Monday meanderings
IPKat - IP news and fun for everyone: Earlier this year Roya Ghafele, who is now with the University of Oxford Department of International Development, produced a paper for the Intellectual Property Institute entitled Perceptions of Intellectual Property: a Review. This paper makes depressing reading for people who love IP, since it reflects the many criticisms — whether founded or otherwise — that are made of IP by some of its most vocal critics, many of whom literally rage against intellectual property. You can download it from the Institute for free: just click here. The Kats can tell you that there’s more to come, in the form of the Brand IP project: watch this space for further details as they emerge.
The IPKat thanks his friend Kaori Minami for sending him news of the latest Japan Patent Office prosecution through its ‘Super accelerated examination’ system. According to Japan Today Keio University (where Kaori studied) received a patent for a process for detecting toxic metals following a screening process that took just 17 days. You can read more about speedy Japanese patents here.
Left: Japanese patent examiners can now transfer an application from formalities examination to prior art search in 3.7 seconds.
Via another of the IPKat’s friends Kristof Neefs comes news on Ars Technica of two German court rulings that Google thumbnail images infringe copyright. Since there is no duty on owners of copyright images to let search engine indexing robots know what files to avoid, the need to avoid infringing copyright rests firmly on Google’s shoulders. These rulings are both subject to appeal. If the law stays as it is, Google may have to withdraw or radically restructure its Google Image service in so far as it is available in Germany (after receiving this item, the IPKat also received this version of it from Birgit Clark,…