Friday fantasies

Conferences, seminars, talks -- there's so much coming up in the next few months, so be sure to check out the IPKat's Forthcoming Events page. Just click here to indulge your wildest fantasies ...

People are generally careful, when seeking to register trade marks that correspond to surnames, to check out any secondary meanings which those names may have acquired.  This caused the IPKat to wonder whether any of the trade mark attorneys, brand creation agencies and others who assist in the birth of a new brand make any use of the list of eponymous diseases, or indeed the list of eponyms in general, which exists on Wikipedia.  Merpel says, some are quite appropriate actually.  Abercrombie & Fitch fans might note that Abercrombie's Syndrome "indicates impairment of nutritive function and is seen in wasting diseases" -- like some of the models used in A&F's advertisements.

Around the blogs. The IP Finance blog hosts a really useful piece by Susan Sneddon (Maclay Murry Spens)  on a recent mammoth Scottish decision that considers alternative approaches for assessing the damage done to the value of a brand when quality control and customer relations standards were allowed to slip: you can read it here.  The MARQUES Class 46 European trade mark blog has finally reached the 1,600 subscriber mark (well done!). Recent posts include news of Nokia's day in court in Luxembourg and a request for feedback on some issues relating to copyright in depictions of trade marks in official registers.

When the IPKat was a little kitten, his eye was caught by Adbusters -- a bright, exciting organisation dedicated to freeing the consumer from the tyranny of brands and of exploitation via the manipulated media. Well, though he has heard pretty well nothing of Adbusters over the past few years, he can see that it's still around, as is evidenced by Buy-Nothing Day (coming to a shopping centre near you ...)  This is the story: "We are a network of activists organizing a Carnivalesque Rebellion that will shut down consumer capitalism for a week. The climax of our efforts is Buy Nothing Day, a 24-hour moratorium on consumer spending, celebrated November 26th in North America and 27th Internationally".  Merpel wonders if anyone is monitoring the pulse of the capitalist world on those days, to see whether the heart of Mammon skips a beat.

"Enforcement Strategy in Eastern Europe" -- no, it's nothing to do with the old USSR's foreign policy, it's a one-hour online seminar (how the Kats hate the word 'webinar') on 1 December, conducted by his friends at Petosevic.  The IPKat can't honestly say it sounds like fun, but it does sound interesting and, if you take this large and increasingly important chunk of Europe seriously, you'll probably get a lot from it.  Details here.

Post for a llama ...

Lisa from Edinburgh writes excitedly to tell the Kats about a juicy vacancy in the School of Law, University of Edinburgh, which suitably qualified readers of this weblog might just like to apply for: "a new Senior Lecturer in IT Law to join the excellent team in SCRIPT" [Home of the legendary TechnoLlama, adds Merpel]. Information about this post can be found here -- but you'd better be quick since the vacancy closes TODAY!