AIPPIe-News
No.1
April 2008
April 2008
AIPPI General Secretariat |Toedistrasse 16 | CH-8027 Zurich
Tel. +41 44 280 58 80 | Fax +41 44 280 58 85
enews@aippi.org | www.aippi.org
President's Report
Ron Myrick (USA), President of AIPPI This inaugural edition of our e-News is the result of hard work by many people who deserve our thanks. I am especially grateful to the Editorial Advisory Committee, the Secretariat and the many authors who have volunteered to write for us.
We have made and are making a wealth of changes to the association based upon inputs from our members, our advisory committees and the Bureau. The guiding principle is to listen to our membership to learn what we must become in this 21st century, while retaining the best of what we have been in the 19th and 20th centuries.
This first edition of our e-News thus opens a new era for AIPPI. The communication that will be facilitated efficiently, broadly and frequently with our entire membership internationally will open doors previously closed by the cost and labour intensive nature of printed publications physically mailed to members.
We hope to facilitate communication between members of different National and Regional Groups so that the entire association can better stay up with what our various groups are doing that may be of mutual interest. We are using our website www.aippi.org effectively to transfer larger amounts of information in support of the eNews and will be redesigning the look and feel of the website to marry well to the e-News.
In the next six months, you will see more innovations and updates to our association, some of which are described in this edition, as the results of the hard work by so many during the last 18 months come to fruition. These changes are also thanks to the wonderful cooperation we had had in our continuing programme of visiting and learning from our National Groups. Most recently, we had excellent and informative meetings in South Africa and India. You will see articles about those meeting in this edition.
You will also see articles about our meetings recently with the new President of the EPO and our regional meeting in Mexico City where we have continued the model of leading in the development of thought and analysis about IP around the world. The vigorous efforts regarding our proposed Privilege Treaty continue and we have garnered growing support for it through the tireless efforts of our task force on the subject, with the active support and participation of 40+ national Groups.
The Statutes of the association are being strengthened as you already know. In this edition, the Chair of Q200 describes how the changes that will be formally considered during our Boston Congress will be fully described to all of you well before Boston to enable full understanding and a complete dialog. Not only are there proposals for improving the election of the President and Vice President but also many more advances in our governance may be included. For example, we are looking at ways to enhance our subscription fee structure to advance the possibilities for growth by members of corporations and firms without changing the basic nature of AIPPI as an association of individuals. I also hope that we can propose a statutory vehicle for increasing the overall cohesiveness of the association by dynamically adapting the entire association to changes that our broadest governing bodies, the Executive Committee and the General Assembly, believe serve the best interests of the entire association.
The planning of the Boston Congress just gets better and better with more substantive sessions than ever and innovations that will please. The entertaining and different opening ceremony will introduce these innovations and the closing Gala will be a world class event to remember.
This is an association moving rapidly to position itself to achieve in the 21st Century even more of the global IP leadership that it enjoyed over the more than 110 years of its mission. Our Membership Advisory Committee is looking forward to working with all of you and the Bureau in achieving that objective. Welcome to a new era for AIPPI.
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