Without a background in horse racing, I feel comfortable expressing today as a “Fivefecta”. Since Monday’s announcement that the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) would release judgments in five critically important copyright appeals heard on December 6 and 7, 2011, there has been a growing excitement in the Copyright community. The decisions from these appeals, […]
While North American IP enthusiasts had likely been pre-occupied with the controversy surrounding the stalled American anti-internet piracy bills known as SOPA and PIPA (covered by IP Osgoode here), Europe has been struggling to deal with the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). Even though it was designed to be an international framework for improved intellectual property […]
At the Rio + 20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development -- which followed by forty years the Stockholm Declaration of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment and by twenty years the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development -- the negotiators sought to “reinvigorate political will and raise the level of commitment by […]
Edward Elgar Publishing has released a paperback edition of the book Copyright, Contracts, Creators - New Media, New Rules by Prof. Giuseppina D'Agostino. Copyright, Contracts, Creators evaluates the efficacy of current copyright law to address the contracting and use of creative works. It looks in particular at freelance works and argues that their copyright treatment […]
On June 11 2012 an article by Vinay Menon appeared in the Toronto Star titled “Anne of Green Gables to be remade for TV”. The article reports that Kate Macdonald Butler, granddaughter to author Lucy Maud Montgomery and president of the family-owned company Heirs of L.M. Montgomery Inc., will be centrally involved in a new […]
After years of debate (almost 15, to be precise) and numerous revisions and cancellations (4, to be precise), Bill C-11 or An Act to Amend the Copyright Act, arguably the most controversial set of changes to the Canadian Copyright Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-42), has just been passed by a vote of 158 to 135. […]
The Intellectual Property Institute of Canada (IPIC) and IP Osgoode are delighted to announce our 2012 Canadian writing challenge in intellectual property law. We are pleased to be running our third annual writing challenge. Our goal is to further enhance thoughtful and well-researched intellectual property public policy scholarship and discussion. We encourage a broad range […]
In the past few years, policymakers, academic commentators, consumer advocates, civil liberties groups, and user communities have expressed grave concerns about the steadily increasing levels of enforcement of intellectual property rights. Many of these concerns relate to the “alphabet soup” of transborder intellectual property enforcement, which consists of the following: SECURE (Standards to Be Employed […]
Zut alors! Christian Louboutin is not having a good year with the judicial system and must be seeing red! I have previously covered Christian Louboutin’s dispute with Yves Saint Laurent in the US, with respect to YSL’s use of the red-soled shoes. Christian Louboutin suffered a blow when he was denied a preliminary injunction […]
The trademark dispute over the “iPad” name rages on in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) between Shenzhen Proview Technology and Apple Inc. However, the Cupertino-based producer of the ever popular iPod, iPhone, and of course the iPad won’t let its legal issues in China get in the way of the brand’s overall expansion into […]