Community Projects vs Private Projects

Apache is one of the greatest product by community projects. It is a web server program contributed by programmers who collaborated in a community board to build a reliable and stable web server. Anyone can modify and improve the codes of the program. Programmers voluntarily contributed codes to the program. It started the open source revolution. Are open source a boon or bane to the development of technology? I believe both community projects and private projects have its own merit. Private projects are important because it fosters entrepreneurship and employment. Community projects are important because it allows people of similar interest to collaborate and contribute to the community.

IP from National Projects; MP3 from Germany

If a breakthrough is found, who will own the IP? IP of national projects were discussed in the AIPPI forum. Cases from Germany, Switzerland, Japan and Singapore were presented. Each country is distinctive with considerations for national interest, project initiator and inventors rewards. Do you know that MP3 is a result of one of Germany's national project?

The coding of MP3 is owned by Alcatel-Lucent and Fraunhofer Gesellschaft. In Aug 7, 2007 a federal judge reverses a USD1.5 billion judgement against Microsoft for including MP3 coding in Windows Media Player. The decision seems to ease fears on other MP3 provider such as Apple and RealNewtworks.

Patent Filings in Malaysia

Singapore is known to be a top patent filing destination after Japan, Korea, China and India. In the AIPPI Forum, I promoted Malaysia (MY) as a popular national phase filing destination. I highlighted the following points in my discussion:
- MY is a PCT member
- MY acccepts English application as offiial language. Hence, no translation is needed
- MY acknowledges search report of US, AU, EPO, JP, and KR granted patent. The MY application can be fast tracked to grant.
- MY court widely uses English as official language
- MY has a one year grace period for novelty. Does not practice absolute novelty.
- MY economy lies in the following industries: electrical and electronics, rubber, palm oil, automotive, petroleum and plastics.
- MY has a population of 27 million

AIPPI Forum 2007

Phew.. Just return from Singapore after attending AIPPI forum, an international forum for IP practitioners. This is the first time I'm attending such an event. I was overwhelmed by the number of delegates, more than 400 people from all over the world. I made friends with delegates from USA, Germany, Japan, Nigeria, Brazil, and ... the list goes on and on. It is a mind blowing experience for me to exchange name cards for the past three days until I run out of name cards... arrgh! I'm lucky to be able to attend this event due to the short traveling distance between Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. Congratulations to Singapore for successfully hosting the event. Some of the delegates expressed that this is the first time they are traveling to Asia. Some delegates manage to squeeze a short vacation in Malaysia. Hope to see you guys again next year in Boston for AIPPI Congress. Will update on what I learned from the event later.