I think that if someone is really interested in industrial property law issues then such a person would admire this part of human creation as well, for instance typography art. I track news about this kinf of activities in the Internet all the time and I found a list of music videos that use typography effects lately. The whole playlist is available at yuxt.com website.
Now, maybe a little bit more about the law. Christoph Mueller, who is the author of Mom’s typewriter typeface which as you may have noticed I used in the topic of this post, can seek for protection of his creation based on industrial property law regulations within Poland and European Union. Unfortunately, unless such work is a digital one (popular term font) he won’t be able to get proper protection from the US copyright law (sic!). I recommend you to read the judgment in the case Adobe Sys. v. Southern Software, Inc., 45 U.S.P.Q.2D (BNA) 1827, 1998 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1941 (D. Cal. 1998) and 37 C.F.R. § 202.1(e) (1998). Additionally, it is always worth reading some paper. Check, J. L. Mezrich, “Extension of Copyright to Fonts—Can the Alphabet be Far Behind?“, The Computer Law Review and Technology Journal 1998. PDF file, 28 kB.
Judgment of the Court of First Instance (Grand Chamber) from September 17, 2007 in the case T-201/04, Microsoft v. Commission.
1. Annuls Article 7 of Commission Decision 2007/53/EC of 24 March 2004 relating to a proceeding pursuant to Article 82 [EC] and Article 54 of the EEA Agreement against Microsoft Corp. (Case COMP/C-3/37.792 – Microsoft), in so far as:
– it orders Microsoft to submit a proposal for the establishment of a mechanism which is to include a monitoring trustee with the power to have access, independently of the Commission, to Microsoft’s assistance, information, documents, premises and employees and to the source code of the relevant Microsoft products;
– it requires that the proposal for the establishment of that mechanism provide that all the costs associated with the appointment of the monitoring trustee, including his remuneration, be borne by Microsoft; and
– it reserves to the Commission the right to impose by way of decision a mechanism such as that referred to in the first and second indents above;
2. Dismisses the remainder of the application;
3. Orders Microsoft to bear 80% of its own costs and to pay 80% of the Commission’s costs, with the exception of the costs incurred by the Commission in connection with the intervention of The Computing Technology Industry Association, Inc., Association for Competitive Technology, Inc., TeamSystem SpA, Mamut ASA, DMDsecure.com BV, MPS Broadband AB, Pace Micro Technology plc, Quantel Ltd, Tandberg Television Ltd and Exor AB;
4. Orders Microsoft to bear its own costs and to pay the Commission’s costs relating to the interim measures proceedings in Case T‑201/04 R, with the exception of the costs incurred by the Commission in connection with the intervention of The Computing Technology Industry Association, Association for Competitive Technology, TeamSystem, Mamut, DMDsecure.com, MPS Broadband, Pace Micro Technology, Quantel, Tandberg Television and Exor;
5. Orders Microsoft to pay the costs of Software & Information Industry Association, Free Software Foundation Europe, Audiobanner.com and European Committee for Interoperable Systems (ECIS), including those relating to the interim measures proceedings;
6. Orders the Commission to bear 20% of its own costs and to pay 20% of Microsoft’s costs, with the exception of the costs incurred by Microsoft in connection with the intervention of Software & Information Industry Association, Free Software Foundation Europe, Audiobanner.com and ECIS;
7. Orders The Computing Technology Industry Association, Association for Competitive Technology, TeamSystem, Mamut, DMDsecure.com, MPS Broadband, Pace Micro Technology, Quantel, Tandberg Television and Exor to bear their own costs, including those relating to the interim measures proceedings.
September 17, 2007, The Court of First Instance will rule in the case Microsoft v. Commission, T-201/04, OJ C 294 of 02.12.2006, p.56 (PDF file).
Annul the Commission Decision of 24 March 2004 in proceedings regarding the application of Article 82 of the EC Treaty (Case COMP/C-3/37.792 Microsoft), concerning competition conditions in the markets of work group server operating systems and multimedia players or, in the alternative, annul or reduce the fine imposed on the applicant.
Meanwhile, if you are a Polish language speaker/reader there is also a very interesting post and discussion started by Piotr Waglowski on his website. It concerns “foggy” lobbing PR action which is dedicated to protecting companies consumers. In general, the goal is to raise the awarness that one comapny has almost 80% of the Internet ad market share within the European Union. We wonder who sponsors this so-called “social movement” with the help of PR company. As someone points such action is visible in London’s tube since two months.
