I invite myself to the Informals’ Committee meeting, to let
them know that Big CIPA still cares about them.
They politely overlook the fact that I am Old and Outdated, and they
very kindly buy me a drink and offer to send me some minutes afterwards. I listen to them talking about the training
and social events they are organising up and down the country, and I feel very
humble because at Big CIPA we sometimes struggle to organise a plate of biscuits.
Then I rush across London to a posh dinner with a group
called UNION-IP. No-one at UNION-IP is
able to tell me exactly what the group is about and who it is for, much less
why it writes its name in CAPITALS so much of the time, but I see it has a
website and a Wikipedia entry so I think they are perhaps not trying hard
enough. Anyway, because I arrive late
due to being an Old Person guest at the Informals’ meeting, I end up being
served my starter, main course and pudding all at the same time. I eventually catch up but I’m not convinced
it was a particularly elegant affair.
UNION-IP is known for having influential speakers at its dinners,
like judges and senior patent office people.
Tonight’s speaker is from the IPO and he is telling us about patent
harmonisation. Lots of countries want
global patent harmonisation, he says, but every country has its own version of Harmony
and usually this looks pretty much like its own current patent system. Also every country would like to be able to
opt out of the bits of Harmony it doesn’t like.
And to provide more Harmony for its own nationals than for foreigners. Then there are the regional offices, who would
also like to be in charge of Harmony but on a bigger scale, although clearly in
the case of the EPO it may be difficult to find harmony of any kind right now, particularly among its workforce.
The PRESIDENT of UNION-IP points out that if there is HARMONY
then we will all be out of a JOB. No
worries. There will be a few jobs spare
at the EPO by then.
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