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A broad range of questions at various instances in the legal process can be stated and analysed in terms of formal decision theoretic models, with results conveyed in graphical terms, such as decision trees. However, the real-world decision problems encountered by the participants of a legal process, including judges, prosecutors and attorneys, present challenging features, such as multiple competing propositions, variable costs and uncertain process outcomes. This complicates decision theoretic computations and the use of diagrammatic devices such as decision trees which mainly provide static views of selected features of a given problem. Yet, the issues are inherently dynamic, and the complexity of strategic planning and assessing legal tactics – given a party’s standpoint – increases even further when considerations are extended to information provided by forensic science services. This is because introducing results of forensic examinations may impact on the probability of various trial outcomes and hence crucially impact on a party’s interests. In this paper, we analyse and discuss examples of decision problems at the interface of the law and forensic science using influence diagrams (i.e., Bayesian decision networks). Such models, hereafter called normative decision support structures, can be operationally implemented through commercially and academically available software systems. These normative decision support structures represent core computational models that can be integrated as part of decision and litigation support systems, to help the participants of a legal process answer a variety of questions regarding complex strategic decisions.

In this article, I review the legal and regulatory obstacles to the introduction of autonomous vehicles. I provide an overview of the key legislation which is relevant to the introduction of autonomous vehicles in England and Wales. I discuss the motor liability and insurance implications of the introduction of autonomous cars and the legal framework for the testing of autonomous vehicles on public roads. I conclude that there is likely to be significant volume of emerging legislation that car manufacturers and suppliers will be required to navigate as they launch increasingly autonomous driving systems. It is also likely that we will see an increase in the volume and complexity of litigation involving parties such as vehicle manufacturers, software companies, suppliers and mapping agencies.

Due to the increased complexity of new technologies and rapid technological developments, organisations often cannot independently keep up with the technological progress and engage in open innovation activities by setting up R&D partnerships. The allocation of patent ownership of jointly developed inventions is a difficult issue during the negotiations of such partnerships and can be extremely problematic due to the lack of regulation and harmonisation of patent legislation. This entails the need to consult a considerable number of legal systems that may be involved in large-scale international partnerships. The difficulties in allocating ownership can also arise due to non-legal reasons, such as diverging business interests. While many patent systems suggest co-ownership as a default regime, in practice organisations often avoid it due to the complexity related to further joint exploitation. The principle of freedom of contract allows organisations to establish their own applicable rules governing the allocation of ownership and exploitation of jointly developed inventions. Those rules provide more flexibility, but also imply some transaction costs in designing contracts. In this paper I examine why certain default rules are not “sticky” and whether it would be possible to establish a default rule accepted by the majority of the negotiating parties.

The Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons Who Are Blind, Visually Impaired, or Otherwise Print Disabled was signed on behalf of the European Union on 30 April 2014. On 13 September 2017, the European Union created a Directive (2017/1564) implementing its obligations under the Marrakesh Treaty. This Directive and corresponding Regulations came into force on 12 October 2018, which was the deadline provided to member states in implementing the Directive. On the 11th of September 2018, the United Kingdom made the Copyright and Related Rights (Marrakesh Treaty etc.) (Amendment) Regulations 2018. The UK’s Marrakesh Regulations came into force the day before the EU deadline, and the lack of in-depth critical debate around this piece of legislation as well as the EU having initiated legal proceedings against the UK underscores the necessity of this paper. This paper seeks to assess the UK’s Marrakesh Regulations in light of both the EU legislation as well as non-EU international obligations to which the UK will remain bound beyond Brexit. This paper will ask: Can it be said that the UK in implementing the Marrakesh Treaty is fulfilling its obligations owed both to the EU as well as its own citizens?

In this article I examine the experience of UK performers using collective management organisation PPL, a UK CMO established by record companies that also manages the rights of performers. I consider the effect of the regulatory framework on the provision of transparency to PPL’s performer members by drawing on primary sources including interviews with performers, PPL’s regulation and its public-facing material. I demonstrate that PPL marshals social, financial, legal and technological resources to prioritise the interests of record companies over those of performers. Considering that the current legal framework supports PPL’s actions, I discuss two alternatives: i) tightening regulation of individual CMOs whilst respecting their monopoly status, and ii) opening up the sector to competition. Despite difficulties faced by performers vis-à-vis PPL, I ultimately side with a large body of literature suggesting that performers are best off in an environment that supports CMO’s monopoly status. However, in an environment where regulators resist tightening regulation, performers are forced to support a competitive market for CMOs.

