Monday miscellany

Pistols for two, breakfast for one, coriander for no-one. The IPKat seems to have struck a new and possibly inexhaustible stream of posts on the topic of fiction writing about or by members of the intellectual property professions. This time it's the turn of Bristows Associate Matthew Dick, whose novel Pistols for Two -- Breakfast for One can be accessed via Amazon here.  The author's biographical details, below, are far more entertaining than those that appear on Bristows' rather straight-laced description of their fee-earner here:

"Matthew J. Dick is frequently described by those who have had the pleasure of his acquaintance as "at once masculine, sensitive and poetic", apparently without irony. An idler and a shirker, he tries to avoid challenging activity of any kind lest he finds it tedious. More acute (awake) readers may interpret this as a fear of failure, but that is entirely untrue: Dick has no fear of failure, it being a life-long companion of his. The author is often charged with being a killjoy, an accusation which never fails to delight him. He dislikes coriander. Intensely".

Around the weblogs. Easter breaks may come and go, but the indefatiguable Kingsley Egbuonu just marches on and on. Never discouraged in the bleaker areas of his enquiries into the whereabouts of websites for Africa's intellectual property offices on behalf of Afro-IP, this week he visits Sierra Leone, the 43rd state to have received his scrutiny. Across the Atlantic from Africa, over on IP Tango, Patricia Covarrubia writes on geographical indication protection for marble which originates from Cachoeiro de Itapemirim in Brazil.

Long live the Aardvark. The IPKat's sidebar poll on whether the new South African journal on intellectual property law should be called the Intellectual Property Law Journal or Aardvark will be closing in a few hours.  At present the overwhelming response of readers is that the new journal should not have a boringly descriptive name that was in danger of being confused with other journals. Aardvark at least has some connection with South Africa, is distinctive and comes first in every alphabetical list of IP journals known to this Kat. If you feel strongly one way or the other, you still have time to vote. Make it count!