Friday fantasies

Katnews 1. Darren Smyth, a former guest Kat and a bit of an enthusiast for patents, design rights and interesting shirts, is rejoining the IPKat team -- this time as a full-timer.  Despite impressions to the contrary which readers may receive from the photo on the right, Darren doesn't just stop in the middle: he goes all the way down to the ground.   When not blogging for the IPKat or for his own, decidedly personal, blog the IP Alchemist, Darren partnerises at EIP, an IP practice in Holborn, London, which is fortuitously located quite close to the Old Nick. Welcome back, Darren

Katnews 2. Stefano Barazza, the eponymous head (and presumably also tail) of Studio Barazza Legale, has joined the IPKat team as our third guest blogger for the six months to 30 June.  An omnivorous enthusiast, his interests span vast chunks of IP law, which he practises from the haven of his office in Udine, North East Italy.  Stefano has of late been a regular contributor to the Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice (JIPLP) but, to show how versatile he is, he has just written a piece for the Journal of European Competition Law  Practice ("Commission v Microsoft: How to Set Reasonable Rates for Access to Interoperability Information and Evaluate their Innovative Character?", abstract here).

What should be done about unpaid OHIM costs orders?   The fate of orders which the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM) makes in proceedings relating to Community trade marks is that, it seems, not quite everyone complies with them.  This phenomenon has attracted the attention of Katfriend Désirée Fields (McDermott Will & Emery UK, London), whose pensée on the subject can be read on the MARQUES Class 46 website here.  There's a discussion on this topic on the MARQUES Linked In Group page too. So, if you are someone who is owed too small a sum to be cost-effectively enforced, or if you're perhaps someone who doesn't pay when ordered to do so, let's hear from you  [that's neat, says Merpel: this blog doesn't often feature words ending in 'ée', but there are two in this note].

"Something for the weekend, sir?" is a phrase which readers of this Kat's vintage will rarely hear without a tinge of nostalgia for those bygone days when, oh never mind ...  But the proprietors of the Guardian and Observer newspapers (for those whose weekend bedroom habits involve the spreading out of newspapers) insist that the weekend belongs to them, literally.  "We own the weekend", states this jocular tale of trade mark proprietorship.  Says the IPKat, what fun!  But Merpel wants to know: wight this literary text and accompanying video clip be admitted in evidence of the newspapers' reputation and goodwill in the word "weekend", whether as a 'limping brand' trailing behind the dominant brands Guardian and Observer? A katpat goes to the wonderful Margaret Llewelyn for this lead ...