This article considers how trade marks have increased the ability of some firms to attract demand to their products through exploiting the transformation of the nature of consumption associated with the rise of the “consumer society” or “consumerism”. This has involved trends such as the rise of advertising and brand-based marketing, a greater emphasis on the presentation, design and other aesthetics of products, the marketing of “novelty” in various forms along with the rapid upgrading of products and the cultivation of brands as focal points for “values, attitudes and lifestyles” (“VALs”) marketing. As the legal platform for branding, trade mark law has enabled some firms to engage in these practices and attract demand to their products despite the space that may lie between them and consumers in the age of market globalisation. The paper considers the social value of this contribution and relates it to broader issues of business ethics and social responsibility.

Prior to digitalisation, the vertical structure of the market for recorded music could be described as a large number of creators (composers, lyricists and musicians) supplying creative expressions to a small number of larger record labels and publishers. These funded, produced, and marketed the resulting recorded music and subsequently sold these works to consumers through a fragmented retail sector. We argue that digitalisation has led to a new structure in which the retail segment has also become concentrated. Such a structure, with successive oligopolistic segments, can lead to higher consumer prices through double marginalisation. We further question whether a combination of disintermediation of the record labels function combined with ‘self-publishing’ by creators, will lead to the demise of powerful firms in the record label segment. If so, this would shift market power from the record label and publisher segment to the retail segment (and new intermediaries such as ISPs), rather than increasing the number of segments with market power.

EU policy makers are currently debating copyright reforms which aim to provide an ecosystem for the effective combatting of online infringements through the use of algorithms while fostering, amongst other things, cultural diversity. As the goals set by the EU Commission for the Digital Single Market Strategy will only be met if cultural diversity is adequately preserved and promoted, it is important to analyse how algorithms operate as copyright enforcement mechanisms. This article provides an empirical analytical framework on how cultural diversity can be measured in the context of copyright reform suited for the digital environment.

Developing a unitary patent system for Europe has been debated for over 50 years but never achieved. Nonetheless, a unitary patent package (UPP) for the current 25 EU Member States who wish to participate is now within grasp. However, as this system neared completion, the UK voted to leave the EU by referendum on 23 June 2016. The UK subsequently triggered Article 50 TEU on 29 March 2017 commencing its withdrawal from the EU (Brexit) in a process expected to take two years. Beyond the broader legal and political questions which Brexit gives rise to, it raises a key question for patent lawyers, namely, whether, and under what circumstances, the UK can continue to participate in the Unified Patent Court (UPCt) system and European Patent with Unitary Effect (EPUE) when it leaves the EU? In November 2016, despite the Brexit vote, the UK government confirmed its intention to join the Agreement on the Unified Patent Court (AUPC) — and subsequently ratified the AUPC on 26 April 2018. However, this article argues that in light of the complex relationship the UPCt has with the EU, including, the primacy of EU law in the operation of the UPCt and links between the UPCt and the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), joining the AUPC at this point is a curious move and one which is inconsistent with the UK’s previous more general statements on Brexit. In particular, in February 2017 Theresa May while outlining key facets of Brexit stated that the UK would not be subject to the jurisdiction of the CJEU once it leaves the EU. The article highlights the difficulties with ameliorating this position with the UK’s continued participation in the UPP post-Brexit. It argues that Brexit will likely sound the death knell for the UK’s membership of EPUE. Moreover, although UK participation in the UPCt seems more likely there remains considerable challenges to tackle in this respect. Furthermore, the question mark that exists over the UK’s participation in the UPCt and EPUE post-Brexit has attendant consequences for the general feasibility of the UPP. Accordingly, this article argues that instead of focusing on how to keep the UK within the currently devised system, Brexit provides further impetus to pause and consider whether the current proposal is still worthwhile given that it will create a more complex and fragmented European patent landscape at the supranational level. Instead, it echoes calls that a better solution would be to consider ways to modify the current system or redesign a new system to include not just the UK but also other European Patent Convention states which are not in the EU.

The principle of territoriality is one of the foundational principles of International Intellectual Property Law. This principle allows countries to design their intellectual property laws in a manner that facilitates the achievement of specific societal goals. However, while it is true that this principle has managed to survive the incorporation of intellectual property into the international trade law system (via the WTO’s TRIPS Agreement), some scholars have expressed concern that the incorporation of intellectual property into the international investment law system via investment agreements (such as bilateral investment treaties) constitutes a potential threat to the principle of territoriality in the international intellectual property system. This paper will investigate the tension between the principle of territoriality and the global harmonisation of intellectual property standards in the context of the current iteration of intellectual property as an asset in investment agreements. Specifically, it will critically examine how this tension was resolved in two recent investment arbitration disputes. The first is the dispute between Philip Morris and Uruguay which concerned the latter’s implementation of certain measures to curb the consumption of tobacco products in its country but which Philip Morris construed as an expropriation of its trademarks. The second is the dispute between Eli Lilly and Canada which concerned the interpretation of the utility requirement under Canadian patent law. These cases will be used to assess whether there is still scope for the preservation of the principle of territoriality within the investor-state dispute settlement system.