Intellectual Property - Trade Marks - UK Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 5000 words

Intellectual Property - Trade Marks - UK - Essay Example The four main types of IP are: patents for inventions - new and improved products and processes that are capable of industrial application; trade marks for brand identity - of goods and services allowing distinctions to be made between different traders; designs for product appearance - of the whole or a part of a product resulting from the features of, in particular, the lines, contours, colors, shape, texture or materials of the product itself or its ornamentation and, copyright for material - literary and artistic material, music, films, sound recordings and broadcasts, including software and multimedia .In this paper we concentrate on trade marks IPs which are associated with the trade of goods and services and ,in particular, to those that arise in the international trade of goods and services. The WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) TRIPS, was signed on January 1, 1995.The agreement provides for floor standards for the protection of defined intellectual property types and the enforcement of associated intellectual property rights.TRIPS,in turn ,was the outcome of the synthesis of deliberations of two earlier international conventions: (1) the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property (Paris Convention) and (2) the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (Berne Convention). Paris Convention Article 1(3) defined industrial property to include "all manufactured or natural products, for example, wines, grain, tobacco leaf, fruit, cattle, minerals, mineral waters, beer, flowers, and flour." Paris Convention Article 1(2) further provided that the protection afforded to industrial property included "indications of source or appellations of origin." Thus the adoption of the TRIPS Agreement hera lded an important development for the global recognition of geographical indications. However, significant controversies continued to hover on discussions of this issue, as and when they took place, either at the WTO and other platforms of international trade. For instance, there were and are substantial differences of opinions about the manners in which registration of geographical indications under article 23.4 would finally be implemented and recognized. Take, for instance, the case of quite a few developed and developing countries who desire to extend special protection which was available only to wines and spirits to other products. In short such countries are pressing hard for special protection list to be expanded substantially. On issues of public health discussions on geographical indications resulted in a clear North-South divide. However, on issues of industrial products and food products the reaction has been divergent on very many important issues. Both developed and de veloping countries alike- maintain quite differing positions on such matters. This clearly shows that all such countries view differently the economic impacts of the system of geographical i