Branding and Ballet - Ten Top Tips

Whenever possible I try to get the company's T-shirt when I watch them performing in a ballet. So far I have T-shirts from

• Ballet Black
• Ballet Cymru
• Rambert
• The Dutch National Ballet
• The Royal Ballet, and
• The Stuttgart Ballet.

I also have a ballet bag from the Bristol Russian Ballet School and I'be bought English National Ballet's My First Coppelia t-shirts for Vlad the Lad and my Huddersfield ballet teacher's younger daughter. It is a way of supporting those companies and one that I much prefer to the doling out of public money by the Arts Council of England. 

The reason I feel uncomfortable about it is that I can't really think of an answer to my fellow citizens who see opera and ballet as all right for those who like that sort of thing but it shouldn't be their brass that pays for it. Now don't get me wrong. I love opera, ballet and all the other performing arts. I am delighted that my beloved Northern Ballet was favoured in the Arts Council's latest round of investment in opera and ballet. But I am not sure that Arts Council funding is particularly fair to those who prefer their money to be spent in other ways and when I look across the Atlantic where just about every town of any size has its own company that is supported strongly by its local community (some of which such as the Sarasota Ballet seem to be rather good) I have to ask whether this form of subsidy is even good for the performing arts. The Arts Council was promoted by one of its first chairmen Lord Keynes (see "John Maynard Keynes and English Ballet" 3 March 2013). Like a lot of Lord Keynes's ideas that wilted under the scrutiny of Thatcherism in the 1980s direct funding for the performing arts may have to be reconsidered.

Even if the Arts Council can be justified the funds available to it for investment are unlikely to grow by much and there is also a limit to the amount of money that the hard pressed public can afford to pay for tickets or donations.  As I said in "Ballet as a Brand? How to bring More Money into Dance for Companies and Dancers" 13 March 2014 companies, theatres, dancers (at least principals) and possibly even schools and dancers will have to exploit their goodwill a little more in the way that sports stars and artists in the other performing arts have done. To that end I wrote three further articles to show how that could be done:

• "Protecting the Brand" 31 March 2014
• Branding and Ballet - Licensing the Brand 18 April 2014, and
• Branding and Ballet - Copyright and Rights in Performances 3 May 2014

This is a summary of the advice that I gave in those articles. It applies to everyone in dance - individual artists and teachers as well as institutions.

1. Register your business name and any logo as trade marks: You can do it yourself on-line for the UK from as little as £170 though I would advise you to last out a few hundred pounds more and get a trade mark or patent agent to do it for you. He or she will make a search to make sure there are no conflicting registrations, prepare a specification that covers all your needs, file it and correspond with the Intellectual Property Office or other registry until you have your grant. There are two advantages of registration, First it is easier to protect and license branded merchandise. Secondly, it trumps anything a cyber-squatter can say in a domain name dispute. If you do it yourself make sure you cover all the countries in which you want to perform or sell your merchandise and that your registration covers clothing, printed matter and anything else you can see yourself selling in the next five years.
2. Subscribe to a good watch service. A watch service scours the IPO and other patent office websites for applications that could conflict with your registrations and reports back to you if it finds any.  Most patent and trade mark agents can set up such a subscription for you though they tend to be on the pricey side. Leeds Business and IP Centre runs a good service. Call Ged or Stef on 0113 247 8266 for more info.
3. Keep an audit trail of all your artistic, choreographic, literary and musical works. As I said in "Branding and Ballet - Copyright and Rights in Performances" copyright and rights in performances are not registered rights. They come to being when a qualified person creates an original artistic, dramatic, literary or musical work or, in the case of dancers and musicians, takes part in live performances.  The best way of proving your title is by means of contemporaneous notes and logs with references back to the stave on which the choreology or music is recorded.
4. Review and keep under review all your licences and other agreements. This applies both to people who serve you such as your choreographers, dancers and musicians and also to those who want to take licences from you. Make sure these are drawn up professionally and that you enforce them.
5. Take out adequate insurance to cover claims by you and against you.   IP litigation is expensive and is usually excluded from most legal risk indemnity programs. There are some specialist companies that provide such a service and it is worth looking out for them (see my article "IP Insurance Five Years on" 23 Oct 2010 Inventors Club blog).
6. Be sure to talk to a lawyer first if you think someone has infringed your IPR. That is because some statutes such as the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and the Trade Marks Act 1994 provide a cause of action against those who threaten litigation without justification (see "If you think someone has infringed your patent talk to a lawyer first" 11 July 2014 Inventors Club biog).
7. Carry out periodic IP audits. You are creating new works all the time and also licensing in and out other peoples' work. Make sure that everything is covered.
8. If someone infringes your rights don't ignore it. There's an expression in the law that delay defeats equity. At the very least delay in enforcing your rights could prevent your getting an interim injunction. At the worst it could be seen as acquiescence.
9. Make others aware of your IP rights.  Use the copyright symbol (c) and the registered trade mark symbol to make the public aware of your rights. That way they can't use the defence of ignorance.
10. Get your audiences on your side. Folk who have paid a lot of money for their tickets are understandably annoyed when the first thing they hear is an order not to use cameras or mobile phones. But if you explain why they will co-operate with you even to the point of stopping their neighbours from surreptitiously photographing or taping your show.

