The field of collective management of music authors’ rights in Greece is currently experiencing a series of ongoing developments regarding the establishment and operation of collecting societies representing music authors in the country, with the situation still remaining uncertain as to how the landscape will look like in a few months’ time.
ILN IP Insider
January 23, 2020
Collective management of music authors’ rights in Greece: Recent developments in a long-suffering field
January 21, 2020
What happens to EU trade marks after Brexit?
A mere three and a half years after the 2016 referendum on membership of the European Union, the UK looks set to “leave” the EU on 31 January 2020. Instead of exiting without a deal (which at one stage looked distinctly possible), the UK’s departure will be pursuant to the New Withdrawal Agreement. Under this deal – which is currently being enshrined into UK law – 31 January 2020 will mark the beginning of an 11 month transition period, with the true exit date currently set as 31 December 2020 (Exit Day).
January 15, 2020
Is BURNS NIGHT OFF KILT-ER?: Scotch, Trademarks & Distilling American Meanings
Within a year after the 1787 Edinburgh edition of his poems, American editions…were published in both Philadelphia and New York. Ever since we [Americans] have adopted the beauty, the humor and the wisdom of Robert Burns as part of our own culture and our own idiom—-often, even usually, without knowing the source in Scotland’s ploughman poet.
[Montgomery, James M. (1998) “How Robert Burns Captured America,” Studies in Scottish Literature: Vol. 30: Iss. 1, at 237 (emphasis added)].
January 9, 2020
Hong Kong’s Patents (Amendment) Ordinance 2016 ( “the Ordinance” or “PAO” ) came into force on 19th December 2019 to further improve the Hong Kong’s system of protecting intellectual property rights on inventions
To ensure that Hong Kong’s system continues to meet present-day circumstances and be in alignment with Government’s vision of developing Hong Kong into a regional innovation and technology hub, Hong Kong Government appointed an Advisory Committee on Review of the Patent System in Hong Kong in 2011(the “Advisory Committee”) to review and advise it on (a) how the Administration should position Hong Kong’s patent system and (b) how best to implement suggested changes to the system. Apart from the macro issues, the review also involved different professional and technical considerations underpinning the patent system as well as specific issues on (a) whether and, if so, how Hong Kong should have its own “original grant” patent system (as opposed to the pre-existing “re-registration” system), (b) refinements to the short-term patent system and (c) regulation of patent agency services. C. K. Kwong, the writer of this article, was a member of this Advisory Committee.
December 18, 2019
Selling Your Products on US Online Marketplaces
Before you begin selling your products on a U.S. online marketplace like Amazon, Etsy or Rakuten, there are three intellectual property considerations to make: clearance, acquisition and enforcement. This article provides a summary of all three considerations and includes steps to take to help mitigate risk, decrease instances of infringers and position your product for success from a U.S. perspective.
December 11, 2019
Can Appointment of Administrative Patent Judges be Unconstitutional?
For the Patent and Trial Appeal Board (“PTAB”), the Administrative Patent Judges (“APJs”) are appointed by the Secretary of Commerce in consultation with the Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office. For an inter parties review of a patent, three APJs conduct the instituted review and determine if claims of a patent are unpatentable. Is the appointment of the APJs unconstitutional because it violates the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution.? The answer was YES! until the court remedied the APJs to be inferior officers.
November 27, 2019
“Pirate Ships in Dangerous Waters!”
A recent decision of the Three-Member Court of Appeals of Komotini (Felonies Department), dated 19/11/2019, has been intensely debated by the national media as resulting to the first “real” prison sentence that has ever been imposed in our country to a website owner for illegally distributing copyright-protected content. Although the judgement has not been published yet, according to the media, the owner of the “pirate” websites “greekstars.net” and “greekstars.co”, has been sentenced to five years in prison for illegal distribution of audiovisual works, music, books, computer programs, and video games and has been led to prison immediately after hearing the verdict. Although the law also provides for a monetary penalty, this was withdrawn by the Judges due to mitigating circumstances.
November 20, 2019
California Clears the Way for College Athletes to Get Their “Fair” Share of Licensing Pie
Sending shockwaves across the collegiate landscape, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed SB 206, the Fair Pay to Play Act (the Act) on September 30, 2019.
The Act takes aim squarely at the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s (NCAA) amateurism rules which prohibit student athletes from profiting from their athletic skill while in college and threatens to upend the fraught and controversial relationship between colleges and the athletes who represent them on the playing field.
October 30, 2019
Joint authorship of copyright: UK Court of Appeal tears up the script
A dispute concerning the screenplay for the 2016 Hollywood biographical comedy “Florence Foster Jenkins” (FFJ) – a film about a tone-deaf New York socialite who labours under the delusion that she is a talented opera singer – has this month produced a Court of Appeal decision centering on the parties’ own adjustment to reality. Apart from highlighting a perhaps lesser-considered pitfall of working with your other half, the judgment emphasises the practical difficulties of applying the test of joint authorship in English copyright law.
October 16, 2019
Th-Inking About The Law: Tattoos Leaving Indelible Marks On Black-Letter Principles & Coloring Our Perspectives
Tattoos, one of the oldest art forms in the world, are all over the legal news in recent years. The news runs the gamut from a tattooist suing a movie studio over replication of Mike Tyson’s facial tattoo in The Hangover II to artists looking to gaming companies for compensation for reproduction of tattoos appearing on video game avatars of professional athletes, which even made it into the Wall Street Journal and been the subject of court decisions earlier this year and late last year. Even more recently it has included a Larry Bird’s mural being altered, at his request, to remove tattoos an artist had added for a modernizing flourish. (BTW, speaking of murals, the Chuck Wepner mural I had written about has been painted over). It has also included law enforcement receiving criticism from many directions for “Photo-Shopping” tattoos out of pictures of suspects used in policy photo arrays. Just recently, Cardi B was sued for using a photo of a tattoo on her album cover. Though the examples above may most resonate with a US domestic audience, the copyright and other legal issues emerging from, and connected to, tattooing are being considered worldwide. Consequently, it seems like an area worth exploring here.
Welcome to ILN-terviews, a series of profiles of ILN member firm attorneys, designed to give a unique insight into the lawyers who make up our Network. For our latest interview, we chose ILN member, Arthur Li of our member firm Lee and Li in Taiwan, China. In one sentence, how would you describe your practice?...… 
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