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The Age has reprinted a copy of a letter written by Groucho Marx in response to a letter of demand from Warner Brothers studio. Old, but good.

Speaking of Groucho, Andrew Denton last year had a great interview with Alice Cooper, who knew Groucho well and had some amusing anecdotes.

The Trade Marks Office (IP Australia) has apparently ruled that ‘Ugg Boot’ is a generic term. As such, it can be removed from the Register, putting an end to the exclusive rights of the trade mark owner. Given that no decision appears in AustLII, I’m guessing that this is an initial decision, which could be the subject of review or later, appeal to the courts. The story may not be entirely over. >[Update: The decision is in fact available here; it is a decision by the delegate under s 101 relating to an application for removal under s 92. As such, it could be appealed to the Federal Court (s 104). The decision is worth reading, if only for the comedy value in seeing how ‘UGG’, ‘UGH’, etc have been used. After the decision, the trade mark owner’s lawyers issued a statement, (more…)

If you want to know what they’re talking about in trade mark law in the US, you might want to head over to 43(b)log: in particular the posts summarising proceedings from the AALS Section on IP – Parts one, two, three, and four.

In other trade mark news, IPKat reports an ECJ decision (scroll down to C-361/04 P (2006-01-12) Ruiz-Picasso and Others v OHIM) on whether the mark PICARO for vehicles would be likely to be confused with an earlier mark, PICASSO (registered, inter alia, for vehicles). (more…)

2005 was one of those years where the IP developments just kept coming. Kazaa, Fair Dealing/Fair Use, a TPM law inquiry, Stevens v Sony, the occasional patent judgment, another government inquiry. And that’s just the Australian stuff. We also of course had stuff like the Grokster judgment, developments in the Blackberry litigation … more treaty-making. It was hard keeping up. Matt Rimmer has done a run down over here.

Instead of doing my own round up, I thought it might be fun to list up the things that are still to come in Australian IP. Just so I can feel exhausted before we even really start the year. So, over the fold, my round up of developments to expect, and issues to come, in Australian IP law. (more…)

Two trade-related IP stories for this morning, c/o the Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest. (more…)

With all the current terror talk, perhaps it’s time that IP got in on the act. According to the IPKat, and from the New York Sun, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York has filed a trademark application for the phrase ‘If you see, something, say something’, in order to police the phrase and those who use it. This is just wilful misunderstanding of trade mark law. (more…)

At a time when there’s a little flurry about the application for a trade mark for ‘MADE IN AUSTRALIA’, it’s interesting to see this little Parliamentary Library Research Note on the significance of Country of Origin labelling. As you might expect, it shows there is little research, but what there is suggests that country of origin does matter to Australians: (more…)