This is the last of my articles on ballet and branding. It is my gift back to the artists and impresarios who have given me so much pleasure over the years. I hope that at least some of you will find my tips useful.

Branding and Ballet - Copyright and Rights in Performances

Theatre Royal Drury Lane 1821                                           Source Wikipedia

This is the fourth in my series of articles on ballet and branding which is my thank you to companies, theatres and dancers for a lifetime of pleasure watching their performances. The others are "Ballet as a Brand? How to bring More Money into Dance for Companies and Dancers" 13 March 2014, "Protecting the Brand" 31 March 2014 and "Branding and Ballet - Licensing the Brand" 18 April 2014. In this article I shall discuss two important intellectual property rights ("IPR") for companies, theatres and dancers: copyrights and rights in performances.

What is IP?
Intellectual property ("IP") is a portmanteau terms for the bundle of laws that protect investment in intellectual assets.  Intellectual assets are creations of the mind that give one business a competitive advantage over all others. Such assets can be a new invention, a blockbuster film or novel, the cachet that is given to luxury product and so on.  

Intellectual assets fall into four categories:

• Brands
• Design
• Technology, and
• Works of art and literature.

The laws that protect the investment in creating those assets in the UK include the Patents Act 1977, the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 ("CDPA") and the Trade Marks Act 1994. The rights that those laws confer, such as patents for inventions, copyrights in original works of art and literature and registered trade marks for signs that distinguish one business's goods or services from those of all others are types of IPR (intellectual property rights). 

The exercise of those rights can be very valuable for a business which is why we regard them as property.  As they protect creations of the mind or intellect we call them intellectual property.

Copyrights and Rights in Performances

The intellectual assets that copyrights and rights in performances protect are works of art and literature. 

Copyrights have existed in one form or another since the days of Queen Anne. The first copyright statute for this country is still referred to as The Statute of Anne. Copyrights prevent the unauthorized copyright, distribution, performance and other exploitation of works that are written, drawn or otherwise created in some permanent medium such as film or optical or magnetic memory. 

Rights in performances are much more recent. These protect the performances of actors, musicians, dancers and other performers from unauthorized broadcasting, filming or taping and other exploitation of their performances. The existence of those rights has only been possible since the development of sound and motion picture recording and transmission technologies. 

The CDPA

In the UK copyright and rights in performances are conferred by different parts of the CPDA.  Copyright is conferred by Part I of the Act and rights in performances by Part 2.  The CPDA came into force on the 1 Aug 1989 and has been amended many times since then. The Intellectual Property Office has helpfully compiled an up to date version of Parts 1 and 2 of the Act together with other relevant legislation.

International Agreements

The UK is party to a number of international agreements that require foreign governments to protect the intellectual assets of British businesses and individuals in their territories and the British government to protect the intellectual assets of foreigners here.  The agreement that provides reciprocal protection of works or art and literature is the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works ("Berne").  The agreement that provides reciprocal protection for performances is the Rome Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organizations ("Rome"). Berne and Rome have been supplemented by a number of other international agreements of which the most important are the WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty. One of the reasons why Parliament enacted and has revised the CPDA was to enable the UK to comply with those conventions and treaties.

Copyright Works

The CDPA protects the following types of work from unauthorized copying, publishing, performance and other distribution in the UK:

• Original artistic, dramatic, literary and musical works
• Broadcasts, films and sound recordings, and
• Typographical arrangements of publications.

