Evaluation Of New Ideas Research Articles

A comprehensive text on European design law

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. Designs are too often treated as the poor relation of trade marks and patents. Community designs are now ten years old, but there have been relatively few decisions from major courts in relation to them, and minor decisions have often not been widely reported or translated. The application of Community design law has been inconsistent and the quality of decisions has sometimes been poor. For these reasons, this comprehensive review of Community design law will be a very welcome addition to many practitioners' bookshelves.

Philosophical perspectives on intellectual property

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. Professor Annabelle Lever is a political philosopher best known for her work on privacy and democracy. This makes her seem an unlikely editor for a work on the philosophy of intellectual property, but it seems to have been an inspired decision. The world of intellectual property law can, at times, be rather insular. Having input from other disciplines is valuable. Annabelle Lever provides that input in her editorship of this volume. Her introduction is an insightful critique of...

Dealing with IP matters in cross-border cases

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. The past 15–20 years have witnessed a proliferation in cross-border disputes relating to the enforcement of intellectual property rights. Indeed, infringements of IP rights are increasingly international in scope. This is probably due to a mixture of concurrent factors such as the globalization of business and commerce, the increasing role of parallel traders, and the never-ending expansion of the internet and other communication technologies. On the contrary, IP rights are predominantly territorial and national in nature.1 It...

Pymote: High Level Python Library for Event-Based Simulation and Evaluation of Distributed Algorithms

In recent years we have witnessed strong development and widespread use of powerful wirelessly connected platforms, thus the set of the related problems that need to be solved by distributed algorithms is growing rapidly. Some of them present large obstacles in harnessing the full potential of this new technology, so there is an imminent need for a fast and easy evaluation of new ideas and approaches. Simulation is a fundamental part of distributed algorithm design and evaluation process. In this paper, we present a library for event-based simulation and evaluation of distributed algorithms. This library provides a set of simple but powerful tools with a goal to ease virtual setup of a complex system such as a distributed network of communicating entities and to define, simulate, and analyze its behavior. In order to reduce a huge problem space inherent in such systems, our library is using a high level of abstraction. This is made possible by a strict and complete definition of the distributed computing environment. The library is implemented in Python whose simple and expressive syntax provides a possibility of minimal implementations and a mild learning curve. In addition to executing automated simulations or larger experiments, the library fully supports interactive mode along with a step-by-step execution, which can be a very powerful combination.

Geographical indications: a signposted route to the future or an impenetrable labyrinth?

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. The law applying to Geographical Indications (GIs) is a mess, as any practitioner who has tried explaining ‘Stilton’ to a lay person knows (The Telegraph, 27 December 2012, online edition). Dev Gangjee's Relocating the Law of Geographical Indications is a long overdue attempt to disentangle the competing legal theories which produced the current position. Further, the second part of the book, which focuses on GIs in the context of TRIPS, is a valuable insight into the...

Trade secrets for beginners

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. From military data to candy bar recipes, from process of production of a pharmaceutical to sales margins used by the company, to the list of customers of a manufacturer, trade secrets are all around and intertwine into nearly every aspect of our lives, and most certainly into the lives of companies. The growing pace of development characterizing any knowledge-based economy makes information a particularly valuable commodity. Another priceless component of the modern market is still the human being: a skilled employee, an external expert, a service provider, a business partner. Taking into account the intangible and ubiquitous character of data and the accessibility of modern copying techniques, the control over access and use of the secret information proves a difficult task, which may decide on the success or failure of a company. This makes the area of trade secret law particularly relevant to everyone—not only to government security experts or lawyers litigating trade secret disputes—as almost everyone is constantly being exposed to information which may qualify as his or her employer's or business partner's trade secret.

The practical guide to fortress Europe

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. This key text on border measures in the EU, now in its second edition, deserves to be on the shelves of any serious intellectual property practitioner. Border measures are an important weapon in the armoury of intellectual property owners facing infringing goods imported from outside the EU, and this book provides a comprehensive review of the developing practical application of the EU rules. The book is unevenly split into four parts with contributions from more than fifty authors...

