Search results for

Downloading free music in the form of MP3 files has been a point of discussion for a long time now. Only last year Napster, a file exchange program mainly used for music files, was closed down by a US judge. However, a Netherlands competitor to Napster, KaZaA, recently survived a controversial case against Buma/Stemra, the Netherlands agency for collecting copyrights.

The realities of market economics in Romania and the free play of supply and demand mean that there is always the danger of dishonest means being used to attract customers. This makes industrial property protection and the protection (or apparent protection) of trade marks a key area. However, there are numerous interferences in trade mark and industrial design, especially in the domain of bi- and three-dimensional figurative marks, mainly those concerning labels, the form of products and their packaging.

New industrial property regulations in Poland give the Supreme Administrative Court control over the legality of decisions issued by the Polish Patent Office. The new rules that came into force on August 22 last year overturn more than 60 years of administrative procedure where control was limited to extraordinary appeals against final sentences which could be filed only by administrative boards in clearly defined special situations. These appeals were examined by judges of the Chamber of Administration Labour and Social Insurance at the Supreme Court and until last August the Supreme Administrative Court (which was set up in 1980), did not examine any matters related to industrial property. Under Polish constitutional law the Supreme Administrative Court along with the Supreme Court, the Constitutional Tribunal and the Tribunal of State is the highest court in Poland.

Ingrid Hering, London

Programme formats can be a goldmine but to what extent can they attract IP rights? Lyndsay Gough looks at some of the issues facing those seeking to exploit and protect them

Lucian Enescu In Romania, the holder of a previously registered trade mark (or application), or of a notorious trade mark may, under law no 84/1998, file an opposition to the registration of a new trade mark (within three months from the date when it was published in the Official Gazette). The opponent may consider the new sign as being prejudicial to their previous right if it is identical or similar to their own trade mark or if it protects identical or similar products as the ones protected by their own trade mark. An assessment in the case of identical marks is simpler. For similar trade marks, three possible types of similarity must be considered when analyzing a new trade mark for registration: visual, phonetic and semantic.

One of the key issues in the complex of problems surrounding exhaustion is the question of whether goods bearing the mark of a trade mark owner have been put on the market with that owner's consent. If so, the trade mark owner cannot prohibit parallel-importers from importing the goods into the EEA, according to article 7, section 1 of the Harmonization Directive (89/104/EEC).

James Nurton, Brussels

One case that has cast some light on co-ownership of trade marks in Singapore is Ng Chu Chong (trading as Grand Am Fashion Enterprise) v Ng Swee Choon & Ors (Suit No 1108 of 2001/E). Here the plaintiff and his sister, the first defendant, entered into a partnership called Grand Am Fashion Enterprise (Grand Am) to manufacture and sell fashion apparel under the trademark, McBlue. The trademark was created by the first defendant for the partnership and was registered in their joint names, trading as Grand Am. Subsequently, the first defendant withdrew from the partnership due to an impending bankruptcy but continued to work for the plaintiff as an employee. The plaintiff thereafter discovered that another partnership belonging to the first defendant's sister-in-law, named GA Fashion Apparel (GA) was marketing goods bearing the McBlue trade mark. The plaintiff brought an action against the defendants for trade mark infringement and applied for permanent injunction. The first defendant argued that she was entitled as a joint proprietor to authorize GA to purchase and deal with goods bearing the McBlue trade mark.

Milan Kraus, of PATENTSERVIS Praha, reviews the most important changes in protecting IP rights in the Czech Republic, paying special regard to biotechnology