That covers such works as the story, score, the choreology, broadcasts and HDTV transmissions and some of the art work such as scenery and fabric designs.  One of the many things that the Court of Appeal decided in Massine v De Basil[1936 - 1945] MCC 233, one of the few copyright cases relating to ballet, was that there is no such thing as copyright in a ballet. There are instead a bundle of copyrights in the works that make up a ballet such as an outline of the plot, the music, notation, artwork for the scenery, costumes and other works. Secondary copyrights are created in any videos that are made during class and rehearsals as well as in any sound recordings that may be made. Yet more copyrights are made in the notes, photos, compilation, editing and typographical arrangement of the programmes. 

Rights in Performances

Performers including dancers and those who have contracted with a dancer or other performer to broadcast, film or tape a performance such as the BBC, a film studio or a record company have the right to object to the broadcasting, filming or taping of a performance regardless of whether the performance takes place in a theatre, TV studio or film set.

Creating a Copyright?
There is no system of copyright registration in the UK though there is in some other countries. Copyrights come into being the moment a work in which copyright can subsist is created by a British citizen or resident or a citizen or resident of any other state that confers confers protection on the works of British citizens and residents within its territories pursuant to the Berne Convention or some other agreement with the UK government. Most countries of the world are party to Berne and the few that are not have entered other multi or bilateral agreements with the UK.

Copyright can subsist in any of the works listed above provided that it is not copied wholly from another work. Essentially copyright rewards the labour, skill and taste that has been expended on a work. Thus, a poet may write a poem which creates a literary copyright; an artist a drawing that creates an artistic copyright; and an editor may choose the poem and the drawing and combine them with other poems and drawings in an anthology which creates yet another literary copyright in the compilation.

Creating a Right in a Performance
Consent is required for broadcasting, filming or taping of a performance from the moment the dancer or other performer walks on stage to the final curtain call so long as the performance takes place in the UK or by a national of a country that is party to the Rome Convention or some agreement with the UK.

Who owns Copyright?
Usually the author (that is to say the person who makes the work) is the first owner of the copyright subsisting in the work but there are a number of exceptions. If the author is employed to create the work under a contract of employment or apprenticeship the author's employer becomes the first owner unless the employer and employee have agreed otherwise. Merely commissioning a work, however, does not usually confer copyright on the commissioner unless the circumstances suggest that that is what the parties had intended as happened in Massine v de Basil.  When commissioning a score, choreography or other work it is important for the parties to think about who is to own the work and what rights (if any) each of the parties has or should have in its exploitation.

Who owns a Right in a Performance?
In the first instance it is up to the dancer or other performer to consent to the broadcasting, filming, taping or other exploitation of his or performance.  In practice the terms upon which such consent is given have been negotiated by Equity on behalf of its members. Such terms are incorporated into individual performers' contracts of employment. Broadcasters, film and recording studios that have negotiated exclusive contracts to record a performance can also object to broadcasting, filming and taping of performances.

How to make Money from Copyrights and Rights in Performances
Copyrights and rights to make, distribute and otherwise exploit copies of recordings may be assigned or licensed for money or moneysworth.   How much will be paid by way of a royalty, licence fee or other payment will depend on supply and demand. The work of a well known artist, choreographer or composer will generally command a greater payment than that of a lesser known one.  Some copyright owners assign their rights to organizations known as "collecting societies" which collect payments on behalf of all their members and distribute them after deducting their expenses as individual dividends. BECS (British Equity Collecting Society) collects royalties for licensing performers' rights on behalf of their members.

Moral Rights
In addition to the rights mentioned above which are generally referred to as "economic rights" performers and some copyright owners have rights to be identified as performer or author and the right to object to derogatory treatment of their works that are known as "moral rights".  These subsist quite independently of the economic rights and cannot be assigned.

Enforcement
Violation of an IPR is known as "infringement".

Large scale deliberate infringement of copyright (known as "piracy") and rights in performances ("bootlegging") are offences that can be punished by up to 10 years imprisonment and an unlimited fine. Local authority trading standards officers have a statutory duty to investigate and prosecute such offences.

