Friday fantasies

Fed up with webinars? Happy to meet other IP-ers face to face? If so, why not check out the IPKat's Forthcoming Events list.  2011 is just around the corner, so why not book for your favourite seminar or conference now -- and beat the Christmas rush?

Chocs away! At the Sheraton
one can combine some
plane-watching with
the Belgian love of chocolate

And talking of forthcoming events, The special Parallel Trade Seminar which MARQUES has organised for Thursday, 20 January, provides a great opportunity to learn from [and argue with, says Merpel] experts while enjoying the inexpressible pleasures of the Sheraton Airport Hotel, Brussels, Belgium.  Programme and booking details may be found here.  Registration is a modest €200 for MARQUES members and an only slightly less modest €225 for non-members.  US visitors are welcome: they can buy their Omega watches without having to wait for Costco to import them (see here for explanation). A strong international cast of speakers includes Zuzana Slovakova (Unit D2 – Industrial Property, DG Internal Market and Services, European Commission: if she hasn't been at DG Internal Market and Services very long, she might still be disposed to listen to us ...). Go for it!

If the Bulgarian Patent Office refuses your application, pray here

A very happy Ventsi Stoilov has written all the way from Bulgaria to tell the IPKat that, with effect from this Monday, 13 December, the database of trade marks held by the Patent Office of Bulgaria has been added to the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM) TMView search tool, which provides free access to trade mark applications and registrations in Bulgaria.  This latest expansion brings the total number of offices contributing data to TMView to 13: OHIM, WIPO, the UK, Czech Republic, Italy, Benelux, Portugal, Denmark, Spain, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia and Bulgaria.  The IPKat is happy too, but Merpel is too busy wondering how many examiners might allow the registration of TMView as a trade mark for the provision of trade mark information and search services.

42% of voters share this view

Why settle for CRAP when you can have something better?  Not everyone has voted yet in the poll to decide the name of the proposed Community patent that doesn't quite cover the whole of the European Community? The poll can be found at the top of the IPKat weblog sidebar, here.  With nearly 100 votes cast so far, the Community Restricted-Area Patent (CRAP) is comfortably in the lead, but other names are starting to pick up support too.  The Kat has even received some write-in suggestions: "As it took a while arrive after the attempts for a real Community Patent which could have been named ComPat this new Not the Community Patent, which is expected to encourage economic growth, could be called ComPost" writes Steve Barr. From James Legg comes a selection which includes the delightful "patentes de la zona unificada de visión de futuro, pero traicionera países gringos", "brevetto della zona di non avere fede in Silvio" and "europäische Muster ein nützliches Patent".  Evelina Kaarme nominates the ePatent (for Enhanced Patent), while Inga Raudsepp prefers the Partcom.patent.  Meanwhile the practical Robert Börner says it should be called the "Euro-patent"; presumably since the word "Euro" is just part of "European", there would be no likelihood of confusion with the European patent.


Around the blogs.  The IPKat commented on the launch of IPHire earlier this week; SOLO IP now asks for readers' thoughts on the benefits and problems of temporary IP work in the small/sole IP practitioner community.  When the EU's General Court churns out more Community trade marks than a Kat can wave his whiskers at, check out MARQUES' Class 46 weblog, where the indefatiguable Laetitia Lagarde is doing a great job in picking out the most important ones (see here and here, for example).  IP Dragon gives a critical analysis of Nike's enforcement strategy against a single 'end user' here.  PatLit looks at an interesting issue: do you have the right to get hold of court documents in discontinued patent proceedings that you weren't even party to?  If you've ever wondered who the "informed user" of a toilet is, for Community registered design purposes, don't worry: Class 99 has been wondering too.