Interns – Anahida Bhardwaj, Sahaana Chhabria, and Yashwardhan Singh (Final Year Interns); and Ranjini Ghosh (Pre-Final Year Intern) have successfully completed their General IP Internship at ALG. At the end of their internship, they obliged us with their thoughts and ideas during a Sharing of Reflections (SoR) session. Their presence enriched the firm while they interned here. We wish them all the best in their future endeavours.

During last week’s Practice Work Shop (PWS) Session, Sneha Tandon, Associate, lead a discussion on whether higher education or practical experience is a better aid to professional success as an IP practitioner. The session saw active discussion on prospects for an LLM degree holder, cost-benefit analysis of pursing higher education in IP, and whether the stereotype that LLM is best suited for career in academia still holds good.

A ‘Legal Issues Seminar’ (LIS) was conducted by Shreya Kunwar, Trainee Associate, on issues such as related to IP in Literary Works, IP in Comics & Computer Programs.

The seminar particularly touched upon whether movie titles are protectible under copyright law in India, whether there are substantial IP laws in place for protection of comics and whether Graphical User Interface (GUI) should be protected under the Copyright Act or the Designs Act in India. The areas covered in the seminar garnered a lot of interest and concluded with an engaging discussion on the need to have a settled position in India with respect to the protection of Graphical User Interface.

The presentation can be accessed here.

During this week’s Practice Work Shop (PWS) Session, Sunidhi Bansal, Associate, lead an interesting discussion on whether the IP regime in India needs to change to accommodate the evolution of a new kind of social media influencer, viz. the virtual influencer. The session saw active discussion on who or what constitutes a virtual influencer, the ensuing liability concerns, and IP rights in content created by such influencers.