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Trademark Owners Take On Internet Search Engines

By Liza Porteus for Intellectual Property Watch
NEW YORK - Popular search engines like Google are proving to be formidable foes to trademark holders trying to maintain a strong grip on their property in keyword advertising on the Internet, experts said on 10 September.

There are numerous search engines people can use to look up information online, but Google is not only the most popular, it is also involved in a litany of lawsuits involving online ads and trademarks. So far, Google has prevailed in US courts, but has lost similar trademark cases in France.

Data Mining: Consumers’ Convenience, Privacy’s End

By Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch LINZ, AUSTRIA – How distant is the realisation of a “prevision” and prevention culture as portrayed in the Steven Spielberg movie Minority Report? Telling the future is not as far off as critical…

New USPTO Rules, Legal Decision Signal Changes For US Patent Practices

By Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch
New rules by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) governing the continuation of patent applications will wreak havoc in the biotechnology and high-tech sectors, according to some experts. The regulations, announced in August as part of a USPTO effort to boost patent quality, and effective on 1 November, are already being challenged in court.

In addition, US patent practice changes could arise from a 20 August judicial decision setting a new standard for determining when patent infringement is wilful or done knowingly.

Acting To Protect Freedom of Expression At ICANN

By Dan Krimm The continuing saga at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) about policy for approving new generic top-level domains (gTLDs) is entering what may be its final stages this summer. There has been a stream…

Germany: Fight Escalates Over Copyright Fee For Computers

By Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch The fight between German collecting rights societies and hardware companies is escalating. This week the CEO of the society for musical performing and mechanical reproduction rights, Harald Heker, heavily criticised the German Association…

IP, Content Delivery Key To Telecom-Broadcasting Convergence

By William New with Pravir Palayathan
Content delivery and telecommunications are becoming rapidly intertwined in a "converging" world, bringing new opportunities but also likely leading to a dogfight among the high number of networks platforms for content delivery currently available, according to experts.

"Not every horse can win the race at the same time, and there is a lesson there for 'convergence'," David Wood, head of new media at the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), told Intellectual Property Watch. "Every day a new means of providing media to the public seems to come out of the woodwork, all convinced they will be popular, valuable, and make a lot of money. But it can't happen. There will be winners and losers."

The EBU hosted a 21-22 June "meeting of high-level experts" jointly with the UN International Telecommunication Union (ITU). "Our hope in organising the conference jointly with the EBU and ITU was to bring this into focus; and, if we accept that not everything can be successful, to see through to which would be more likely to succeed," said Wood.