CIPIL Intellectual Property Seminar Series 2011-12: Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose: Why the patent disputes of the Industrial Revolution shed light on the patent disputes of the Digital Age

Speaker: Dr Helen Gubby (Adjunct Professor, Rotterdam School of Management and the School of Law, Erasmus University)

Room G24, Faculty of Law

Helen Gubby’s background is in law and history. She studied in England and was called to the Bar in 1978. Since 1980 she has worked in the Netherlands, as a legal translator and editor, lawyer, lecturer and academic. She has a master’s degree in history from the University of Leiden and a Ph.D. in law from the Erasmus School of Law. Her doctoral research traces the development of a legal paradigm for patents during the Industrial Revolution in England (1750s-1830s).

Her current research, carried out for the Rotterdam School of Management, examines the patent strategy of managers of small and medium sized companies. Helen Gubby’s publications reflect her background. She has written several textbooks on English legal terminology (English legal terminology: legal concepts in language (2011), which is now in its third edition, and Practical legal English: legal terminology (2006), the second edition will appear in 2012), co-authored a book on computers and law (Sentencing by computer: an experiment, Oslo, Universitetsforlaget, 1982), a number of articles on this subject (including Legal decision making by computer: an experiment in sentencing, Computer/Law Journal, 1983) and more recently on patents (Taking patents seriously, International Law and Trade, and International Journal of Intellectual Property Management, vol. 2, 2007). Her book Developing a legal paradigm for patents will be published in January 2012.