Original news and analysis on international IP policy
When it comes to intellectual property rights enforcement, developed country rights owners and their governments continue to puzzle over how to get the rest of the world’s economies to drink from the trough now that they have brought them there. One approach that may regain interest is combining the all-out war on piracy with efforts to build greater trust in the enforcement system.
Music companies suing music downloader Joel Tenenbaum of Harvard University for copyright infringement won the right to block webcasts of the court proceedings, according to a copy of the opinion available here. The case has attracted national attention for its…
CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND – In an age when private sector interests are arguably returning to dominance in intellectual property policy debates, two key global policy bodies are being pushed to show their relevance.
Industry representatives sent a message to the Group of 20 leaders last week that intellectual property rights should be given more attention by governments and could bring benefit to the global economy if properly protected. A representative from the Confederation…
The French National Assembly on 2 April gave initial approval without changes to a restrictive draft law on the diffusion and protection of works on the internet known by its French acronym HADOPI, (IPW, Access to Knowledge, 23 February 2009),…
Switzerland and the United States on Tuesday signed the first-ever bilateral agreement on scientific and technology cooperation in Washington, DC. The framework agreement covers basic and applied research, involves joint programmes and conferences as well as information sharing, and facilitates…
The Obama administration’s new trade team has quickly come under pressure to focus on protecting United States interests, including enforcement of intellectual property rights, at a time when multilateral institutions urge governments to remain open for the sake of the global economy.
The European Commission this week will launch a forum for coordinating attacks against counterfeit and pirated goods, to be announced at a daylong event featuring representatives from a wide range of industries. No representatives of the public interest or consumers appear to be included in the event or related initiatives.
Newly confirmed United States Commerce Secretary Gary Locke was asked some questions about patents during his nomination process in the Senate. The Commerce secretary oversees the US Patent and Trademark Office. Here are his responses [pdf], according to a Washington…
The academic Internet Governance Project reports that the World Intellectual Property Organization – a key arbitration body for global internet domain disputes – appears to have registered a domain name using a name trademarked by someone else three years earlier.…
The committee of the United States Senate drafting legislation to reform the US patent system made little progress at a meeting Thursday, according to sources, but adopted a bipartisan amendment and scheduled to reconvene next week to continue work.
Gary Locke was confirmed as the United States Commerce Secretary by a unanimous vote in the Senate Tuesday evening. Locke, a former Washington state governor and the first Chinese-American to hold the post, will inherit position shaped by the global…