Abstract Generative artificial intelligence (AI) systems, together with text and data mining (TDM), introduce complex challenges at the junction of data utilization and copyright laws. The inherent reliance of AI on large quantities of data, often encompassing copyrighted materials, results in multifaceted legal quandaries. Issues surface from the unfeasible task of securing permission from each copyright holder for AI training, further muddled by ambiguities in interpreting copyright laws and fair use provisions. Adding to the conundrum, the clandestine practices of data collection in proprie ..read more

Abstract Using freedom of information requests, we examine the operation of the Patents Māori Advisory Committee of Aotearoa New Zealand. The Committee advises the Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand on whether inventions claimed in a patent application are derived from Māori traditional knowledge or from indigenous plants or animals; and if so, whether the commercial exploitation of that invention is likely to be contrary to Māori values. There is limited publicly available information on the operations of the Committee and the decision-making process undertaken in reviewing applicati ..read more

Abstract In China, a hosting audio-visual platform does not bear a copyright general monitoring obligation. It bears a public law obligation to monitor content proactively and constantly to safeguard the governance objective of cybersecurity. Little literature has discovered that Chinese case law has shown a risk that this public law obligation can impose an actual copyright general monitoring obligation upon platforms. The crux lies in that the public law obligation weakens the rationale of the copyright no monitoring obligation that a platform cannot access and assess each piece of work proa ..read more

Abstract The availability of punitive awards varies across different common law jurisdictions. In recent years, China, as a civil law jurisdiction, has progressively introduced a comprehensive punitive damages system in Intellectual Property (IP) law in recent years. To investigate how this common law product functions in the civil law system, this paper scrutinizes the evolution and functions of punitive damages and depicts the map of punitive damages in Chinese IP law. Then this paper reports and analyses 657 IP judgments involving the application of punitive damages that were tried and deci ..read more

The Journal of World Intellectual Property, Volume 27, Issue 1, Page 1-1, March 2024 ..read more

Abstract Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues to be a powerful tool in the research and development ecosystem. AI computers are invented to assist human invention and also created to invent. Where an AI is created to invent, through self-learning, they can interact with set of data presumably created by humans and as a result, a new patentable invention(s) can emerge. However, where the AI inventors and the resulting inventions sit within the inventorship legal framework, and the theory of legal personhood continues to raise legal and policy questions that challenge some underlying or presum ..read more

Abstract While intellectual property laws protect rights holders from infringement of their intellectual property, these laws also protect against abuse of those rights where rights holders unjustifiably threaten competitors with infringement proceedings. The introduction of additional damages for flagrant unjustified threats under the recent Intellectual Property Laws Amendment (Productivity Commission Response Part 1 and Other Measures) Act 2018 (Cth) may benefit an alleged infringer who is not found to have infringed a valid patent. In particular, new section 128(1A) to the Patents Act 1990 ..read more

Abstract The Plant Variety Rights Act of Aotearoa New Zealand (PVR Act), recently reformed in 2022, adopts new protections for Indigenous relations with native and culturally significant plants, and for traditional knowledge. The Act specifically aims to protect kaitiaki (guardian or caretaker) relationships that Māori have with taonga (treasured, culturally significant) plant species and mātauranga Māori (Indigenous knowledge) in the PVR system. By taking these reforms into account and examining how they may operate in practice, this article considers whether the PVR Act fulfils the constitut ..read more

Abstract The increasing prevalence of immersive technologies and blockchain platforms in modern commerce has ignited animated debates among intellectual property law scholars on the use of nonfungible tokens (NFTs) in the sale of crypto-assets or virtual property. Despite the rapidly growing interest in the implications of NFTs for copyright law, particularly in the realm of digital art, relatively little attention has been given to the question of whether the rights of copyright stakeholders (as opposed to the works in which such rights subsist) are capable of tokenisation as NFTs or of being ..read more

The Journal of World Intellectual Property, Volume 26, Issue 2, Page 115-116, July 2023 ..read more