In a move with far reaching implications for the debates around pharmaceutical patents, innovation and access to medicines, the Indian patent office issued its first ever compulsory licence in the post TRIPS era. While health activists, generic manufacturers and several academics lauded the decision, the multinational pharmaceutical industry was up in arms.
In celebration of Canadian Music Week, the IP Osgoode Speaker Series presented a panel discussion on “Copyright and the Music Industry” on March 22, 2012 featuring Robert Levine and Dr. Brett Danaher. Levine spoke about the current state of copyright and the public discourse surrounding it. He argued the need for more effective enforcement mechanisms […]
On February 21, 2012, Judge Perell of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice granted certification for a proposed class action suit under the Class Proceedings Act, 1992, S.O. 1992, c. C.6 against Thomson Reuters Canada Limited in Waldman v Thomson Reuters Corporation. The suit was launched by Mr. Lorne Waldman, an Ontario lawyer specializing in […]
In Slater v Wimmer [2012] EWPCC 7, a cameraman claims copyright infringement after a skydiver provided some footage of what was billed as “the first tandem skydive over Mount Everest” to a Danish television show. As an aside, it turns out the skydive occurred about 20 km away from Everest and the adventure company that […]
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 […]