A must-have for cinema and copyright lovers

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. Have you ever wondered if a book about copyright law could be as compelling as the Fifty Shades trilogy, but without BDSM scenes? Well, wonder no further. The answer, after reading Hollywood's Copyright Wars by Peter Decherney, is definitely yes. The subject is intriguing per se. As suggested by the title itself, the book—which spans from Edison's aggressive copyright disputes to recent lawsuits brought against YouTube—analyses the numerous legal controversies associated with US film industry since its early days. It undertakes an examination as to how and to what extent legislative evolution has been mirrored in industry practices, but also how changes have been dictated by influential lobbying on behalf of studios. The interplay between law and private regulation is indeed among the leading themes throughout the entire book. While legal developments have shaped industry practices (for instance: antitrust law changed the system for distributing and marketing films back in the 1950s and tax law is decisive when it comes to choosing filming locations), private regulation has played an important role, too. Indeed, private initiatives have increasingly gained momentum, and recently they have also been discussed widely in the context of online enforcement.

A trade mark practitioner's little helper

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. Trade mark practitioners, whether they are working in-house or in private practice, often find themselves in situations where they have to provide some quick initial advice concerning trade mark prosecution or litigation in another country and where neither time nor budget allow them to seek local advice. In such a situation, Sweet & Maxwell's new Practitioner's Manual for Trademark Prosecution and Litigation in the EU promises help and could come in handy—provided that the query relates...

The past, present and future of copyright law--in three lengthy volumes

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. This remarkable three-volume work represents a labour of love by the two editors, both well-known Australian copyright academics. Each of the three volumes follows the same pattern—a lengthy introduction by the editors, followed by a number of key articles and other texts (primarily taken from law journals, together with some significant speeches and letters (eg to The Times), some political texts (eg, extracts from Proudhon's Property is Theft arguments and from Marx and Engels' 1848 Manifesto of the Communist Party)), the text of a few, very selective US and UK court cases and statutes, together with some fiction (an extract from Charles Dickens' Hard Times), a Papal Encyclical, and each volume ending with a well-developed index. There is, however, no overall index to all three volumes. Volume 1 is subtitled ‘The scope and historical context’ and, as this subtitle implies, sets out the history of copyright and copyright law from the earliest times. Volume 2 is subtitled ‘Application to creative industries in the 20th century’ and Volume 3, ‘Copyright in the 21st century’—again self-explanatory titles.

A study of durability of hip implants

Total hip replacement (henceforth abbreviated THR) has become a routine surgical procedure over the past few decades. This has led to advances in understanding both the biological and the mechanistic aspects of hip joints, which in turn has fueled the quest for the ideal implant that performs as close as possible to the real hip joint. As a result, the design of hip implants is still very much evolving, which naturally requires evaluation of new ideas and designs from a durability point of view. The work presented here can be placed within this broader context. The mechanical response of both two-dimensional and three-dimensional (henceforth abbreviated 2D and 3D, respectively) finite element (henceforth abbreviated FE) models of the hip implant, including the femoral ball, have been studied for a single stance phase of gait (defined later). The influences of (i) variations in the femoral ball diameter, (ii) the nature of the contact interactions between the femoral ball and the stem, (iii) the boundary conditions on the stem, and (iv) the loading conditions on the femoral ball, on the stress distribution in the implant stem have been analyzed. In particular, the effects of the size of the femoral ball on the stress/deformation state in the implant was investigated, in order to assess whether a larger femoral ball size has an adverse effect on its durability. The accuracy of the simplified 2D model is evaluated by comparing the results with those obtained from the 3D model. The reliability of the FE results is ensured by performing mesh convergence studies. In addition, an analytical model is developed and its predictions are compared with the 2D FE results. The study suggests that stresses in the neck region decrease, while those in the contact (between the stem and the femoral ball) region increase with increasing femoral ball size. A simple fatigue life analysis based on a set of standard empirical models suggests that the change in the femoral ball size could potentially affect the design life of the implant.

