Monday miscellany

Art & Artifice's Red Bus free event, on 24 October, was only launched this morning and has already attracted over 30 registrations, despite the fact that we are wallowing in the midst of the holiday season and no-one's checking their emails. Jolly good show, says the IPKat, who is happy to point artistic copyright enthusiasts, and anyone who wants to sneak into Simnmons & Simmons' enviable collection of contemporary art, to the relevant bit of the Art & Artifice website here, where they can find further particulars and registration details.

No poll-rigging,please!

Sidebar polls.  With just one day to go, that day being tomorrow, the 1709 Blog's sidebar poll on the question "Do you think that the US fair use defence really makes a difference in terms of user freedoms" has now got itself into three figures. At the moment, the race is between "absolutely it does" and "sometimes" -- but your opinion counts so please let Eleonora (who masterminded this poll) have it.   Meanwhile, there's plenty of time to ponder the deeper meaning of the words "Greek yoghurt" but, once you've done so, the jiplp sidebar poll awaits your views. Interestingly, a clear majority of voters so far do not consider that "Greek yoghurt" actually comes from Greece -- but much the same was said about the term "feta cheese" not coming from Greece, until the European Commission and Court of Justice ruled otherwise ...   Finally, the Afro-IP sidebar poll on where the World Intellectual Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) should locate its proposed African Regional Office has now closed.  The winner, with nearly 30% of the vote, was Zimbabwe, having overtaken Kenya and shrugged off a strong late challenge from South Africa.  This is one poll which Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe can't be accused of rigging [Merpel wonders if the result is a vote of confidence in Zimbabwe or a reflection of what people think of WIPO ...]

The Kats have received a recent missive from Teri Karobonik (Staff Attorney Fellow, New Media Rights).  Teri, who describes herself as a "huge fan of the 1709 blog" (whoops!), explains her position as follows:

"We provide one-to-one legal services in the areas of IP, internet and entertainment law at low-to-no-cost for all types of creators. Recently we've had an influx of requests for help from the United Kingdom [now, why should that be, wonders Merpel. Anything to do with this?]. Short of sending people to the Open Rights Group,which is more of a policy group, I have no idea where to send people for help. Do you know of any law school clinics or non-profits within the United Kingdom that do pro-bono (or low cost) IP work?" 

This Kat has vague recollections of his student days, when law school clinics were all the vogue, but is quite out of touch with that scene these days.  He hopes that readers, not just in the UK but beyond, will be able to post some helpful suggestions about places to which deserving cases can be directed so that their legal position -- whether as creators, performers, owners or consumers -- can be properly explained to them and their interests represented.