September 1, 2016
Osgoode Clubs Fair
Visit IP Osgoode’s table at this year’s Osgoode Hall Law School Clubs Fair to learn more about our programs and activities.

September 13-14, 2016
ICT Seminar 2016
In New York City. Co-organized by the EPO and the Intellectual Property Owners Association. Visit the EPO event website for details.

September 14, 2016
Formalities of Filing and Prosecuting Patents before CIPO and the USPTO
An IPIC webinar. Visit the IPIC event website for details.

September 28-30, 2016
Intellectual Property Institute of Canada Annual Meeting
In Quebec City. Visit the IPIC AGM website for details.

October 3-4, 2016
International IP Law Association Annual Meeting
In San Francisco. Visit the IIPLA website for more details.
August 31, 2016               Extended deadline to submit comments on CIPO’s consultation regarding the governance model and disciplinary process for IP agents.
Call for Papers
LAWS: Special Issue “Intellectual Property Law in the New Technological Age: Rising to the Challenge of Change?”. Prof. Carys is the guest editor for this special issue. Visit LAWs website for details.
Lassonde Professor Hui Jiang and visiting researcher Quan Liu won first place at this year’s CommonSense Reasoning Competition held in July in New York City. The researchers are working on ways to improve artificial intelligence (AI), and used deep learning to train a computer to recognize the relationship between different events.
The IPIGRAM (4 August 2016) 
Feature Posts
Pole Vault in Rio 2016: A Contest of Skill or a Contest of Patents?
August 4, 2016 by Justin Philpott
With the Rio 2016 Summer Olympics getting started on August 5th, there is no time like the present to explore the evolution of patents relating to the vaulting pole. Originally, pole vaulting was a practical way to cross obstacles, such as rivers or enemy walls. Inevitably, this led to competitions among Ancient Greeks, Cretans and Celts. The pole vault became a male Olympic sport in 1896, while the female pole vault made its Olympic debut in 2000. As you might expect, the pole used by vaulters has changed significantly since the sport’s inception.
In a hundred years, the vaulting pole has changed from a piece of hardwood to an intricately-built piece of fiberglass and carbon fiber, assembled through patented methods. Unsurprisingly, the pole vault record is the most frequently broken world mark in men’s track and field history. As of 2014, the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) has reportedly ratified 71 world records, set by 33 different vaulters. The current record holder is Renaud Lavillenie of France, who cleared a height of 6.16 metres in Donetsk, Ukraine in 2014. To put this into perspective, the world record in 1904 was 4.02 metres. The best pole captures all of the energy transferred to it by the vaulter and efficiently transfers it back to the vaulter as they are launched into the air. Minimal increases in the world record in the last decade have hinted that the combination of materials technology and athletic performance may be reaching its peak. The heights achieved by modern pole vaulters undoubtedly rely on the pole. However, with all vaulters equipped with similar fiberglass poles, the sport becomes a truer contest of technique.
Justin Philpott is an IPilogue Editor and a JD candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

This is Why You Have an Editor: Politics, Plagiarism, and Copyright
July 27, 2016 by Sebastian Beck-Watt

The inescapable world of U.S. politics, especially in an election year, consistently offers much legal debate. Somewhat less often, politicians and their entourages accidentally wade into the domain of intellectual property law. Politicians have famously gotten themselves into controversies by using musical works without the artists’ permission (though, without strong moral rights in the U.S., it is typically legally sufficient that a politician just obtain a licence from a songwriter’s association). Political speeches have a long history in copyright law. However, recent events have raised another copyright issue in the political arena: plagiarism.

Sebastian Beck-Watt is the IPilogue’s Content Editor and a JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.
EU-US Privacy Shield Adopted: Now What?

August 4, 2016 by Keith D. Rose

The re-posting of this article is part of a cross-posting agreement with CyberLex.
On July 12, 2016, the European Commission formally issued its adequacy decision endorsing the EU-US Privacy Shield, following the approval of the deal by the Article 31 Committee on July 8.  Although the European adequacy decision has immediate effect, U.S. organizations will not be able to take advantage of the Privacy Shield until the U.S. Department of Commerce begins accepting self-certifications, on August 1.
Read more 

Keith D. Rose is an associate in McCarthy Tétrault’s Business and Technology Law Groups in Toronto.

RECENT POSTS

German Regulator Finds Banks’ Data Rules “impede non-bank competitors”

August 4, 2016 by Kirsten Thompson

The re-posting of this article is part of a cross-posting agreement with CyberLex.
“Open Banking” is an emerging term in financial services / financial technology that refers, among other things, to the use of open application programming interfaces (“APIs“) enable third party developers to build applications and services around a financial institution. This requires a financial institution to throw open the doors to its customer data and allow it to be used by developers and other third party providers. Think of it as an app store for banks, where the apps allow consumers to compare rates, manage their accounts, obtain credit and make payments – all without having to actually engage a bank.
Kirsten Thompson is Counsel in McCarthy Tétrault’s National Technology Group.

powered by emma
Subscribe to our email list.