Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Intellectual Property Law Blogs -> IPKat

Intellectual Property Law

: IPKat

Lisbon party -- but is there so much so celebrate?

By Johanna Gibson, David Pearce, Jeremy Phillips and Ilanah Simon.

According to a World Intellectual Property Organization Press Release earlier today ("Ceremony Marks 50th anniversary of the Lisbon Agreement", 2008UPD/2008/307) some 200 participants, including government representatives from 50 nations, joined the new WIPO Director General Francis Gurry at a ceremony in Lisbon last week to mark the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Lisbon Agreement on the international protection of appellations of origin.

Right: the trouble with appellations of origin is that, after the first three or four glasses, it's quite difficult to tell one from another ...

The IPKat wonders why representatives from 50 countries were busy partying, when in the past half century only 26 countries have even bothered to become contracting parties -- and it' not as if the Lisbon Agreement has been at the top of everyone's agenda; arguably recent post-TRIPs debate has done far more to get people motivated to respect, if not protect, appellations of origin. Merpel notes that, apart from a paw-full of European countries, there aren't exactly many of the world's economic powers among the 26 contracting states, several of which could probably have put the cost of the party to good use if it could have been pumped into their economy without passing through the hands of corrupt officials.

Organise your own Titanic party here

Full post as published by IPKat on November 06, 2008 (boomark / email).