Wednesday whimsies

When trade marks overlap. "When Trademarks Overlap with Other IP Rights", this year's INTA winter conference in Munich, Germany, takes place on 8 and 9 December in the warm and cosy Westin Grand Munich Hotel. The subject of discussion is plainly described in the conference's title, and some difficult questions will be addressed. There is a substantial feline interest in this topic: Kat team members Neil and Jeremy are participating (Neil is the programme's co-chair and Jeremy is giving the keynote address), while one-time guest Kat Tara Aaron is speaking too. Click here for full programme details and registration.

On the subject of Kat-flavoured events, Eleonora has been busily organising another of her highly popular  e-LAWnora "specials".  Titled "Nothing but exceptional copyright exceptions", this bespoke copyright briefing runs on the afternoon of Friday, 12 December 2014 and this time it's being held in London. You can read more about it here or click to register here.

Around the weblogs.  Ben Challis (1709 Blog) was quick off the mark with news that Klinger v Conan Doyle Estate (the "Sherlock Holmes" case) is not heading for a US Supreme Court ruling, Tara Aaron (Aaron Sanders) has potted this too, for IP Breakdown.  On SOLO IP, Barbara Cookson maintains her track record for shaking things up a bit with this post on governance of the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys in the UK. PatLit hosts a thoughtful piece by Mark A. Cantor on whether all US patent issues, including claims under State law, should be heard by the Federal Court.  Regarding designs, the MARQUES Class 99 blog carries two recent posts. One asks what can be done when an offence of falsely representing goods as being design-protected is committed; the other draws attention to the existence of alternative modes of interpretation of the Indian provisions relating to the calculation of damages for design infringement.

Coming sooner ... or later.  The IPKat's Forthcoming Events page is often mentioned in our round-ups, but we don't have a monopoly of lists of events.  The Queen Mary Journal of Intellectual Property's weblog carries one too, and here, courtesy of fellow Class 46 blogger Pedro Malaquias, is its November list. Warning: it's pretty long!

IPAN and an attaché case.  The activities of Intellectual Property Awareness Network (IPAN) are not as well-known to the IP community as they might be, since this UK group appears to be fairly committed to going good by stealth.  Describing itself as a "network of professional and business organisations with a shared interest in improving general awareness and understanding of patents, trade marks, designs, copyright and other intellectual property rights", IPAN, now chaired by longstanding Katfriend Ruth Soetendorp, has been furthering the cause of IP attachés in foreign markets where British businesses can benefit from local on-the-spot guidance on IP and related issues (Brazil, China and South East Asia are the places to which such attachés have been attached: you can read about IPAN's recent meeting with them here, and the Intellectual Property Office's independent review of their performance can be read here.  The basic conclusion of this report is that the attachés are doing a good job, but they could be a bit more proactive [this is important, adds Merpel: a business that doesn't know it has a problem doesn't expend time and effort trying to solve it] and should be more widely known within the community of smaller businesses.