The Gazette 1993

GAZETTE

GEM N

JUNE 1993

Annual Review of Irish Law,

1991

R. Byrne and W. Binchy, [Dublin,

The Round Hall Press, 1993, 1 +

494 pp, IR£85.00, hardback.]

Lewis F. Powell, Jr, Associate

Justice, Supreme Court of the

United States, (retired), writing on

the late Professor Paul Freund of

Harvard University stated that when

Paul and he were at Harvard, the

university there could fairly boast

that its law faculty included the lions

of the legal academy: Felix

Frankfurter was teaching

Administrative Law, Thomas Reed

Powell instructing Constitutional

Law, and Roscoe Pound teaching

Jurisprudence. [106

Harvard Law

Review,

3 (1992)].

The time will come when lawyers

will look at our time and note that

Raymond Byrne and William Binchy

were among the great lions of the

Irish legal academy. Apart from their

other achievements and works, their

Annual Review of Irish Law,

will

have secured their reputation for

posterity. To some, this may appear

grandiose, but not to readers of the

Annual Review,

now in its fifth

volume.

For those who may not yet be

familiar with the

Annual Review,

the

present volume provides a review of

legal developments, judicial and

statutory, that occurred in 1991. The

law is considered under thirty-three

main headings with several sub-

headings. The main headings include

Administrative Law, Agriculture,

Commercial Law, Company Law,

Constitutional Law, Contract Law,

Company Law, European

Communities, Family Law, Labour

Law, Practice and Procedure, Safety

and Health and Torts.

Previous reviews have stated that the

Annual Review

is "a very thorough

guide" and "an invaluable aid" to

have all the relevant case law and

legislative developments for one year

so readily available in one volume.

As early as the first volume, this

writer described the achievement as

heralding the inauguration of a new

Irish institution. We have not been

disappointed. An investment in the

Annual Review

should be repaid

handsomely.

Dr. Eamonn G. Hall

The Law of Information

Technology in Europe 1992:

A comparison with the USA

Edited by A.P. Meijboom and C.

Prins. Published by Kluwer as part

of its Computer Law Series.

This book consists of a series of

chapters by expert EC authors on

the interaction between EC law

(competition, intellecutal property,

products liability, and

telecommunications) and

Information Technology (IT) in the

context of the completion of the

Single Market. The US authors

provide an overview of the

corresponding legal situation in the

USA.

The law of IT covers computer

hardware and software and

telecommunications.

The book is divided into five parts,

Part I provides an introduction to

EC law for those who are not

familiar with the way the EC

operates.

Part II highlights the effect of EC

competition law on distribution

agreements, transfers of technology,

and joint ventures in the computer

industry. The European experience is

not unsimilar to the effect of the

Sherman and Clayton Acts on the

American IT sector.

The most extensive coverage is given

to intellectual property protection in

Part III. Developments such as the

European Patent Convention and the

Community Patent Convention. The

effective protection of the look and

feel and sequence of software and

databases continues to cause

difficulties in Europe and America.

In particular the limits of copyright

protection in relation to the

interoperability of user interfaces.

Dr. Thomas Hoeran explains how

computer chip protection in Europe

was a response to the US

Semiconductor Chip Protection Act

1984 (SCPA) which introduced sui

generis protection for American

chips, and denied it to EC chip

makers in the absence of reciprocity.

Like the SCPA EC Directive

87/54/EEC incorporated elements of

patent, copyright and competitive

law.

In Chapter 10,

Erik C.

Nootenboom

discusses the current and future EC

initiatives in the field of Trade Mark

law which has limited importance for

the protection of IT products and

services. The following chapter

compares US Trademark law and

practice.

Part IV of the makes a novel

application of the EC Directive on

Products Liability to injuries caused

to consumers by IT products. This

includes a discussion on who should

bear the risk for software failures.

David Bender

explains how US

products liability differs from the

European model.

Finally the development of a

European telecommunications

network infrastructure which

includes the development of a pan-

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