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Interview: MARQUES Chair Antony Douglass
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 Specsavers Legal Director Antony Douglass, who specialises in intellectual property, data protection, marketing and digital strategy, took over as MARQUES Chair during the recent spring meeting in Frankfurt. In this interview, he talks about the role of Chair, his interesting day job and the big challenges brands face today.
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Highlights from the Spring Meeting
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 More than 150 Council and Team members attended the MARQUES Spring Meeting in Frankfurt on 1 and 2 March
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During the Meeting, all MARQUES Teams met to discuss plans and activities, and the Team Chairs presented to all attendees. There was also a Leadership Meeting where Team Chairs shared ideas with each other and discussed collaboration opportunities. 
Peter Wild, for many years a MARQUES Council and Team member, gave the Kay Uwe Jonas Memorial Lecture on the topic of human rights and IP. He was also presented with the David Goldring Volunteer Award.
In the lecture, Peter identified four main ways that IP and human rights interact: (1) IP rights as rights to property, for example in Article 17(2) of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights; (2) potential tensions between protection of IP rights and free speech defences, such as in recent NFT cases; (3) human rights issues in supply chains of branded products; and (4) in the reliance on independent justice and due process.
"These aspects come under pressure and we need to stand up against the violations," said Peter. But he added that standing up in this way "can be painful" and said: "We should put human rights on the list of our concerns and actions, and not abuse them for short-term gain." Read more in this post on the Class 46 blog. The Spring Meeting also included a workshop, "What’s new at the EUIPO". Presented by members of the MARQUES European Trade Mark Law and Practice Team, the workshop covered European convergence projects (particularly CP13 on bad faith and CP14 on public policy/morality) and recent trade mark case law. Read more about the workshop on Class 46 here. Photos taken by James Nurton and Willem Leppink
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Book now for webinar on design case law
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 The MARQUES Designs Team will host a webinar on EU design law on Wednesday 3 May from 15.00 to 16.30 CET
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Question the Trade Mark Judges
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 On 7 March, UCL-IBIL and MARQUES hosted the latest “Question the Trade Mark Judges” event in London. The Q&A panel discussion covered various timely issues in EU and UK trade mark law and procedure
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Practical guides published
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AI against counterfeits
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The MARQUES Brands and Marketing Team has published two new documents: a Basic Introduction to Web3 presentation and a paper on social media impersonation
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As part of its ongoing project on AI and IP, the MARQUES Cyberspace Team has prepared a paper looking at how AI-powered solutions can help in the fight against counterfeiting
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From the Observatory
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 In their regular update, Petra Herkul, Maria Cecilia Romoleroux and Sonia Santos of the MARQUES Anti-Counterfeiting and Parallel Trade Team summarise recent news from the EUIPO Observatory, EMPACT and the European Commission
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WIPO reports annual IP data
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MARQUES joins EUIPO User Group Meeting
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 Use of the international trade mark system fell by 6.1% in 2022, but the number of designs included in international applications under the Hague System increased by 11.2%, according to figures published by WIPO
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 European Union Intellectual Property Office (@EU_IPO) _ Twitter.png) The EUIPO User Group Meeting took place in Alicante during the week of 27 March. This was the 34th meeting since they began in 1998.
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Trade mark and design judgments in March
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The CJEU has published its opinion in a case concerning design rights, and the EU General Court has delivered several interesting judgments in cases concerning EUTMs and RCDs
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MARQUES Media Roundup
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 The MARQUES blogs include reports on cases and legal developments as well as news from MARQUES Teams. Sign up for notifications so you don’t miss out!
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Issue 147
