This past fall, I was lucky to have the opportunity to intern at Industry Canada in Ottawa as part of the Osgoode IP Law and Technology Intensive Program. Industry Canada is a federal department that works to make Canada’s industrial sectors more competitive in the world market by attracting investors and traders. The Department’s focus […]
On February 14th, 2012 following the High Court and Court of Appeal decisions, the UK Copyright Tribunal released an interim decision concerning the requirement of licensing agreements for media and news monitoring services in Meltwater Holding BV v The Newspaper Licensing Agency Limited. The Tribunal determined that services such as Google News and Alerts as […]
Advocate-General of the European Court of Justice (ECJ), Yves Bot’s opinion at the end of last year, on SAS Institute Inc. v. World Programming Ltd., was based on the High Court of England and Wales’ preliminary judgment for the same case. Issued on 29 November 2011, Adv.-Gen. Bot focused on specific provisions of Directives 91/250/EEC […]
I was one of the lucky few that had the chance to take part in the inaugural IP Intensive program last term at Osgoode Hall Law School. Before coming to Osgoode, I was a musician for over a decade, so I was thrilled when I received the news that my placement was at the Society […]
Earlier this year, the Westminster Magistrates’ Court found that a young British student could be extradited to the United States to face allegations of copyright infringement. The United States Justice Department requested that he be extradited under the Extradiction Act, 2003 and the US-UK Extradition Treaty.
Last January, a Federal Court summary judgment held that the Aga Khan’s copyright in his literary works had been infringed by the publications of Nagib Tajdin and Alnaz Jiwa. The IPilogue drew attention to comments made in obiter stating that “it was not for a plaintiff in a copyright infringement suit to prove a lack […]
If the past month is any indication at all, 2012 is going to be an eventful year for intellectual property legislation, at least in the US and Canada. The controversy over the twin anti-digital piracy bills— the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), and the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA)— has gained much attention, particularly because […]
Modern concepts of art and creativity pose a challenge for traditional notions of copyright law. Last March, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled on the legality of appropriation art.
After a little over a year and two failed attempts, the Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency of Sweden (Kammarkollegiat) finally officially approved an application in January made by 19-year-old Swedish philosophy student Isak Gerson to recognize the Missionary Church of Kopimism (Missionerande Kopimistsamfundet), and thus ‘Kopimism’ as a religion.
The complicated position that subconscious copying occupies when establishing reproduction and infringement in copyright law was recently highlighted in a key decision by the Patents County Court (PCC) of the UK. In Michael Mitchell v. BBC, Judge Birss’s meticulous judgment focused on whether there existed the possibility of either conscious or subconscious infringement, the latter […]