IPR owners can also sue infringers in the civil courts for injunctions (orders of the court to refrain from or stop infringements on pain of fine or imprisonment for disobedience), damages (compensation for past infringements) or an account of profits (disgorging any profits that have been made from infringements), surrender of infringing copies and their costs (legal expenses for bringing the action). In England and Wales most claims for IPR infringement (including small claims) are brought in the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court ("IPEC") or the Intellectual Property list of the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice.

Collecting societies also bring proceedings in the civil courts on behalf of their members.

Further Reading
The Intellectual Property Office has published a very useful guide entitled "Copyright, Essential Reading" which can be downloaded in pdf from its website. Equity also has a considerable volume of materials on performers' rights which is accessible to its members.

Should anyone require additional information he or she can call me during office hours on 020 7404 5252 or send me a message through my contact form, twitter, Facebook, G+, Linkedin or Xing.

Happy May bank holiday everybody.

Branding and Ballet - Licensing the Brand

In "Ballet as a Brand? How to bring More Money into Dance for Companies and Dancers" 13 March 2014 I argued that more could be done to raise funds and indeed dancers' incomes by harnessing the enormous goodwill enjoyed by companies, theatres and individual dancers. In "Protecting the Brand" 31 March 2014 I counselled companies, theatres and dancers to protect their goodwill by registering their names, logos or other signs as trade marks. In this article I discuss the legal instrument by which the goodwill is monetized. That is to say the licence.

Watch the Spelling
In the UK and most other English speaking countries the noun licence is spelt with a "c" and the very "to license" with an "s".  In the United States, however, both the noun and the verb are spelt with an "s". The distinction between the verb and the noun is a very convenient one but some people including, sadly, even a few lawyers find it confusing and get mixed up.

What is a Licence?
A licence is another word for permit or consent. A familiar example is a TV licence that allows us to watch television. Without such a licence it is unlawful to watch a live broadcast in the UK however it is transmitted. There are also licences that permit us to do something for which we would otherwise be sued like park a car on someone's land. The sort of licences that we are talking about are intellectual property ("IP") licences.

What is IP?
IP is the collective name for the bundle of rights that protect investment in intellectual assets. Intellectual assets are such things as books, goodwill, inventions, performances and software that have been made by creative or inventive people.  Examples of IP rights are patents for inventions, trade marks for the signs by which the public recognize a supplier or his or her products in the market place, copyright for literary and artistic works and rights in performances for the right to film, tape or broadcast an actor, dancer or musician's performance.

What is an IP Licence?
That is a licence to do an act such as sell a product or supply a service under a trade mark or film or broadcast a performance by a dancer that is restricted to the IP owner.  Without such a licence, such a person can be sued by the trade mark owner or dancer.  Licences can be oral or written and they can arise expressly or impliedly. However, most IP licences are in writing and drafted by specialist lawyers.

Types of Licence
Licences can be exclusive, non-exclusive or sole.

Exclusive licences are those in which an IP owner ("the licensor") transfers all his or her rights in the IP including the right to prevent others from exploiting the IP to the person to whom those rights are granted ("the licensee") with the result that the licensee can prevent anyone in the world including the licensor  from exercising those rights. Many agreements to make and sell goods bearing a company's name, logo or coat of arms in a specified location are exclusive licences.

Non-exclusive licences are those in which more than one licensee (and, of course, the licensor) can exercise the rights that are granted but only the licensor can prevent third parties from exercising the rights. Software is usually supplied to end-users under a non-exclusive licence known as a "EULA" (end user's licence agreement").

Sole licences are non-exclusive licences in which the licensor agrees to grant only one licence.

Licensing your IP
Before you enter negotiations for a licence it is a good idea to read the Intellectual Property Office ("IPO")'s booklet on Licensing IP in the IP Health Check series. The IPO has also published a Skeleton Licence or check list of the terms commonly found in licence agreements. The provisions to which you should give particular attention are as follows:

