6 July 2015
A group of us meet with an ex-MP, who explains about how Parliament works so that we can understand how to extend our influence. Basically, it works like this. MPs are very busy. They are not going to turn up to anything you organise. They are not going to answer your letters or return your calls. They are not going to be remotely interested in IP unless it threatens to destabilise the entire UK economy, and even then they will probably wait for instructions from Angela Merkel. But there is an exception to this. If you can find a local connection, an MP will turn up to be photographed shaking hands with his or her constituents. So all we have to do is find some photogenic voters who have had something to do with IP (other than downloading pirated movies), and invite MPs to come and meet them, and make sure our Chief Shouty Person Mr Lampert is there with his camera and the Daily Mail on speed-dial. And we use this opportunity to tell Daily Mail readers throughout the UK how outraged we are by the EPO’s stance on added subject matter.
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4 July 2015
The weekend is when you finish the things you started during the week but left hanging because of all the pesky interruptions. It is also a time to move everything on your to-do list from last week to next week, and assure yourself that it wasn’t really urgent anyway. So I am at my computer replying to emails and sending some of my own. They are about all sorts of things, from IP insurance to diversity, regulation to international liaison. It is my own fault. Last year I rather stupidly said yes to everything. Yes I’ll do that for you. Yes I’ll set up a task force. Yes I’ll come to your meeting. Yes I’ll make a speech. Yes I’ll chair that committee. Yes I’ll support that project. Yes I’ll write a letter/agenda/report/proposal. Yes I’ll be your friend. Yes I’ll have another gin and tonic. Along with this, even more stupidly, came: Yes here’s my email address; contact me any time you like. Yes I’ll sort out your problem. Yes I’ll make sure people do stuff we haven’t been able to make them do for years. Yes a double would be nice; thank you. And underlying it all, of course, is: Yes I have absolutely no idea what I’m talking about. 2 July 2015
The IPO have organised a conference on IP insurance. I take this as an indication of their boundless optimism. Another manifestation of their optimism is that when they found a gap in the agenda and the magician cancelled, they asked me to come and make one of my famous speeches in which I say very little but sound enthusiastic about it. I have just about managed to wash off the Battle of the Bands wrist stamp. The gin and tonics are harder to get rid of. Mr Lampert is at the conference and he is laughing at me because of my incredibly not dignified dancing last night. Still, I manage to get through my speech, and I only forget a couple of my lines. Sadly, they were the two lines that the IPO had absolutely asked me to mention. They have to make me part of a panel discussion later in the morning, just so I have another chance to remember to say the important lines. They make sure to ask me a question that I cannot fail to answer with the necessary pieces of information. It is touch and go. |
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