WIPO: Francis Gurry's Appointment as Director-General
I am no sycophant but I am genuinely delighted that Francis Gurry has got the top job at the WIPO . I first heard of Gurry 20 years ago when I read his book on Breach of Confidence which is to my mind one of the best books on the subject. It was published by Clarendon in 1984 but for some inexplicable reason it does not appear ever to have been reprinted. I still refer to it from time to time. In 1992 I actually met Gurry at a seminar on IP arbitration which was organized by the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators. Several things sprang from that seminar. Peter Ford set up an arbitration panel for the Patents County Court led by Professor Bryan Niblett which he asked me to join. Sadly, I never got any appointments but I don't think anybody else on the panel did either. Secondly, the WIPO set up the Arbitration and Mediation Centre. The Centre was one of the first domain dispute resolution providers and having handled many thousands of domain name disputes it is arguably ...