This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Learn more

Law Notes Intellectual Property Law Notes

Introduction To Intellectual Property Notes

Updated Introduction To Intellectual Property Notes

Intellectual Property Law Notes

Intellectual Property Law

Approximately 1014 pages

IP law notes fully updated for recent exams at Oxford and Cambridge. These notes cover all the LLB Intellectual Property law cases and so are perfect for anyone doing an LLB in the UK or a great supplement for those doing LLBs abroad, whether that be in Ireland, Hong Kong or Malaysia (University of London).

These were the best IP Law notes the director of Oxbridge Notes (an Oxford law graduate) could find after combing through dozens of LLB samples from outstanding law students with the highes...

The following is a more accessible plain text extract of the PDF sample above, taken from our Intellectual Property Law Notes. Due to the challenges of extracting text from PDFs, it will have odd formatting:

Introduction to Intellectual Property

IP LLM Notes

Notes

Table of Contents

Introduction 3

1. General Issues 3

What is intellectual property? 3

What is the purpose of intellectual property? 3

Pressure to expand protection – tensions and controversies – some examples 3

2. Types of intellectual property 3

(a) Patents 3

(b) Copyright 4

(c) Trade Marks and Names 4

(d) Confidential information/ trade secrets 5

(e) Other - should the law expand? 5

3. Justifications for IP 5

Natural rights arguments 5

Utilitarian arguments 5

A mixed approach? 6

4. The EU’s influence on intellectual property - harmonisation 6

Introduction

1. General Issues

What is intellectual property?

Patents, copyright, trade marks, design rights, performers’ rights, recording rights, plant variety rights, semi-conductor chip protection, database rights, geographic indications etc...

We often use the language of IP to cover a wide range of intangible things, many of which are not actually covered by the law, so this is the influence of colloquialism on the language of IP. We also have the idea of Industrial Property, which usually refers to Patents, Designs and Trademarks, not the other areas of IP.

What is the purpose of intellectual property?

One of the purposes of IP law is to protect applications of ideas and information that are of commercial value - such protection offers potentially valuable economic rewards. This economic element shows the pressure to expand and strengthen IP. The protection leads to incentives to create IP products, which is beneficial. This can be seen in things like protection for databases and conductor chip protection. However, technology also leads to ways around the protection for intellectual property.

Pressure to expand protection – tensions and controversies – some examples

J. Craig Venter Institute, Maryland – has synthetically reproduced the DNA of the bacteria Mycoplasma laboratorium. Goal to create an artificial life form based entirely on a man-made DNA genome. Hypothesis that this might bring solutions to practical problems - diseases, energy, global warming… In May 2010, Venter and his team built the genome of a bacterium from scratch and incorporated it into a cell to make what they call the world’s first synthetic life form – nicknamed SYNTHia. The institute has filed a patent on the genome. Opponents have expressed concerns that such technology could be used negatively as well as positively. Objections have come from bioethics campaigners: ‘For the first time, God has competition’.

The question here is whether the considerable costs of research should be allowed to be recouped by the awarding of intellectual property rights.

Compulsory licensing of pharmaceuticals - The Doha Declaration (2001). Although reiterating their commitment to the TRIPS agreement, WTO members affirmed that it could and should be interpreted and implemented in a manner supportive of WTO members’ right to protect public health and, in particular, to promote access to medicines for all.

[Glaxo v Dowelhurst & Taylor [2004] EWCA Civ 290; [2005] ETMR 104]

‘If a major pharmaceutical company is treated in this manner when it is voluntarily trying to assist with the supply of inexpensive drugs to developing countries, one can only anticipate the extensive litigation as envisaged under the Doha Declaration finally comes into effect.’

Illegal downloading – Napster’s early days.

The Pirate Bay – ‘The world’s most resilient bittorrent site’

2. Types of intellectual property

(a) Patents

- granted for inventions, i.e. technological improvements over what is already known

- issued by state or regional patent office, usually with substantive pre-grant examination

- maximum duration: 20 years

- adequate description in patent specification

- right good against all third parties

- right extends to all embodiments of the invention as defined in specification

- objectives: to encourage invention and subsequent commercial innovation, to secure

early public knowledge of invention

A patentable invention must be…

New,

Inventive (so not obvious)

Capable of industrial application

Subject-matter not excluded

So, we don’t patent…

Discoveries and scientific theories ‘as such’

Business methods

Aesthetic creations

Methods of medical treatment (e.g. surgery)

Plant and animal varieties

But we CAN patent…

Inventions which concern plants or animals, but which are not confined to a single plant or animal variety (the Harvard Oncomouse).

- for literary, dramatic, musical and artistic works (now including films) and ‘neighbouring’ subject-matter: sound recordings, broadcasts, cable-casts, typographical format, and databases

- rights arise informally, essentially on creation: registration not a pre-requisite

- duration: LDMA works: author’s life plus 70 years, other ‘neighbouring’ copyrights

lesser periods

- right is only against copying, and lies in the expression of an idea rather than its

general concept or character

- objectives: to recognise the personal relationship between author and work; to

encourage production of new works which add to cultural heritage???

(c) Trade Marks and Names

- objective: not to encourage the production of such symbols but to protect the means by

which one competitor distinguishes goods and services from those of another

- duration of right: so long as needed

- entitlement...

Buy the full version of these notes or essay plans and more in our Intellectual Property Law Notes.

More Intellectual Property Law Samples