The Computer and Communications Industry Association has published a report, PDF file, 2,28MB, that finds fair use exceptions add more than $4.5 trillion (1 000 000 000 000) in revenue to the U.S. economy and add more value to the U.S. economy than copyright industries contribute. Meanwhile there is also a provoking story available at slashdot.org about the Canadian Recording Industry Association admitting legality of P2P.
You can also check what others think about downloading music from the Internet. Here is a short movie clip from “Christian Rock Hard“. It was the episode 709 of Comedy Central’s South Park. It originally aired on October 29, 2003.
There is also a very interesting statement of Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails available at boingboing.net website.
As for the special situation in China, it does not seem to be easy to obtain Western music via legal channels, so I have the following suggestion for our fans: If you can find and buy our legal CDs, I express my thanks for your support. If you cannot find it, I think that downloading from the Internet is a more acceptable option than buying pirated CDs. Our music is easy to find on the Internet, and you might not need to spend much effort to find most of our songs. If you like our songs after you’ve heard them, please feel free to share it with your friends. As I have put all my effort and heart into my music, I sincerely hope that more and more people can share the enjoyment with us.
Intellectual property scholars have begun to explore the curious dynamics of IP’s negative spaces, areas in which IP law offers scant protection for innovators, but where innovation nevertheless seems to thrive. Such negative spaces pose a puzzle for the traditional theory of IP, which holds that IP law is necessary to create incentives for innovation.
This paper presents a study of one such negative space which has so far garnered some curiosity but little sustained attention – the world of performing magicians. This paper argues that idiosyncratic dynamics among magicians make traditional copyright, patent, and trade secret law ill-suited to protecting magicians’ most valuable intellectual property. Yet, the paper further argues that the magic community has developed its own set of unique IP norms which effectively operate in law’s absence. The paper details the structure of these informal norms that protect the creation, dissemination, and performance of magic tricks. The paper also discusses broader implications for IP theory, suggesting that a norm-based approach may offer a promising explanation for the puzzling persistence of some of IP’s negative spaces.
Loshin, Jacob, “Secrets Revealed: How Magicians Protect Intellectual Property without Law” (July 25, 2007). Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1005564. I found it in the post available at boingboing.net website.
Sad news for trade mark holders from Poland. According to Rzeczpospolita’s article entitled “Poles still willingly buying counterfeit goods” and a survey carried out by The Public Opinion Research Centere, every second citizen admitted that he or she has bought counterfeit products, mostly cosmetics and clothing. This shady business causes around PLN 30 billions losses to Poland’s national budget. The awareness of such phenomenon is very low but 88% of respondents consider it unethical.
The US legislative proces should be a subject of a hudge scientific research. I must admit I was really happy and suprised when I read that Larry Lessig will work on it. Meanwhile, I found an insteresting movie clip at Dennis Crouch website as a comment about pending legislation, reform of the US patent law.
Couple of hours ago US Congress has voted Patent Reform Act (H.R. 1908, 110th Congress, 1st Session, (2007)). The biggest reform is the change from first to invent to first to file system. It will harmonize the US patent law with other countries’ legal regimes.
Update on September 8, 2007
Hey readers, hey hackers, hey lame^H^Hwyers, you know who you are. I installed a plugin so everyone will be able to watch those short movie’s fragments directly on my website. But of course I still recommend you to use VLC software.
YouTube has removed couple of movies’ fragments I put there to use as an illustration of my post and to explain some legal issues. I haven’t got enough free time to follow what professor Wendy Seltzer did. I wrote about that in the post titled Effective Wendy. I do not want to share a correspondence with Comedy Central or 20th Century Fox lawyers or what is more important to educate them for free about fair use or the right to citation. However, if there will be any communications I write about that on this website. I also hope that American lawyers started to learn Polish language (some hints: include terms such as prawo autorskie and prawo cytatu) but I guess they will find Polish branch to do their job. Anyway they are all invited. Below, I present you as an illustration links to those movies in FLV ile format together with posts’ titles I wrote. I suggest you to use VLC software to watch it. It works with almost each operating system and its free.
Krusty the Clown as trademark in the Simpsons (660 KB), which I originally used in the post titled Krusty the Clown.
Eric Cartman’s opinion about Family Guy series (3,8 MB), which I originally used in the post titled The Simpsons about Family Guy and American Dad.
South Park and downloading music from Internet (1,7 MB), which I originally used in the post titled South Park gang and downloading from the Internet.