Thursday thingies

ertert. "The first EU-wide interactive website dedicated to young people and Intellectual Property is launched today", announce the IPKat's friends at the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM). It's called Ideas Powered [OHIM does not appeared to have registered this name as a Community trade mark, notes Merpel] and it comes courtesy of the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights. According to OHIM's media release:

"The site brings together contributions from young designers, composers, entrepreneurs and artists from all across the EU to show how IP underpins and supports innovation and creativity. [It] also includes a video competition which invites young people to submit their views on how Intellectual Property matters to them.

Today’s release follows on from a 2013 study carried out by OHIM into how EU citizens – including young people – perceive Intellectual Property. The results showed that eight out of ten 15-24 year olds in the EU believe that buying counterfeit products has a negative economic effect, and two thirds agree that illegal downloading is a threat to the economy and jobs. However, 50% still justify buying counterfeits as an act of protest or a smart purchase and 57% think illegally accessing copyright-protected content for personal use is acceptable" [well, if you will ask them ...].

Ideas Powered is a bit more fun than the regular OHIM website, and easier to find your way round. The style of the website is might best be described as a rather self-conscious "this is about as funky as we can be, considering that we're EU bureaucrats" sort of style and this Kat thinks that some good folk have been second-guessing what might just appeal to all those protesting but basically fair 15 to 24 year-olds at whom it's directed. You can also enjoy Ideas Powered on Facebook and Twitter [oh goodness, murmurs Merpel, I've just realised that it's called Ideas Powered because its initial letters are 'IP' ...].
 

Forthcoming events.  During the long summer days which we enjoy in the Northern Hemisphere, you may find that things are getting a bit quiet. Lawyers find that their clients have gone on vacation; courts close as their terms end; students bask in the blissful state of post-examination relaxation and infringers wander off to spend their ill-gotten gains. So now's the time to take some time to check the IPKat's Forthcoming Events page and see if there's anything that takes your fancy.

New eZine on the block. Oxford University Press, publisher of the Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice (JIPLP, the IPKat's favourite IP journal since so many members of the blog team are involved with it), excitedly announces the launch of a new Intellectual Property law eZine. This eZine offers more than 50 pages of free content, videos, podcasts and blogs. You can sample its delights by clicking here.

Churchill's opinion of the
French basketball team?

Around the weblogs. A guest post on the MARQUES Class 46 weblog by Clara Cabecerans summarises the main changes introduced into European IP litigation by the new General Court Rules of Procedure [nb they are already in force, as of 1 July]. These rules govern appeals from the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market's Board of Appeal in Community trade mark and registered Community design cases. The same blog has a perceptive note by Christian Tenkhoff on the General Court's inconsistent treatment of laudatory terms, prompted by its recent decision regarding the mark HOT.  On Afro-IP Caroline Ncube gives an account of the Battle of the Fairhavens and explains how passing off can fill in the gaps in South African domain name ADR rules. Writing on SOLO IP, Barbara Cookson explains why Russian oligarchs are especially welcome in the IP courts of England and Wales. Finally, the late Sir Winston Churchill found himself at the heart of a truly French piece of moral rights litigation after his statue was unceremoniously garbed in a French basketball jersey and then photographed without the sculptor's permission: here's a neat account on the 1709 Blog by Marie-Andree Weiss.