Whew… Big week last week for events about IP. Sunday was World Intellectual Property Day
(did you sign on to the Statement of
Principles yet?). Monday and Tuesday
brought the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s transatlantic collaboration event where
representatives from governments and various industries discussed their efforts
to fight counterfeiting and piracy, and an assortment of campaigns around the
world to communicate the value of IP.
One topic of discussion was how to deal
with digital natives and a generation of
people for whom Internet piracy—particularly of music, movies, and games—has
always been a reality with little consequences. Various stakeholders have
campaigns aimed at counterfeiting and piracy awareness, and how such activities
affect “the little guy” rather than the Mr. Big Shot Movie Star Earning $20M
Per Flick—but does that messaging hit home with the 14-year-old who doesn’t
have a job and just knows he can find a place to download “Wolverine” for
free? The USPTO showed off some of their
interesting InventNow educational
campaign, created in conjunction with the Ad Council and the National Inventors
Hall of Fame, to educate kids early on the process of coming up with cool ideas
and then protecting them. I really like this idea of getting to ‘em early with
education on innovation and IP, but I wonder if it means that there’s a whole
segment of young people who we’re going to write off as hopeless in this regard—what tactic or
messaging would really get through to someone who is currently in the
12-24(ish) range?
Turning to another aspect of IP, our own Jonathan Zuck was
on a panel at the Institute for Policy Innovation’s event on the role of
intellectual property in the global economic recovery. He, along with Innovators Network’s Andre
Carter, provided a more practical view of how IP can help entrepreneurs during
difficult financial times, and also how difficult financial times can help IP.
As Jonathan put it in his opening statement, “I love a good recession.” (Yes,
you read that right.) He went on to flip
the event’s main question into, “What is the role of an economic downturn on
IP?” and explained that policymakers often focus on frivolous things during
times of prosperity, but recessions represent an opportunity to focus on
getting things right in the economy. The
same holds true for businesses: without luxuries like expansion, and paying
bills on time, and having funding readily available to develop the Next Big
Thing, recessions tend to make businesses on what’s really at their core—in
this case, IP. (Andre wrote a little bit about that here.)