• What exactly are you licensing and how is the licence to be exercised? For instance, is this to be a non-exclusive licence to print you logo or image on t-shirts and sell those t-shirts in the UK. Do you want your licensee to be able to make other products or export them? If so, how will that affect your agreements with licensees elsewhere? Also, are those foreign licensees allowed to export their goods here in competition with you or your British licensee?
• Quality Control. You have put a lot of effort into building up a national and international reputation and you don't want it trashed or trivialized. Any goods bearing your name or logo must be made of good quality materials with high standards of workmanship and they must be packaged attractively. But how do you make sure that is done? And what are the consequences if it isn't?
• Defending and Enforcing the IP? Which party is responsible for the legal fees if a third party infringed the IP or challenges its validity. Legal fees can mount quickly in litigation, particularly in the UK.
• How are you to be paid? When? Where? In what currency? How can you be sure that the right amount is paid? Do you have the right to audit your licensee's accounts? What happens if he or she does not pay you on time?
• What happens if your licensee under-performs? Do you have the right to appoint another licensee or even terminate the licence?
• What happens if your licensee becomes insolvent? Do you really want to be dealing with a liquidator or the licensee's creditors?
• There are bound to be disputes and differences but how are they to be resolved and under which legal system?

Professional Advice

On all those matters you will need professional advice not just from lawyers but also accountants and maybe patent or trade mark attorneys. The Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales has a searchable database of their member firms by geography and specialization. So, too, does the Law Society for solicitors, the Institute of Trade Mark Attorneys and the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys. You can now access the Bar direct and you can consult the Intellectual Property Bar Association for a barrister specializing in IP. The corresponding association for solicitors is the Intellectual Property Lawyers Association.

Further Information
As I said in my previous article I am making this information available to the ballet world pro bono as a thank you for all the pleasure dancers, companies, theatres and schools have given me throughout my life.  I will answer any questions that anyone has by phone or email. My number is 020 7404 5252 and you can contact me through my contact form, twitter, Linkedin, G+. Facebook or Xing.

Protecting the Brand

The United Kingdom Intellectual Property Office

In "Ballet as a Brand? How to bring More Money into Dance for Companies and Dancers" 13 March 2014 I argued that if dancers are adequately to be paid and companies and theatres properly to be funded they should learn from sport and indeed the other performing arts and tap the potentially enormous sums that could be released from harnessing their goodwill. In order to do that they need to protect that goodwill. The best way of doing that is by registering the names, logos and other signs under which they are recognized by their audiences as trade marks. As I said in my previous article I made a search of the UK Intellectual Property Office trade mark database and was surprised to find how few dancers or even ballet companies and theatres had taken that step.

What is a Trade Mark?
The UK Intellectual Property Office defines a trade mark as

"a sign which can distinguish your goods and services from those of your competitors ........... It can be for example words, logos or a combination of both."

It can be an actual name like "W H Smith", an invented name like "Microsoft" or indeed a logo such as the three red arrows against a black background in the shape of a triangle of the National Westminster Bank.  It can be just about anything that can be the recorded on paper or other medium. In ballet English National Ballet's white stripe against a red background and the words ENGLISH NATIONAL BALLET are good examples.

Protection of a Mark without Registration
You can have a trade mark whether you register it or not and there is a limited degree of legal protection for trade marks in the UK and many other countries under a doctrine that we call "passing off" and other countries "unfair competition" ("concurrence déloyale"). In England and Wales (and similarly in Scotland, Northern Ireland and most other English speaking countries) this doctrine has been developed by the judges in a series of decisions over many years. Essentially, it means that you cannot offer your goods or services under a name, logo or other sign that is the same as or similar to that of another trader. If you do, even inadvertently, that trader can sue you for an injunction (order by a judge to do or refrain from doing something upon threat of punishment if you disobey), damages (compensation) and other remedies. To win such an action the complainant must show that he or she is recognized in the market by his name or other sign, that you have misled his or her customers or potential customers by using a similar sign and that he or she has suffered as a result.

Trade Mark Registration
The trouble with passing off is that it takes a lot of time and costs a lot of money to prove those three things. Moreover the doctrine will not help a new or very small business that has not yet established itself in the market. To avoid those difficulties the UK and most other countries provide a service by which businesses can register their names, logos or other signs and the goods or services for which they use or intend to use those signs with a national or supra-national registry. The registry for the United Kingdom is part of the Intellectual Property Office in Newport (also the home town of Ballet Cymru) but businesses can if they so wish register their mark for the whole of the European Union at the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market ("OHIM") in Spain. By registering a mark the registered you can prevent anyone else from using the same mark in relation to the same goods or services, the same or similar mark in relation to the same or similar goods or services where by reason of the similarity there is a likelihood of confusion including association with yourself. Registration avoids the need to prove reputation, misrepresentation and damage as is required for an action for passing off.

