Innovation is, once again, a topic of great concern for Canadian policy makers and the commentariat. And for good reason. Yet, at a time when (mainly foreign) companies – notably Alphabet (Google), Apple, Tesla, Amazon, and Facebook – are lauded as being the ‘world’s most innovative’ (for example, see FastCompany and the Boston Consulting Group) […]
This is a repost of Prof. Giuseppina D'Agostino's blog dated July 5, 2016. IP Osgoode is delighted to congratulate Professor David Vaver on being inducted into the Order of Canada. Professor Vaver was acknowledged, on the eve of Canada Day on July 1, “for his leadership in intellectual property law as a scholar and mentor”.
Doing a PhD is a long and lonely endeavor. Family and friends brave enough to ask for updates are rewarded with responses ranging from the tired, “I sat. I read. I wrote.” to the lifeless, “I sat. And sat. And sat.” Some students break up the monotony by watching cat videos; I read cat decisions […]
This year’s World Intellectual Property Day theme is focused on the role that IP rights play in encouraging innovation and creativity and how the IP system supports innovation. At Osgoode Hall Law School, one of the ways we strive to foster innovation is through our Innovation Clinic, a student-focused initiative that assists start-up companies, entrepreneurs […]
Osgoode Hall Law School’s mooting team recently returned from the University of Oxford, UK, where they competed in the annual Oxford International Intellectual Property Moot. They achieved the highest preliminary round score and made the quarter-finals, losing to the eventual champion of the competition: Bucerius Law School, Hamburg, Germany. The quartet of Jordan Fine, Alicja […]
WHAT IS ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE? Artificial intelligence (“AI”) is a technical field of computer science that includes machine learning, natural language processing, speech processing, expert systems, robotics and machine vision. The term “artificial intelligence” is sometimes challenged in favor of machine intelligence or machine learning. Machine learning automates decision making using programming rules and in some […]
As we get busy in 2017, it is always useful to reflect back to 2016 to see developments in the IP world that will set the stage for many ongoing changes that are already taking place in 2017. As usual, I have also included some IP Osgoode highlights (see the end of what I tried […]
On September 14, the European Commission published draft legislation aimed at modernising the European copyright framework. To ensure the draft legislation delivers the best outcomes for all those affected by it, the Intellectual Property Office made a call for views on the costs and benefits of the proposed measures, and suggestions for how the language […]
The distinction between combinations and aggregations is a well-accepted principle of patent law. A combination is an assemblage of known elements whose combined use leads to a result that is different from the sum of the results of the individual elements. Whereas, an aggregation is an assemblage of elements that each produce their expected result […]
OVERVIEW Similar to other traditional industries, a digital revolution for financial services is underway. Financial technology, or ‘‘FinTech,” is an accelerating technical sector gaining in popularity with both traditional financial institutions and new market entrants. Competitors are forming constructive partnerships to collaborate, efficiently develop, and deploy new FinTech products and services. Patents for core technology […]