An engaging introduction to US IP law

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. With the first sentence of the preface to The Oxford Introductions to U.S. Law: Intellectual Property, Dan Hunter makes it clear to the reader that, in authoring this text, his intention is to do much more than just providing a basic, accessible introduction to the topic of US IP law. He states: ‘This book provides an overview of the laws of intellectual property, and does so by focusing on the battles that are fought over these laws.’ Considering that Hunter has previously described IP discourse as a ‘culture war’, it comes as no surprise that he has returned to the polemical metaphor of ‘IP as an instrument of warfare’ with this new text. Indeed, if there is one thing that marks this book out from other similar introductions to IP law, it is the spirited way with which Hunter guides the reader through the basic tenets of IP law, while also giving the reader an impression of the issues and controversies which informed the enactment of each new piece of legislation. In particular, he highlights the fiery debate which surrounded the passing of the Sony Bono Copyright Term Extension Act and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998.

Whither copyright? A call for self-examination

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. Copyright law is often criticized for reflecting the past and for protecting works framed within new technologies by regulations that were not designed for those technologies. As new technologies continue to emerge, the policy challenge is to balance existing rights with new claims, while maintaining an equilibrium between copyright owners’ rights to control their works and users’ desire to access the works. The rapid evolution of digital technologies—particularly in combination with unprecedented dissemination opportunities via the internet—has presented a variety of unexpected and unpredicted challenges (eg peer-to-peer file sharing, Google digital library, the ubiquitous nature of ‘copies’ on the internet); given these testing realities of the digital age, legislators and jurisprudence are left in a continuous struggle searching for the right balance. The question thus is whether current copyright law provides a good foundation to solve new problems or whether an altogether different—more visionary—approach is needed.

Comparative lectures on competition and IP

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. This book is a compilation of lectures from eminent speakers at a conference held in Singapore in September 2009. Those speakers serve as judges and governmental IP law or competition law advisors or high-rank officers in their jurisdictions—the USA, Australia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam. Those speakers from countries other than the USA compare laws in their jurisdiction with the US laws with regard to IP laws and competition law and the...

Orphan works: vitalization, modification, and creation of an international norm

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. This note proposes and analyses solutions to the orphan work issue: dynamic interpretation, as well as objective and subjective interpretations of the non-formality principle, and solutions beyond the interpretation of the current norms—ie the limitations and exceptions, including the compulsory licence, and also the establishment of applicable laws on IP. Under the non-formality principle, many copyright works are not registered, so their identity or location is unknown (orphan works). Dynamic interpretation of the non-formality principle,...

The quizzical in pursuit of the mercurial: on defining 'IP'

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. Confusion about definitions and differences over terminology in the field of IP haunts any conversation about IP, channels scarce attention away from real issues into verbal fetishes, bedevil and confuses debates on IP and a host of related policy questions, torments legislative drafters (who sometimes pass on this torment to others), and offers enhanced job security for practitioner and academic alike. Some supposedly fundamental definitions and distinctions can be surprisingly elusive. Try asking a random IP...

A book to use

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. This is not a book to read but, rather, it is a book to use. This is what I discovered when I tried to read it in order to prepare this review. You cannot start at page one and read through to the end. I tried. However, I could not make it—and found that it was not as interesting to read as a normal book. Yet I came to understand the full intent and significance of the book when I started to use it while I was working on cases.

What TRIPS is and what it is not

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. For industry people, journalists, activists, lawyers, diplomats, national legislators, and students of the World Trade Organization's Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS) has awesome proportions. These are magnified by the fact that these groups lack detailed knowledge of either IP as such or international trade law. IP involves a broad spread of academic specialists and practitioners covering heterogeneous complex regimes of patents, copyright, trade marks, design, undisclosed information (trade secrets), and geographical indications. IP, and...

Making your way to success in a digital world of contracts

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. Transactional skills are fundamental to any IP practitioner. Yet so far, they have been left a bit aside in educational programmes, both in the UK and abroad, as these are primarily focused on litigation and very little (if at all) on IP transactions. This attitude fails to take account of the fact that litigation often ensues as a consequence of badly written contracts, whether incomplete or unclear. Things get even worse when one thinks that, to fill this...

New life and vigour at Terrell?

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. I must confess to having indulged in a certain amount of hyperbole when I wrote in a previous issue of this Journal that the editors of Terrell on the Law of Patents, then in its 16th edition, could ‘trace their succession back in line unbroken to … the first edition of 1884’.1 There have in fact been two successive editorial dynasties, the first having been founded by the eponymous Thomas Terrell QC in 1884 and the...