Posts Tagged: "francis gurry"

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) recently announced that the number of cybersquatting cases has reached an all time high. In 2010, trademark holders filed 2,696 cybersquatting cases relating to some 4,370 domain names with the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center (WIPO Center) under procedures based on the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP). This spike in the number of domain name disputes caused by cybersquatting represents an increase of 28% over the 2009 level and of 16% over the previous record year, 2008.

I am pleased to announce that IPWatchdog.com was selected by the readers of the ABA Journal as their favorite IP Law blog for 2010 ABA. I am also pleased to announce that for 2010 we had over 2,000,000 visits, delivered nearly 11.8 million pages, our homepage was viewed 3.06 million times and we averaged over 67,000 unique monthly visitors! Thanks to all our readers for coming back day after day, and thanks to all of our Guest Contributors!

I am pleased to announce that the Editors of the ABA Journal yesterday announced they have selected IPWatchdog.com as one of the top 100 best law blogs by lawyers, for lawyers. Now readers are being asked to vote on their favorites in each of the 4th Annual Blawg 100’s 12 categories. IPWatchdog.com is in the “IP Law” category. To vote, please visit The 2010 ABA Journal Blawg 100.

Wednesday was my day to walk through the BIO Exhibit Hall. I had already decided to blow off the Al Gore “media availability.” I am not sure exactly what that is, but as near as I can tell it meant I would get to listen to the first 5 minutes of Al Gore’s keynote address. I’m not a big Gore fan, and there were so many cool innovations to learn about. I love to talk shop and nothing quite captures me like innovation, innovators and those who speak the language of business. So… sorry Mr. Vice President, this nerd decided to join the other nerds in the Exhibit Hall. The decision to skip the Gore media availability was sealed when I learned of an tech transfer iPhone app that needed some investigation. Hey, I can’t help it, I’m an electrical and computer engineer at a BIO Convention?!?! I needed some computer angle somewhere!

Yesterday I had the honor of spending 30 minutes interviewing Francis Gurry, the Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The Director General spoke substantively about issues facing the Patent Offices of the world, as well as some possible solutions. Gurry also discusses harmonization attempts, work-sharing agreements and the crushing worldwide backlog of patent applications that could lead to irrelevance of the system. As you read the interview you will also see that he thinks it is possible that the rest of the world will adopt a US-like grace period.

What follows are pieces of Director Kappos’ remarks at the session prior to taking questions and answers. While it is probably unfair to call these remarks prepared remarks, it was clear that he referred to his notes as he provided detailed information and statistics. He also seemed to be reading what he said when he spoke about the ACLU case against Myriad Genetics, but who can blame him given the USPTO was a nominal party to the case and it will be appealed to the Federal Circuit. It is also worth mentioning that during the Q&A there were a few interesting things that came up, chief among them was Kappos’ explanation of the long odds facing a small entity claiming to be the first to invent but who filed the patent application second. Kappos likened the odds of such a Junior Party prevailing to the odds of being bitten by a Grizzly Bear and a Polar Bear on the same day. He then went on to say that you have to go back to FY 2007 to find a prevailing small entity Junior Party in an interference.

How is it possible that a calendar that tells me that January 2 is a bank holiday in the UK, that February 6 is Waitangi Day in New Zealand, that March 13 is Eight Hours Day in Australia, and that July 12 is Battle of the Boyne Day in Northern Ireland, could possibly forget to mention that April 26 is World Intellectual Property Day! After all, World Intellectual Property Day is one of those global holidays celebrated all around the world, right? It is sort of universal, almost like Christmas and New Years Eve, although with substantially less hoopla. But not too much less hoopla this year given that today marks the 10th Anniversary, or birthday if you prefer, of World Intellectual Property Day.

Last month a two-day international symposium sponsored by WIPO concluded with broad agreement on the need to pool efforts at the international level to address the problem of backlogs in patent applications at patent offices around the world.  In 2007, the last year for which complete worldwide statistics are available, unprocessed patent applications around the world reached 4.2 million, and…