Declaration of Internet Freedom!

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The recent past has seen a spate of internet legislation across several different countries – sometimes attempted and foiled, sometimes successful – which have raised a number of issues which have unfortunately been discussed very minimally. I believe the SOPA and PIPA bills received the largest amount of publicity when several large websites and internet activists vigourously protested against it. More locally, the multiple website blocking Ashok Kumar (John Doe) orders garnered much attention as well, before it was clarified […]

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Obama admin actively opposes Nexavar compulsory license

/ By / Patent

While I shouldn’t be surprised at the arrogant nature in which the US treats the Indian IP regime, I was still slightly shocked at how superiorly the US behaved over India in this particular exchange between the USPTO and Congress. Teresa Stanek Rae, the Deputy Director of the USPTO testifies before Rep. Bob Goodlatte, in the House Subcommittee on Intellectual Property that the USPTO continues to actively try to ‘educate’ and persuade Indian officials to not grant any further compulsory

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Socio-Legal Review puts out call for papers

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The Socio-Legal Review, published by the Law & Society Committee of the National Law School of India University has put out the following call for submission. Submission guidelines maybe accessed over here, while past issues of the journal can be accessed on its website over here. The Socio-Legal Review (SLR) is a student-edited, peer-reviewed interdisciplinary journal published by the Law and Society Committee of the National Law School of India University, Bangalore. SLR aims to be a forum that involves,

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G.I Registry fixes a hearing on the Tirupati Laddu rectification petition for July 16th

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The Registrar of the Geographical Indications has finally scheduled a hearing on the rectification petition over the controversial grant of G.I. status to Tirupati Laddu for July 16. Incidentally, Prashant earlier this month criticized the Registry for failing to fix a date for hearing in the rectification proceedings against the grant of G.I status to ‘Tirupati Laddu’ and ‘Darjeeling Tea’ despite repeated reminders by the respective petitioners for more than a year now.  By way of a quick recap, Mr.

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Off Topic: Course announcement: NUJS Diploma course on Entrepreneurship Administration and Business Law and How it is useful for Law Students

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  Course announcement: NUJS Diploma course on Entrepreneurship Administration and Business Law and How it is useful for Law Students     Law schools or colleges in India do not really focus on teaching practical skills – they rather try to inculcate skills of research, writing and analysis – which are essential, but do not give you all the lawyerly skills you need to provide services to a client. Consider the following:   You read contract law in class. But

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Off Topic: Google Policy Fellowship Program: Call for Applications

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  The Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) is inviting applications for the Google Policy Fellowship program. Google is providing a USD 7,500 stipend to the India Fellow, who will be selected by August 15, 2012.   The Google Policy Fellowship offers successful candidates an opportunity to develop research and debate on the fellowship focus areas, which include Access to Knowledge, Openness in India, Freedom of Expression, Privacy, and Telecom, for a period of about ten weeks starting from August

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Dealing with the cost of cancer treatment in India: Are patents the problem?

/ By / Patent

Image from here Over the last several months, I’ve spent some time visiting some dear family friends who are undergoing treatment at a cancer hospital. This was the first time that I witnessed the disease and its treatment first-hand. Apart from putting life and the law in a new perspective, my occasional visits to the cancer hospital also served the purpose of researching the costs of cancer treatment in India, the manner in which Indians deal with the cost and

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SpicyIP Tidbit: Madras HC clarifies extent of URL blocking

/ By / Copyright

In an update to the seemingly random mass censoring of video and torrent sites about a month ago, an ISP consortium approached the Madras High Court for a clarification as to the extent of the Ashok Kumar interim injunction. According to MediaNama, who have a copy of the order issued on June 15th, 2012, the Madras HC clarified that only specific URLs containing the allegedly infringing content are to be hit by this injunction and not entire websites. This is

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Stepping Down From SpicyIP

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For reasons that are both personal and professional, I will be stepping down from the leadership of SpicyIP, effective today. I will write a longer post about future arrangements soon. I want to take this opportunity to thank you all for the wonderful support and encouragement through all these years. I’ve learnt a lot from my interactions with you and I do hope that you will support SpicyIP in its continued fight for transparency and more informed IP policy making

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Tea Board ‘regrets’ earlier RTI reply; discloses legal expenses on registering and defending its Intellectual Property

/ By / Others

Continuing from my earlier post on how the Tea Board & APEDA were making an absolute mockery of the Right to Information Act, 2005, I’m glad to report that the Tea Board has overruled its earlier decision and agreed to disclose its expenses. The Appellate Officer for implementation of the RTI Act, 2005 agreed with my argument that legal expenses of the Board could not be considered confidential and ordered the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO) to immediately disclose the

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