Me" by Robots in Disguise, adding "Not sure how many people will be familiar with the tune, but the chorus lyrics and second verse surely make it suitable as the intellectual property anthem!":

Was your hair cut by the council?
Two in one, Louise Brookes and Shirley Temple.
One Madonna glove and a jacket too tight.
Are you wearing your whole badge collection out tonight?

I've got the style and you can't cheat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't beat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't cheat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't beat it
Stop! Don't copy me me me!

Like your busby, guess you saw the same on me,
Get out you want to pay me a royalty.
You can laugh but it looks much better on me,
What can one do? I'm always years too early

I've got the style and you can't cheat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't beat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't cheat it
Stop!
I've got the style and you can't beat it
Stop! Don't copy me me me!

Heard you're learning drums too: Quelle suprise!
Guess you'll be checking out my fierce beats.
Three drummers in one band hmm, un peu de trop
Get back on your guitar or else go solo!

I've got the style and you can't cheat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't beat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't cheat it
Stop! Don't copy me!
I've got the style and you can't beat it
Stop!

Patent attorney Jim Boff (Phillips & Leigh) weighs in with an event-specific [and short] anthem:

The Sun has got his hat on
IP IP IP hooray
The Sun has got his hat on
And he’s coming out to play.

All praise due to WIPO
They sure know what to do
Name a day for all IP
And celebrate it too.

The Sun has got his hat on
IP IP IP hooray
The Sun has got his hat on
And he’s coming out to play.

All attorneys listen
And their trainees too
Clock this up to CPD
You might learn something new!

Ben Evans has put together this rousing concoction, based though it may be on the principle of territoriality:

Land of the licensor O land of the licensee,
A land of owners and assignees, rights holders all.
Her brave litigators, claims and oppositions much fought,
It was for damages that they filed their claims.

WIPO! WIPO!,
I am devoted to the world wide academy.
So long as there is a PCT and a RDI,
May intellectual property remain.

"The Intellectual Property Anthem, with apologies to Mozart and Darius" is the grand title of this effort, which an anonymous contestant with a pretty name describes as her "first attempt". It is sung to the tune of Non Piu Andrai by Mozart, slightly abridged version of the arrangement sung by Darius on episode four of Popstar to Operastar:

Say Joe Bloggs goes about launching widgets,
Patents, trade marks, copyrights, trade secrets,
Designs – using these to stop infringers:
For Joe can stop or allow them to
Use, make, sell, import, copy his widgets
When a government permits him to.

IP, intellectual property
Encourages creativity.
But its detractors insist on the converse,
Saying that what happens is really the reverse,
When in fact Joe gets a monopoly.

Most of the stats
Most of the figures
Show IP owners
Recoup investments
Before reinvest…ing…
in…to… more… wid… gets. (the lyrics do fit into that long aaahh part!!)

Now most firms they just love to make use of
Patents, trade marks, designs and trade secrets
Plus copyrights to deter infringers
And make money, yes, lots of it too.
Use your IP rights to stop infringements
You could make money, lots of it, too.

Three cheers for IP rights now,
Yes, it’s that time of year,
To thank WIPO and the lawyers,
For helping creators get free beer.

Stephen Castell (WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center List of Experts) offers first, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, what he calls "my existing Jubilee Anthem, renamed for these purposes the IP Anthem" (please see click here.) "It’s not exactly ‘singalong’", he writes, "but anyone with a bit of choral know-how should be able to learn fairly readily the appropriate parts for the opening quizzical (Shakespearean) stanza, which are surely most appropriate and fitting for World Intellectual Property Day 2010":

“What hath this day deserv'd ? what hath it done
That it in golden letters should be set
Among the high tides in the calendar ?”
[From William Shakespeare's The Life and Death of King John, Act III, Scene 1 (c. 1594)].

He adds, "No copyright or other IP problem – I am its composer… and Bill Shakespeare is, well, decomposing, these long centuries". Stephen's real entry is a new ditty, "Wiser than the WIPO", sung to the tune of a well-known First World War Tommy's trench song ('Whiter than the Wipers (for ‘Ypres’)/Whitewash' (here). The tune will be familiar to everyone who has seen the film/show ‘Oh What a Lovely War’):

Wiser than the WIPO
Wiser than the WIPO on the call!
Wiser than the WIPO on the call!
Oh mail me with the IP law you paid your lousy lawyer for,
So I can be wiser than the WIPO on the call!
On the call, on the call, On the call, the conference call,
Oh hit me with the boring law you paid your wealthy lawyer for,
So I can be wiser than the WIPO on the call!

The ever-creative Nia Roberts has put her talents to good use with this stirring song -- which you can even listen to via this PowerPoint 2007 sound file:

Designers, inventors and owners of brands -
Creators and artists of various strands -
Their rights are protected; Their int'rests assured;
Their piracy problems are cured.

Chorus: IP, all sing this anthem to thee
Whether patent or trade mark
Copyright or design
The glory, the honour is thine.

A cunning invention? A patent is best
A registered mark sets you off from the rest
Design registration (OHIM or UK)
Is well worth the cost, so they say.

Chorus

And so as my song nears its final farewell
I sing to "la propriété intellectuelle"
An encomium of praise, oh so richly deserved
(But note that all rights are reserved)

Chorus

With this embarrassment of riches before him, the IPKat just couldn't make up his mind [Merpel's also a bit embarrassed, but that's because she thought an encomium was a sort of musical instrument ...]. Accordingly he has decided to invite you, the reader, to vote for your preference. The winner will be announced next Monday -- on World Intellectual Property Day itself! The poll can be found at the top of the IPKat's sidebar. Please take the trouble to vote!