Copying meaning

In this issue Designs Patents IP and technology Daily and weekly news alerts Dates for your diary Trackers Useful information Designs EU design reforms prompt a portfolio review. Law360 notes that in-house IP teams should start examining their organisations’ design portfolios in light of soon-to-arrive, strengthened European design reforms to future-proof their IP approach. See: EU design reforms signal its time to review portfolios. Court of Appeal rejects appeal in design conspiracy case (Iqbal v City of Wolverhampton Council). The challenge to conviction and sentence for conspiracies involving counterfeit goods and the unauthorised copying of a design under section 35ZA of the Registered Designs Act 1949 was dismissed. The defendants received 31 months’ imprisonment on each count, to run concurrently. The Court of Appeal upheld the Crown Court’s convictions and sentences. See: [2025] EWCA Crim 498. Patents Patents Court strikes out claim against the Comptroller (Ahmad v Comptroller General of Patents). The Patents Court...

A number of record companies, among them Warner, Sony Music and Atlantic Records, have brought actions against Suno and Udio, issuing two lawsuits that accuse generative AI of producing ‘convincing imitations’ of existing tracks. Pre-action correspondence indicates that, as with other US disputes over generative AI, the companies’ core defence will rest on the claim that any copying amounted to fair use. How Suno and Udio allegedly hit the wrong note The claims assert that Suno (which has a deal to feature within Microsoft’s Copilot AI chatbot) and Udio ingest vast numbers of recordings, then refine and standardise them for use as training data, before extracting parameters from that dataset to build their AI models. When a user supplies a text prompt (for example, make a jazz song about New York), the service outputs one or more tracks—typically with lyrics—on the chosen theme. In a well-trained model, the goal is for results to reflect a generalisation of the training corpus. Here, however, it is alleged that the Suno...

Although Stability AI Ltd. accepts that ‘at least some’ images from the stock photography giant’s site were used to ‘train’ its generative art system, the company — in a defence newly made public at the High Court on Wednesday — again asserted that no training occurred within the UK. ‘Stable Diffusion was not trained in the UK and we expect to be fully vindicated at trial’, a Stability AI spokesperson told Law360 on 1 March 2024. Getty brought proceedings against Stability AI in the High Court in May 2023, alleging copyright infringement for training Stable Diffusion on millions of its works via an online data set compiled by ‘scraping’ links to photographs and videos, together with their captions, from across the web, including websites such as Getty Images, Flickr and Tumblr. In certain instances, outputs from Stable Diffusion allegedly contained a ‘substantial part’ of photographs on the Getty platform, and even reproduced the stock agency’s watermarks, according to the initial claim...

This Practice Note outlines the legal and practical considerations relevant to digital rights management (DRM), and examines how far technical tools and other safeguards can be deployed by rights holders to protect and administer their digital works lawfully and effectively in practice. It also sets out the categories of offences that may arise where technological protection measures are bypassed or where rights management information is abused in any context. What is digital rights management? DRM describes the technical mechanisms used by copyright owners of digital material to label, monitor and secure their assets. These controls are applied to block unauthorised copying, for instance by using encryption, ensuring that only approved software and permitted users can open a given digital file where appropriate. DRM also serves to identify content and to manage its distribution to consumers, eg by tracking how often a work is accessed for the purpose of calculating the royalties payable lawfully, or to support business models such as online music subscription services. For example, the video...

This Practice Note sets out a concise overview of mechanisms for enforcing copyright across borders. An international system of copyright enforcement Copyright is a territorial intellectual property right, safeguarding a work only within the bounds of a single country. As early as the nineteenth century, this limitation was acknowledged as a challenge for rights holders. Copying abroad became simpler, yet owners had no recourse, since their rights were recognised solely in their home jurisdiction and carried no force beyond it. As a result, demands grew for a unified international approach to copyright. Such a framework now operates, built on four conventions. Central to it is the rule of national treatment: a copyright holder is treated as though they are a national of the country where the infringement occurs and may invoke that country’s copyright laws. Those wishing to rely on this international regime must be ready to bring actions in overseas courts, accepting the additional complications and expense that this may entail...

This Practice Note explains in detail the requirements and rules governing the delivery and service of documents throughout the course of employment tribunal proceedings. Documents may need to be sent or served: to the tribunal: see Sending to the tribunal, below to the parties to the proceedings: see Sending to parties, below to others who are not parties to the proceedings: see Sending to non-parties and other special addressees, below In each situation there are rules setting out the permitted method and place of delivery. At times the address specified by the rules cannot be ascertained, or is known but presents practical difficulties; in such circumstances an order may permit service by another means or method: see Problems with regular address—substituted service, below. The date on which a document is delivered is often particularly critical in assessing compliance with procedural requirements. Consequently, there are deeming provisions for the various different methods of service that state the date on which a document will...

Introduction The purpose of this copyright policy is to guide employees and other personnel on copyright as a right. It also: sets out guidelines and procedures for obtaining permission to use company and third‑party works; provides a framework for reporting misuse of copyright works. This policy supplies practical advice and procedures on copyright matters. It is not a substitute for legal advice, so obtain proper legal guidance when needed. The copyright officer, [ Name ], may assist with any questions; contact [ Name ] at [ telephone number or email address ]. What is copyright? Copyright recognises the intellectual creation invested by an author in producing a work. Where copyright subsists in a work, the owner holds exclusive rights to undertake specified acts in relation to that work. Acts such as copying, as defined in the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, carried out by anyone other than the owner without permission, may infringe those exclusive rights...

To: [ enter employer’s name & address ] Date: Dear [ enter organisation name ] I consider that I [ am being OR might be being OR have...