Post by account_disabled on Mar 9, 2024 4:08:10 GMT
Caroline BERUBE It is not one entity or one part of the government that must deal with it, this should be done cohesively. In Singapore, there are ACRA (The Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority) and IPOS (The Intellectual Property Office of Singapore), one for the companies, and the other for IP and they are working together to create a joint framework. But, again, this is about Singapore, however, if we talk about data across the world, it is interesting how to deal with it. Samuel LEE: In terms of the law, it is behind the times. As a US-licensed attorney, I can say that US law is behind the times in terms of data protection and privacy. Certain states within the US have separate privacy laws which are stronger than the national standard, but generally, the US is behind. The GDPR is better in terms of data privacy. Korea has stronger data privacy protection with the Korean Personal Information Protection Act on the level of GDPR. Finally, in Korea, the Copyright Act has a database protection portion in it where it is protected for 5 years, and you need significant effort to renew (update) the database to extend it for another 5 years. In essence, other countries (including the EU) are reevaluating their laws to come up to speed. Because of the speed with which the digital economy is changing, especially after generative AI has made such a huge hit, the governments are being reactive with the laws right now, they are playing catch up.
Caroline BERUBE This is what we encounter in China. The data protection laws are new, 18 months old, now the question is how it is going to be enforced. There are very few court cases on this in China right now. Even if lawyers decide how it is going to work and advise clients, courts and governments can have a different opinion. Thus, although the law is there, enforcement is very new, and we do not know in which direction the government and courts will go. Once they do it, the law will probably need to be amended again, because the digital economy is moving fast, especially post-COVID. During COVID so many things were USA Phone Number disrupted, and such industries as e-commerce, subscriptions, and electronic signature have been changing at a rapid pace because of COVID, and it may not have been so fast without COVID. Companies were forced to be innovative to carry on business. Samuel LEE: One thing that everyone might be interested in – in the trademark space there have been certain classes modified and upgraded to include virtual goods and cover virtual transactions. You file the trademark application, and then you have to identify the goods classes. There has been a recent litigation filed by Hermes as there was an NFT of one of their famous bags that was sold.
Fortunately, they have updated their trademark registration to include virtual goods, and it included these necessary classes (such as class nos. and including blockchain). Dr Nicola SEARLE: Quick comment on NFTs, it caused a bit of a problem for trademark owners and brands. It will be interesting to see what happens next as the market has self-corrected in some ways. If we have other areas like the digital economy and data develop, will we have new bubbles such as AI-generated content and IP-related issues? With NFTs it was such an interesting combination of IP and creativity, and where consumers did not understand at all what they were buying. A lot of opportunities have died with the market. Samuel LEE: Unfortunately, there was a combination of buyers not understanding what they were getting and sellers who were not completely honest about what they were selling. These rights were written in the attached contracts for these NFTs, and these contracts were using language that was not exact. I must say that bubble has burst because the metaverse has not taken off as fast and greatly as everyone was thinking it would. It was expected that with COVID everyone would go online and live in the virtual worlds instead of experiencing life. When the metaverse becomes as developed as the internet is right now, where what you do right now on the internet you are going to do things in the metaverse – designing, meeting people, even financial transactions.
Caroline BERUBE This is what we encounter in China. The data protection laws are new, 18 months old, now the question is how it is going to be enforced. There are very few court cases on this in China right now. Even if lawyers decide how it is going to work and advise clients, courts and governments can have a different opinion. Thus, although the law is there, enforcement is very new, and we do not know in which direction the government and courts will go. Once they do it, the law will probably need to be amended again, because the digital economy is moving fast, especially post-COVID. During COVID so many things were USA Phone Number disrupted, and such industries as e-commerce, subscriptions, and electronic signature have been changing at a rapid pace because of COVID, and it may not have been so fast without COVID. Companies were forced to be innovative to carry on business. Samuel LEE: One thing that everyone might be interested in – in the trademark space there have been certain classes modified and upgraded to include virtual goods and cover virtual transactions. You file the trademark application, and then you have to identify the goods classes. There has been a recent litigation filed by Hermes as there was an NFT of one of their famous bags that was sold.
Fortunately, they have updated their trademark registration to include virtual goods, and it included these necessary classes (such as class nos. and including blockchain). Dr Nicola SEARLE: Quick comment on NFTs, it caused a bit of a problem for trademark owners and brands. It will be interesting to see what happens next as the market has self-corrected in some ways. If we have other areas like the digital economy and data develop, will we have new bubbles such as AI-generated content and IP-related issues? With NFTs it was such an interesting combination of IP and creativity, and where consumers did not understand at all what they were buying. A lot of opportunities have died with the market. Samuel LEE: Unfortunately, there was a combination of buyers not understanding what they were getting and sellers who were not completely honest about what they were selling. These rights were written in the attached contracts for these NFTs, and these contracts were using language that was not exact. I must say that bubble has burst because the metaverse has not taken off as fast and greatly as everyone was thinking it would. It was expected that with COVID everyone would go online and live in the virtual worlds instead of experiencing life. When the metaverse becomes as developed as the internet is right now, where what you do right now on the internet you are going to do things in the metaverse – designing, meeting people, even financial transactions.