NIPC Law

For several months the "Patents Court Guide" link on the Justice Ministry website led not to a guide to the  practice of the Patents Court but to a guide to the new practice in the Patents County Court. Between the 23 April 1999 and the 30 Sept 2010 that would not have mattered because the rules and practice directions for the Patents Court and the Patents County Court were essentially the same. Since the 1 Oct 2010 the practices of the Patents Court and Patents County Court have diverged once more and there is now a small claims track in the Patents County Court where the claim for pecuniary relief (damages or profits) is less than £5,000. For more information on those developments, read "The New County Court Rules" 31 Oct 2010 and "Patents County Court - The New Small Claims Track Rules" 30 Sept 2012. We now have a plethora of new practice guides: The Patents Court Guide  The Patents County Court Guide , and Guide to the Patents County Court Smal...

Kate Storey Many thanks for your interest in Guernsey's innovative image rights legislation. Your blog gives me the opportunity to highlight the benefits of having Guernsey registered image rights if you are a personality based outside Guernsey, anywhere in the world. By 'personality' it is meant the personality of any individual, corporate entity or fictional character, or a group or double act, whether alive/in existence or deceased/dissolved within 100 years prior to the date of application (in this latter regard, think of the continued commercial significance of Elvis, Michael Jackson and Marilyn Monroe). The Guernsey legislation will be of interest to those in the public eye, or those at the beginning of their careers who anticipate being well known in the future, in a wide or relevant sector of the public in any part of the world. The below-listed benefits are extracted from an article I co-authored, which is due to be published in the Entertainment Law Review lat...

Guernsey Letter Box Author Alan Ford Jane Lambert Guernsey is a tiny island in the English Channel with a population of 66,000 and a land area of 63 square kilometres. As you can see from the picture above, it has blue pillar boxes and also, so I am told, blue phone boxes. It is all that is left of the Duchy of Normandy which was lost to France by King John.  It has its own language called  Guernésiais  which is spoken by over 1,000 people (mainly OAPs) though English is the language of business, government and everyday life. For me the most interesting thing about Guernsey is that ut has its own intellectual property law which I last discussed two years ago in "Guernsey's Patent Law" .   This is made possible by  The Intellectual Property (Enabling Provisions) (Bailiwick of Guernsey) Law, 2004 . S.1 of that statute provides: "The States may by Ordinance make such provision as they think fit in relation to the law concerning intellectual property; and any s...