Trends, analysis and insights in IP Law
The Madrid Protocol is celebrating its second anniversary in Canada! Since it came into effect on June 17, 2019, Canadian businesses have more than one string to their bow to protect their trademarks in Canada and internationally. This is the first article in the series on the Madrid Protocol in Canada; it will focus specifically on international filings made by Canadian companies.
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In Part I of this blog post, I explained what a reaction video is, how it could constitute copyright infringement under the Copyright Act, and how the possible legal exception for “criticism” or “review” might apply to a reaction video. In Part II of this blog post, I further analyze this exception through both a Canadian and U.S. legal lens (no pun intended).
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In May 2021, CIPO added upwards of 60 cannabis- and marijuana-related terms to the Goods and Services Manual (the “Manual”).
Most of the new terms fall into Nice Classes 3 (non-medicated toiletry preparations), 5 (pharmaceuticals), and 30 (foodstuffs of plant origin). However, new terms have also been added in Class 16 (namely “printed publications in the field of cannabis”), 42 (“scientific research in the field of cannabis”) and 45 (“legal research in the field of cannabis”).
Continue reading A few months ago, my colleague Jay Kerr-Wilson published this blog post on the intellectual property issues surrounding the phenomenon of “Let’s Play” videos, a genre of online videos where an individual records and broadcasts themselves playing a video game. The individual might film themselves or just provide audio commentary, but in either scenario their own content is layered on top of the game that they are playing. The blog post discusses how this video genre could be considered copyright infringement with respect to the video game being played, as well as why generally we are not seeing infringement cases in this area because of the symbiotic relationship between content creators and video game publishers.
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Today, April 26th, is World Intellectual Property Day. This year’s theme is shining a light on the critical role of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the economy and how they can use intellectual property (“IP”) to build stronger, more competitive and resilient businesses.
On April 19th, 2021, the Canadian government released its first budget under the COVID pandemic (“Budget 2021”). Budget 2021 addresses the Government of Canada’s fight against COVID-19 and its desire to ensure a robust economic recovery. As part of the latter, Canada is investing in innovation.
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