Why bother to register?
If you have a trade mark you have something to license. A registered trade mark is much more manageable, tangible and substantial than a right merely to sue for passing off. Registration makes it much easier to negotiate deals with major clothing, stationery, toys and games, food and drink and other manufacturers and distributors of those products and thus gain royalties on sales of branded products as a result of such deals. Registration also makes it easier to control the quality of such products because you can insert conditions on materials and workmanship into the contract. A trade mark registration will make it easier to prevent cyber-squatters from registering domain names that incorporate your mark under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy or Nominet Dispute Resolution Service. If you do have to go to court to prevent others from supplying goods or services that incorporates your mark it is considerably easier and cheaper to do that if you have registered your mark.

What Sort of Sign can I register?
The first thing you need is a trade mark that is capable of registration. S.1 (1) of the Trade Marks Act 1994 defines a "trade mark" as

"any sign capable of being represented graphically which is capable of distinguishing goods or services of one undertaking from those of other undertakings."

Although this is a British statute it implements an EU directive which has to comply with a number of international agreements so there are broadly similar requirements at OHIM and in most other countries. The sign has to be capable of distinguishing your goods or services from those of others. Clearly you can't register "ballet" or "dance" simpliciter because those are activities that everyone in the dance world perform but you can usually register the name of a nation, town or other region for a ballet company associated with that town. Similarly there are some national emblems that you need permission to use. Her Majesty allows the Royal Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet to use the royal coat of arms but nobody else has that right.

Secondly, you can't register a trade mark that someone else already uses or is about to use for the same or similar goods or services. As there are many registered marks some of which you are unlikely to have heard of it is always a good idea to carry out a search of prior registrations and applications. You can do some of that work yourself but it is always better to commission a search by a specialist librarian or other professional.

As unregistered marks do not show up on a search it is also sensible to scour the internet and specialist magazines and publications to see whether anyone else is using the same or similar sign as an unregistered mark.

How to register your Mark
As there is a lot of help on the "Applying for a trade mark page" on the Intellectual Property Office website I won't go into too much detail here. You will find all the information you need on the articles linked to that page. There are a few extra points that I would stress. The first is that although there is nothing to prevent you from applying for a mark yourself and plenty of people do it is probably more cost effective and certainly safer to instruct a trade mark agent (also known as "trade mark attorneys"). They will carry out the necessary searches, draft the application in the correct way, deal with queries from the examiners and generally shepherd your application through to grant. They will charge only a few hundred pound extra for their services. Trade Mark agents (like patent agents) and regulated by the Intellectual Property Regulation Board ("IPReg") so if you have a problem with your agent IPReg will investigate it and if necessary correct it. If you do not know any agents you can find one through IPReg's "Find an attorney" page. Secondly, you must be sure that you will use the mark in respect of the goods or services for which you register it within 5 years or you could lose it. Thirdly, there are a lot of sharks who prey on unrepresented applicants demanding money for listing and other services that you don't need and often never get. Be on your guard. The Intellectual Property Office gives loads of warnings about those practices but it is amazing how many businesses fall for this trick.

How much does it cost?
It depends on how many goods or service you want to register, whether you use an agent, what extras you need and whether your application is opposed. Goods and services are grouped in classes and you can register your mark in any number of them. The basic cost for a UK mark is £170 which includes one class and £50 for each additional class. Agents usually charge a few hundred pounds for preparing and filing the application.  They would probably advise you to commission a search which will be another £100. If your application is opposed you will have to spend a lot of money on legal representation if you want to fight though you may get some of that back. Once you get your mark I would recommend your subscribing to a watch service which looks our for applications that are similar to your registration so you can challenge it in good time. Unless you have plenty of money I would also advise you to take out IP litigation insurance so that you can afford to take an infringer to court.

Further Information
I am making this information available to the ballet world pro bono as a thank you for all the pleasure dancers, companies, theatres and schools have given me throughout my life. I have offered to give a free half day seminar on IP relating to dance to Middlesex University which has a very successful dance programme in its performing arts department. I have already lectured on IP in the law school and I hold an IP clinic there once a month. If my offer is accepted I will ask for the University to admit dancers, administrators and others to the seminar free of charge. In the meantime I will answer any questions that anyone has by phone or email. My number is 020 7404 5252 and you can contact me through my contact form, twitter, Linkedin, G+. Facebook or Xing.