Wednesday whimsies

"I don’t know if you mind continuing the plugging", writes Katfriend and IP personality Gwilym Roberts, "but Gill Smith will be speaking at the Royal Overseas League, London, for Union on 11 March 2014 about some of Dyson’s experiences. Her talk is entitled “Enforcing your IP Globally – Tales from the Front Line” and I suspect it will be a lively one!"  Gill does not pull her punches, so this should be an interesting dinner. Tickets can be obtained from dinners@union-gb.com.

"Where on Earth
is Synflorix ...?"

Around the weblogs 1. Over on the SPC Blog, thanks to Alex Robinson (Dehns) there's news of yet another reference for a preliminary ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union on a supplementary protection matter, this time involving Pneumococcal Polysaccharides and Synflorix [Merpel gets the giggles here: to her, the former sounds like a Greek shipping tycoon, the latter like a character from Asterix]. Over on Afro-IP, Kingsley Egbuonu considers the latest efforts of the European Commission to promote geographical protection in Africa while Afro Leo contemplates a forthcoming pitched battle between South Africa and Big Pharma that could inflict heavy casualties on both sides.  If you've ever wondered what the Quakers' position is on intellectual property, wonder no longer: the eagle-eyed Chris Torrero (katpat!) spotted this item on the ever-excellent Intellectual Property Watch on QUNO -- the Quaker United Nations Office in Geneva, which has produced two papers looking at alternatives to UPOV-driven plant variety protection, taking particular note of India and Thailand.


Around the weblogs 2. Active again on Class 46, Edith Van den Eede tells how an Italian court can order the publication of its decision in a trade mark infringement action, even when counterfeit goods have not been used and the plaintiff has suffered no loss. Still on Class 46, fellow Kat Birgit draws our attention to TPN 1/2014, a UK practice memo on the relevance of colour in the case of UK trade marks registered in black and white but generally used in a specific colour or combination of colours. Finally, we go over to India, where the SiNApSE blog reviews the latest outbreak of yoga-based IP litigation and J. Sai Deepak, of Indian IP blog The Demanding Mistress, announces his return to the blogosphere after truanting for a good three months. Welcome back!

Private copying from (un)lawful sources.  Earlier this month Eleonora broke the news that Advocate General Villalón had published his Opinion for the Court of Justice of the European Union in ACI Adam, a Dutch reference for a preliminary ruling from the CJEU on private copying form illegal sources (9 January 2014, Case C-435/12). While there is still no official English translation, here is an informal translation, which you can also download, thanks to Katfriend Dirk J.G. Visser (Klos Morel Vos & Schaap, Amsterdam). Says Dirk, the Dutch can be particularly proud of this paragraph:

"[75] ... the reasoning of the Dutch government has its origin in the fact that the Dutch law tolerates that protected work or material is downloaded from without authorisation [illegal sources] and only uploading of protected work or material can be curbed. Thus the Kingdom of the Netherlands supports indirectly but inevitably, the mass distribution of products resulting from the exploitation of protected works and materials, which distribution can in no case be regarded as normal and in fact, the cause itself creates the phenomenon, the damaging consequences for the rightholders of which this Member State seeks to eliminate. The trivialization of downloading protected work or material that circulates online without proper authorization can only undermine its normal exploitation".

Apparently, the representative of the Netherlands used all the available time in the hearing in Copydan Båndkopi (Case C-463/12) last week to argue that this opinion of the Advocate-General in ACI Adam is wrong. Dirk adds: it is not yet known when the CJEU will rule in ACI Adam.

The Gnomes of Zurich

Zurich hosts next MARQUES coexistence agreement workshop.  In just a couple of weeks, the next MARQUES coexistence agreement workshop takes place. It runs on Wednesday, 5 February, 2014, at the offices of Meyerlustenberger Lachenal, Forchstrasse 452, 8702 Zollikon, Zurich.  You can find all the exciting details here. Emeritus Kat blogger Mark Schweizer is one of the starts of the programme, which we hope you will support. Registrants will be introduced to a case study involving a US corporation that proposes to extend its commercial operations into Europe and a long-established German business that is contemplating further development of its brand into related areas of trade. They will be divided into teams which will be briefed with instructions to achieve a Prior Rights Agreement. After the teams have sought to draft the heads of an Agreement, each team is invited to comment on the issues raised by the case study. There will then be a brief presentation of a sample solution by the Moderators.  In order to keep you on your toes, this event is to be conducted solely and exclusively in the German language. To attend and enjoy the thrill of participation, for the derisory sum of just 25 euro (the refreshments are worth more than that!), just click here.