World IP Day 2013 lands with a splash
April 26 is the 13th annual World Intellectual Property Day. Designated by the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) in 2000, World IP Day aims to increase the general understanding of IP while celebrating innovation and creativity.
This year’s theme is “Creativity: The Next Generation,” and will honour the “talented and ingenious creators and innovators who are imagining how the world will look tomorrow.”
In his World IP Day message, WIPO director general Francis Gurry said “creativity and intellectual capacity are common to humanity,” and that IP creates “an incentive for investment in research and development, in innovation and in cultural production.”
“The next generation is coming more and more quickly”, he said. “Young people have the capacity to dream. They are the future.”
He added that the life sciences are the next big technical revolution, predicting they will “fundamentally transform our identity as human beings.”
To mark World IP Day, WIPO is holding an exhibition about 3D printing at its Geneva headquarters until May 3. A panel discussion on April 25 considered the emerging technology’s potential, and the challenges it will bring as it makes it easier to make unauthorised copies of objects.
Gurry noted that although the increased media coverage of 3D printing is a recent development, the first patent related to the technology was filed back in 1971, and granted in 1977, so some of the technology associated with it is already in the public domain.
This week there has been a range of events marking the day in countries all over the world, from seminars, workshops and exhibitions, to competitions, including a creative writing contest in Malaysia.
The Motion Picture Association Asia Pacific partnered with the US embassies and consulates in countries including Hong Kong, India and Japan to host screenings of films The Croods, Oblivion and Admission in an effort to promote respect for IP.
The British Library’s Business and IP Centre information specialist Julie Boadilla will hold a “Beginner’s guide to Intellectual Property” via webinar, which will introduce the main areas of IP and how they apply to business.
The American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA) is holding celebrations in seven locations across the US to recognise the day, each with their own themes.
In New York the AIPLA has partnered with the New York Intellectual Property Law Association and Fashion Law Institute for a programme with a fashion industry focus. Fashion designers will exhibit their work while the Fordham Fashion Law Institute pro bono Pop Up Clinic will offer legal advice to designers and fashion industry professionals.
Meanwhile, an afternoon programme in the San Jose Museum of Art will feature presentations by WIPO director general of innovation and technology James Pooley, US Patent and Trademark Office Silicon Valley director Michelle Lee and the San Jose’s mayor Chuck Reed after a live musical performance.
An invention-focused event in Detroit will feature talks by Bill Coughlin, who manages Ford Motor Company’s IP portfolio, Robin Evans, regional manager of The Elijah J. McCoy USPTO Satellite Office in Detroit, and Alyssa Reiter, the 12-year-old patent owner of the Hamster Bowling game.
