Silcon Chip Copyright Infringement

It seems engineers with a sense of fun have been carving copyrighted characters, among others, onto the silicon chips used in PCs and various other devices. Geeklawyer wonders whether the relevant manufacturers have considered the legal implications of this copyright infringement in the various cartoon characters? if this smurf towing a copyright symbol is anything to go by, the answer is yes.

In the good old days a judge might have been persuaded to order delivery up and destruction of the infringing chips. It made litigation such expensive fun. No longer, sadly, just boring damages.

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Automatic licence analyser?!

Boing Boing reports on software that automatically analyses licences. At first Geeklawyer thought this to be a hoax. Analysing an unstructured piece of complex technical text such as a licence to understand, it even approximately, would be a fairly horrendous job. Evidently they merely yank out keywords of interest and offer them up for perusal.

This seems to be entirely useless since you still need to understand what it is you are reading. The package seems better described as a text extraction tool rather than an analysis tool, it doesn’t appear to analyse or explain anything. Javasoft seem to think that they have created something wonderful and they offer it for free.

Just as well, says Geeklawyer who reckons that the Mark One legal eyeball is in no immediate danger.

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You don't have to give in to trademark 'blackmail'

Googles renaming of its Gmail service as Googlemail in the UK is being widely reported. Apparently the other company picked Gmail a full 2 years before Google for GMail, so barring inside info it would seem probable that it was just innocent good luck. I say ‘good luck’ because with this prior registration under their belt they seem confident Google will have to pay through the nose for the marks use; to the tune of £35million - ouch.

Google have neatly sidestepped the ‘blackmail’ by the simple expedient of renaming. Of course to call it blackmail where the trademark has been properly attained is unduly pejorative: it is the proper right of a trademark holder to licence it on commercial terms. Nonetheless if you are the one having built a successful product elsewhere and then find yourself being put to these harsh terms seems unfair.

The advice, as usual, is that if you do intend to brand a product or service then you should do adequate checks on its availability in your chosen markets. For smaller companies not to do so is sometimes understandable but for a company of Google’s size not, apparently, to have done so is surprising and perhaps an indicator of their reputedly chaotic management style.

The other lesson is that rebranding or parallel branding is sometimes a viable option: it is very much a last choice but it can be workable.

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Second most stupid IP lawyer?

Perhaps not so intermittent… outlaw reports on a UK ex-IP lawyer nailed for a domain name grab. The domain name grab itself is an Internet variant of an old old game played by chancers since, well, not sure how long but it’s a long time. It goes like this: grab a company name ransom it off to the sucker. The trick is to pitch the sale price at below the nuisance price of litigation.

It’s not known if Mr Davies pitched the price too high or if Citigroup had a hissy fit and refused to play. Making a premptive strike against Citigroup may have been a tactically sound move: the cost of a complaint to Nominet is very small and sets the hassle price too low to be worthwhile. On the other hand it was a poor strategic move as the law and the facts simply didn’t support his game.

Given these facts it was blindingly obvious no court would countenance his retention of the name: on the balance of probabilities the timing would not be a coincidence and the misrepresentation is strong. Geeklawyer could forgive a punter not knowing about or assessing the impact of passing off law or the ‘One in Million’ case, but an IP lawyer !? oy

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Neglect

Of my blog. I apologize that I have not been more apparent. I've not many [good] excuses, so I think I will skip right on past this and get into today. Although I don't have a lot to write about -- perhaps the top-most of excuses for not being here.

It was lovely misty all morning and then is clear this afternoon, mid-60s and very pleasant. Let me show you the persimmon harvest this year:

That's it. The tree was loaded with fruit in the middle of the summer and then they all dropped. I'm going to have to research that. I'm waiting for these to ripen -- I'm so glad that they take a long time as I may be able to paint them before they do.

Finding room for anything in our kitchen, our house is a creative endeavor. At some point I will be getting one of those double or triple hanging mesh baskets for my fruit and onions. In the meantime:

I'm always pleased to come back to the cooking of fall and winter. Making soups and stews is a physical-sensual-emotional-mental practice in centering -- at least most of the time. Bread making used to be; but that is more of a frustration now -- all those good ingredients to make something that isn't satisfyingly dense and chewy. One of the breads that is comes from Stephen's sister-in-law, Jackie, who was raised by missionary parents in Brazil. Pao de Queijo are the tapioca cheese rolls that Brazilians have with their coffee.

I'm waiting for my shipment of tapioca flour to come into the store, but here is a link to a recipe. As you can tell, it isn't exactly heart healthy, but every once in a while, I want bread that has some resistance when I bite into it. There was a gluten-free bread made in Vermont that had that quality -- and for the same reason -- it was made with lots of mozerella cheese in it.

May you all have some good soup and bread.

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