The WIPO Journal: Analysis and Debate of Intellectual Property Issues was a peer-reviewed law review established in 2009 that was published by Sweet & Maxwell (a division of Thomson Reuters) on behalf of the World Intellectual Property Organization. [1] Its editor-in-chief was Peter K. Yu. [2] The WIPO Journal was discontinued at the end of 2016. [3]
Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, copyrights, trademarks, and trade secrets. The modern concept of intellectual property developed in England in the 17th and 18th centuries. The term "intellectual property" began to be used in the 19th century, though it was not until the late 20th century that intellectual property became commonplace in most of the world's legal systems.
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention. In most countries, patent rights fall under private law and the patent holder must sue someone infringing the patent in order to enforce their rights. In some industries patents are an essential form of competitive advantage; in others they are irrelevant.
The World Intellectual Property Organization Copyright Treaty is an international treaty on copyright law adopted by the member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in 1996. It provides additional protections for copyright to respond to advances in information technology since the formation of previous copyright treaties before it. As of August 2021, the treaty has 110 contracting parties. The WCT and WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty, are together termed WIPO "internet treaties".
The World Intellectual Property Organization is one of the 15 specialized agencies of the United Nations (UN). Pursuant to the 1967 Convention Establishing the World Intellectual Property Organization, WIPO was created to promote and protect intellectual property (IP) across the world by cooperating with countries as well as international organizations. It began operations on 26 April 1970 when the convention entered into force. The current Director General is Singaporean Daren Tang, former head of the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore, who began his term on 1 October 2020.
Pro bono publico, usually shortened to pro bono, is a Latin phrase that means for the public good.
The Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) is an international patent law treaty, concluded in 1970. It provides a unified procedure for filing patent applications to protect inventions in each of its contracting states. A patent application filed under the PCT is called an international application, or PCT application.
The Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, signed in Paris, France, on 20 March 1883, was one of the first intellectual property treaties. It established a Union for the protection of industrial property. The convention is currently still in force. The substantive provisions of the Convention fall into three main categories: national treatment, priority right and common rules.
World Intellectual Property Day is observed annually on April 26. The event was established by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in 2000 to "raise awareness of how patents, copyright, trademarks and designs impact on daily life" and "to celebrate creativity, and the contribution made by creators and innovators to the development of economies and societies across the globe". April 26 was chosen as the date for World Intellectual Property Day because it coincides with the date on which the Convention Establishing the World Intellectual Property Organization entered into force in 1970. World Intellectual Property Day is WIPO’s largest intellectual property (IP) public outreach campaign.
The Copyright Act 1957 as amended governs the subject of copyright law in India. The Act is applicable from 21 January 1958. The history of copyright law in India can be traced back to its colonial era under the British Empire. The Copyright Act 1957 was the first post-independence copyright legislation in India and the law has been amended six times since 1957. The most recent amendment was in the year 2012, through the Copyright (Amendment) Act 2012.
Kamil Eltayeb Idris is a Sudanese statesman, scholar and international civil servant. He was Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) from November 1997 to September 2008. He was also head of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV). Idris stepped down a year early from his post as head of WIPO, amidst "allegations he misled WIPO about his age".
Francis Gerard Gurry is an Australian lawyer who served as the fourth director general of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) from 2008 to 2020. During that time, he was also the secretary-general of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV). Gurry also served as a deputy director general of WIPO from 2003 to 2008.
Intangible asset finance, also known as "IP finance", is the branch of finance that uses intangible assets such as intellectual property and reputation to gain access to credit. Like other areas of finance, intangible asset finance is concerned with the interdependence of value, risk, and time.
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, was an international assembly held in 1886 in the Swiss city of Bern by ten European countries with the goal to agree on a set of legal principles for the protection of original work. They drafted and adopted a multi-party contract containing agreements for a uniform, crossing border system that became known under the same name. Its rules have been updated many times since then. The treaty provides authors, musicians, poets, painters, and other creators with the means to control how their works are used, by whom, and on what terms. In some jurisdictions these type of rights are being referred to as copyright.
The African Regional Intellectual Property Organization (ARIPO), formerly African Regional Industrial Property Organization, is an intergovernmental organization for cooperation among African states in patent and other intellectual property matters. ARIPO was established by the Lusaka Agreement of 1976. It has the capacity to hear applications for patents and registered trademarks in its member states who are parties to the Harare (patents), Banjul (marks) and Arusha protocols. ARIPO also features a protocol on the protection of traditional knowledge, the Swakopmund Protocol, signed in 2010 by 9 member states of the organization which entered into force on May 11, 2015, and was amended on December 6, 2016.
The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) is an international legal agreement between all the member nations of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It establishes minimum standards for the regulation by national governments of different forms of intellectual property (IP) as applied to nationals of other WTO member nations. TRIPS was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) between 1989 and 1990 and is administered by the WTO.
World Intellectual Property Indicators (WIPI) is an annual statistical report published by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The publication provides an overview of the activity in the areas of patents, utility models, trademarks, industrial designs, microorganisms, plant variety protection, geographical indications and the creative economy.
Cybersquatting is the practice of registering, trafficking in, or using an Internet domain name, with a bad faith intent to profit from the goodwill of a trademark belonging to someone else.
Iran is a member of the WIPO since 2001 and has acceded to several WIPO intellectual property treaties. Iran joined the Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property in 1959. In December 2003 Iran became a party to the Madrid Agreement and the Madrid Protocol for the International Registration of Marks. In 2005 Iran joined the Lisbon Agreement for the Protection of Appellations of Origin and their International Registration, which ensures the protection of geographical names associated with products. As at February 2008 Iran had yet to accede to The Hague Agreement for the Protection of Industrial Designs.
The Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore in charge of negotiating one or several international legal instruments (treaty) to protect traditional knowledge, traditional cultural expressions, and genetic resources in relation with intellectual property, thus bridging existing gaps in international law. The IGC is convened in Geneva by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and has been meeting since 2001.