TODAY (P.41) carried an advertisement by IPOS on the IP career seminar held on the 30th May 2008, Friday. The seminar will talk about the challenging IP professions and opportunities such as being a Technology Transfer Manager, IP Manager, IP Lawyer and IP Administrator/ Para-legal. Information on IP professional development and certification programmes will also be available. The venue for the seminar is at IPOS, Promise Seminar room and admission is free-of-charge.
The Straits Times(p.1-2) featured an article on the Nanyang Technological University's Technopreneurship Innovation Programme (Tip) - a one-year, full-time, master's-level programme. The course will cover on how to protect their inventions with patents, how to position these innovations with a business model, how to write business and capital-raising plans, how to market the product and how to make it through the first five to seven bruising years of the business. The competition to get into the program is quite tough as this year alone, there were 400 applicants with only 80 successfully getting into the course.
ZDNet Asia Wed. reported that music retailers have been moving away from enforcing DRM (digital rights management) restrictions on music downloads.
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The New Paper (p.10) reported that Mr Ronald Langford, 68, the man behind Singapore-based Vuestar Technologies, maintains that his idea - "method of locating websites using visual images" - and his companies' claims that the techonology is patented, are valid. He claimed that he came up with the idea in 2000, before Internet bandwidth allowed for images and other multimedia to be used extensively, and added that because broadband Internet was still in its infancy at the time, hyperlinking from images to video, audio and other features could not be supported. The company is currently sending out invoices to websites with a predominantly Singaporean audience, which include several overseas websites. Netizens are calling for those who received invoices to ignore them.
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MYPAPER (p.A11) reported that Barry Gitarts, a key member of the online music piracy group Apocalypse Production Crew(APC) has been convicted of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infrigement. He faces up to five years in prison, a US$250,000($340,225) fine and three years probation at sentencing.
The Straits Times (p.H5) reported that a Singapore firm, VueStar Technologies, has threatened to sue websites that use pictures or graphics to link to another page, claiming it owns the patent for a technology used by millions around the world. The firm has sent 'invoices' to local website operators asking for thousands of dollars in licensing fees.
The company, which said 'virtually all websites' are infringing on its patent, is also planning to take on giants like Microsoft and Google, but intellectual property experts have some doubts that VueStar can actually enforce its claims. The company said it has been awarded a patent here and in several other countries, including Australia, New Zealand and the United States, for the method of 'locating Web pages by utilising visual images'.
VueStar managing director Paul Smith said if sites want to keep using images as links, they will have to pay his company - located in a single-unit office at The Adelphi off Coleman Street - between '$200' and 'millions' annually.
The New Paper (p.11) carried a similar report.
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Time (p.97-100, May 12) featured a commentary on how the music industry is racing to re-invent itself as the digital age renders its old business model obsolete. The article noted that rising sales of digital music can't keep pace with the fall in sales of CDs and revenue from record companies have tumbled roughly 6 per cent in 2007. To the crucial teenage market, paying for music is as outdated as picking up a newspaper. The article also said that innovation such as accessing bands' concert tickets through social networking sites, and allowing cellphone users months of free access to songs, could help to strangle music piracy.
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Lianhe Zaobao (P4) reported that Innovative Nano Systems, a local company, has invented the world's smallest and thinnest camera lens which is smaller than a 5 cents Singapore coin and has optical zoom and auto focus function.
The Straits Times (H P4) reported that StarHub is blocking popular BitTorrent, a software program that allows netizens to share movies and other large digital files.
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Business Times online reported that A*Star's Insitute of Materials Research and Engineering (IMRE) has patented a new technology for a film that has the potential to jump-start the plastic electronics industry in Singapore. Some possible end products include flexible solar panels, electronic paper and curvy display screens. According to Nanomarkets LLC, the global plastic electronics industry is projected to grow to a market size of more than US$23 billion in the next 5 years.
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The Straits Times (p.H24) reported that the percentage of computers in Singapore running illegal software fell from 39 per cent to 37 per cent. A study on piracy rates by Business Software Alliance also should that almost forty per cent of PCs in Singapore are running bootleg copies of Microsoft Office of Grand Theft Auto. Financial losses by software industry as a result of piracy grew by 27 per cent to US$160m.
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ST (p.H8) reported that a maid agency was using the Red Cross emblem on signs advertising training of maids in the care of babies and the elderly. The Singapore Red Cross has sent letter urging the company to stop using the emblem. The Ministry of Health is also ordering that the sign be removed from ambulances and clinics as it has not given them permission to use the sign. Under the Geneva Conventions Act, anyone found abusing the symbol can be fined up to $10,000 and jailed for six months.