IMPACT®

Companies Act 2006: what does it mean for you? FC guide

Important provisions of the Companies Act 2006 are due to come into force in October. Some provisions are already in force, and others come into force during the course of 2008.

Our Corporate Finance team has published two bulletins about the Act, which give the lowdown on its implications for businesses:

• Download companies_act_commercial_review_part_i.pdf

• Download companies_act_commercial_review_part_ii.pdf

These are being accompanied by a range of detailed briefing sessions for clients.

Attitudes to copyright & infringement

The IPKat contains a good report on a session at the MARQUES conference, in which a number of IP lawyers discussed their views on, and research about, attitudes to copyright and copyright infringement. Particularly worth noting are the following comments:

• Young people don't regard infringement as being theft (those wonky screened booming music "you wouldn't steal a CD so why watch a pirated DVD?" type clips at the start of movies clearly aren't working, then)
• Attitudes to infringement and use of pirated materials varies from culture to culture
• In places where the perception is that the IP owners are in a distant land, and where locals are the ones producing the pirated versions, the rate of infringement is high

Government worried about our labouring broadband

A BBC News report today indicates that HM Government has woken up to the fact that poor UK broadband speeds, rather than being just "one of those things" we Brits have to put up with, could be a serious threat to the country's ability to compete economically.

Amid claims that the UK will apparently struggle to stay in the top 25% of "broadband nations", a determined-looking Mr Stephen Timms, Minister for Competitiveness (see the pic attached to the report) has called for "a high level summit" to consider what the government can do to improve matters.

This follows a recent investigation revealing just how slow our domestic broadband actually is, and realisation of how badly the situation here compares with that in many of our european competitors - sorry, partners.

To borrow from the underpant gnomes featured in the cartoon series South Park:

Step 1 - Government involvement.  Step 3 - Speedier broadband, soon.  All we have have to do is come up with Step 2...

GPL3: IMPACT guide to the essentials

This is a legal analysis of GPL3 (full name, the GNU General Public Licence version 3). It is based on an article that I have written for the August/September 2007 issue of Computers & Law, the magazine of the Society of Computers & Law.

Microsoft sued in China for infringing personal privacy

The Computerworld website reports that Microsoft is being sued in a People's Court in China on the basis that its installation and use of WGA Notifications on a computer belonging to a Mr Lu without consulting him infringed his personal privacy.

Although this would not be the first action brought against Microsoft arising from its propagation of WGA Notifications, to be sued in China for invasion of privacy does have a weirdly paradoxical feel to it.  No doubt the court will enjoy dealing with such a novel concept - especially against a US defendant - but one has to wonder how much of a precedent China's government wants to see being set here, given the conditions it recently imposed on Google.

GIKII tomorrow

I'll be attending an event called GIKII at University College London tomorrow.

The event is a law conference with a difference, describing itself as "a one day workshop on the intersections between law, technology and popular culture". Judging by the programme, attendees are in for an interesting and entertaining day; what other law conference features talks called things like:

• Extreme IP
• The future's so bright I gotta wear shades

The event isn't just talks with gimmicky titles however; the line-up of speakers features some of the leading academic lawyers in the technology & law area.

I'll report on the event later in the week.

It's not Rrocket science - or, for that matter, much of any kind of science...

I was at a regional business event last week and one of the key themes to emerge was the chronic problems even successful technology businesses have recruiting staff.  More than one referred to "a lack of suitable graduates out there".

This is echoed by an article in the latest issue of Information Age. it is now received wisdom that this country needs to remain at the forefront of technological innovation and excellence, but the available stats make chilling reading.  The numbers of those taking science A Levels continue to dwindle, to the point were it seems that only 12 (TWELVE !) per cent of the student population graduates with a science degree.  Many of these graduates arrive in the workplace ill-equipped to do the jobs offered them.

(What percentage of that 12 % are foreign students is not revealed...)

Whether you blame school league tables for pupils being encouraged to take "easier" subjects, or students paying for their own education demanding a better and more immediate return on their investment, this hardly helps us meet even the present challenges from India, Russia and the rest - never mind those looming even a few years from now.

Ideas, anyone ?  Radio 4 this moring referred to the German system of technical "apprenticeships" which are seen as a stigma-free and legitimate alternative to degree courses - what do the Germans know that we don't ?

US court confirms validity of the "browse-wrap" contract

In the case of Cohn v TrueBeginnings, the Californian Court of Appeal has confirmed that so-called "browse-wrap" contracts are valid, and that the terms & conditions linked to by those contracts are incorporated into the contract. This is a case originally picked-up by Out-law.com, although a more entertaining report can be found at Technollama.

"Browse-wrap" is a form of contract used by the vast majority of e-commerce websites. On almost any occasion on which you've bought online, you'll have entered into this type of contract with the seller. In this case, the contract was formed by the user being shown the following, and accepting it by clicking "continue":

I am 18-years-old and I have read and agree to the TRUE
Terms of Use and Code of Ethics.
CONTINUE

Given that "browse-wrap" contracts meet all the rules for valid contracts (offer, acceptance, consideration) and that the user is given the opportunity to view the terms & conditions for the purchase before the sale, by way of hyperlink, this ruling is unsurprising. However, it's still a nice ruling for online sellers, and helps bring further legal certainty to this way of doing business.

US "fair use" exception generated £4.6 trillion in 2006

The Google Public Policy Blog has picked up on a report which claims that US businesses generated a mighty £4.6 trillion in revenue in 2006 from the "fair use" exception in copyright law (that link is to a Wikipedia article that outlines how "fair use" is defined under US law). It goes without saying that fair use is regarded by the report as important to the US economy.

Whilst attributing these revenues to the "fair use" exception, a look at the report suggests that its authors appear to regard all exceptions to copyright, and situations where copyright does not protect something (e.g. the idea/expression dichotomy, which in essence says that copyright doesn't protect ideas, just the expression of ideas), as being part of "fair use". In other words, the report is about the revenue generated from situations where the rules of US copyright law doesn't apply to the activities of US knowledge / information-based industries.

Even if my analysis of the report's scope is right (corrections from US copyright lawyers and economists welcome!), this does not detract from the significance of the report, which has placed a significant economic value on the use of copyright law.

'That' Nokia ring tone

Las Vegas Trademark Attorney reported earlier this week on his blog that Nokia has obtained a trade mark registration in the US for the well-known ring tone which is used as the default ring tone for Nokia mobile 'phones and also in the company's advertising. Details of Nokia Corporation's trade mark registration number 3288274, which was registered on 4 September 2007, can be found online at the US Patent and Trademark Office's website. The Nokia ring tone is an excerpt from Tárrega’s Gran Vals and was referred to as "Grand Valse" on old Nokia 'phones.