Copyright
Perspectives on copyright across India and the subcontinent.
Adlin Mini M · 18 November 2022
One IP Lawyer Sues Another Over a Logo
The defendant argued the font was freely available and that a LinkedIn pitch two years earlier meant the plaintiff had acquiesced. Both arguments failed — and the court observed that a higher standard of integrity is expected of IP practitioners.
22 July 2021
Copyright and AI, Part Two: Testing Machine Intelligence and Placing Liability
The Turing test is outdated and the Lovelace test is superficial — a machine surprising its programmer may only mean a bug. If we cannot reliably identify intelligence, granting copyright to a system that may just be advanced software is hard to justify.
Abhishek R. · 20 July 2021
Copyright and Artificial Intelligence: Who Is the Author?
The US registers only works created by a human being. India and the UK instead give copyright to the person who causes the work to be created. Neither answer copes well when the system produces output its own programmer cannot explain.
Adyasree Prakriti · 16 April 2021
The Copyright (Amendment) Rules, 2021: What Changed
The 2021 Copyright Rules modernised the regime — a new online Copyright Journal replacing the Gazette, simpler software-copyright filing (first and last 10 pages of code), annual transparency reports for copyright societies, and alignment with the IPAB's abolition.
27 March 2021
Making Platforms Pay for News: Australia's Bargaining Code
Australia's Code requires platforms to pay news organisations for content, with arbitration if negotiations fail. It works for large publishers — but the revenue threshold excludes the independent journalists most in need of it.
7 December 2020
AI and Intellectual Property: The Questions WIPO Started Asking
Innovation was until recently a defining characteristic of the human species. Machine learning has unsettled that, and IP frameworks built entirely around human authorship and inventorship are still working out what to do about it.
3 November 2020
Morality and IP: How Far Is Too Far?
Trademarks and patents can be refused on morality grounds — scandalous marks, inventions contrary to public order. But copyright has no such bar. How the three IP regimes treat 'morality', and why the terms stay undefined.
5 October 2020
Radio Royalties Under Section 31D: The IPAB's Last Consultation
Radio broadcasters applied to have statutory licence royalties fixed, and the IPAB invited suggestions in September 2020. The tribunal was abolished before it could determine them — leaving the rate-setting function to the High Courts.
Raja Pannir Selvam · 29 September 2020
Playing Music in Your Business? You Need a Public Performance Licence
Hotels, restaurants, gyms and malls that play music need copyright licences. Who to license from, why PPL and Novex matter, and the Leopold Café ruling on agents issuing licences under Section 30.
Archana Priyadharshini · 1 July 2020
Author vs Owner: Who Really Holds the Copyright? (Section 17)
The author is usually the first owner of copyright — but employment, commissions and consultancy blur that line. How Section 17 and cases like V.T. Thomas v. Malayala Manorama decide ownership, and why a written agreement matters.
23 March 2020
Indian IP Office Deadline Extensions During COVID-19: A Record
A chronology of the CGPDTM, Patent Office, Trade Marks Registry and Copyright Office notifications that extended IP deadlines during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown — plus the Supreme Court's suo-motu limitation extension.
17 September 2019
Model IPR Guidelines for Academic Institutions: Who Owns Campus Innovation?
CIPAM's draft model guidelines give academic institutions a framework for IP created on campus — default institutional ownership of resource-backed inventions (with author-owned scholarly copyright), revenue-sharing with researchers, startup-friendly reassignment, and open-source encouragement.