Wednesday whimsies

Feeling a bit like Tom Hanks in Big, here's my first go at Wednesday whimsies:

Authoritative, ministerial arm crossing

In politics - Labour announced their shadow cabinet and named the "vastly experienced" Angela Eagle  as Shadow Business Secretary & First Secretary of State. Eagle has an identical twin and is an avid chess player, both of which should prove helpful in navigating the political landscape of IP. She also appears to be a fan of Babs and something called a, "cricket." Eagle looks to have decent economics credentials, so here's hoping.

Michael Dugher, "a fierce northern attack dog" is now Shadow Culture Secretary.   Dugher's claim to culture appears to be a shared love of karaoke with his Conservative counterpart and is into something called a, "Nottingham Forest." His previous role as shadow transport secretary suggests he's not a fan of privatisation. Let's see how he fares with the BBC...

Authoritative, ministerial squinting

Events - The teams at CREATe and the Digital Catapult are putting on a free, full-day event on Orphan Works at the Digital Catapult Centre in London. The event is already waitlist only, but you never know. Wigs and Gowns is running workshops on Fashion and IP, including one on September 19th in London, info here.

Around the weblogs - Afro IP covers some corruption and bribery by Ghanaian judges. IP Tango raves about a Geographical Indications event held at Bournemouth's CIIPM and sponsored by Grana Padano.  1709 reports on Prince, in a suitably Princely pose, and Universal, being told off for not considering fair use when they issued a takedown notice in 2007 for dancing babies. The target of the notice was a 29-second clip of two toddlers dancing to Prince's "Let's Go Crazy" (sadly not the Ally McBeal baby.) AmeriKat coverage here.

Have your say - Don't forget that the UK IPO has an open consultation on Section 72 which closes October 8th.  Sports rights holder will be hot on this one.

"The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (CDPA) provides copyright owners with a range of rights allowing them to control the use of their works and to seek payment for this use. Among these rights are rights to control the showing, playing and other communication of works to the public. This includes the showing of a film or broadcast to a public audience. 

CC Wikimedia

Section 72(1) sets out an exception to these rights. It allows organisations which do not charge for admission to show television programmes to the public without permission from the owners of film and broadcast copyright in those programmes. If an organisation wishes to show broadcasts that contain other copyright elements, for example any original literary, artistic, musical or dramatic works, as well as most commercially produced sound recordings, it still needs the permission of the relevant owners of those works. 

Recent court cases have highlighted both legal and policy issues in relation to the provision set out in Section 72, which the proposals set out in this consultation seek to address."

Finally, Happy Birthday to Jacob Schick, who was the only inventor I could find with a birthday today. Famous for patenting the first electric razor and for renouncing his US citizenship in to evade tax, Schick introduced a new form of dermatitis to the modern world.