It’s Intellectual Property Rights week. Every last week of October has been named Intellectual Property Rights week by Presidential Proclamation No. 79.

Contrary to what most people think, intellectual property is more than just about battling pirated software and fake designer bags. It covers any creation of the mind—copyrights, trademarks or brands, patents, industrial designs, and undisclosed information. So that includes written works, audio visual creations, music, inventions, and distinctive marks, among others.

Have you protected your trademark already? How about copyrighting that catchy jingle or that unique product design? Think of them as your assets–and they are, intangible and valuable–that need protection. As we can see, they’re fairly easy to copy. Safeguarding IP assets is thus vital to ensure that artists, inventors, and innovators benefit from their creations.

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High school and college students no longer have to travel for hours to log on to the Internet, as the Sogod Community e-Center has become a center for e-learning in the community.

Public school teachers in Sogod, Cebu, introduce new teaching methods to facilitate easy learning. They frequent the Sogod Community e-Center to do research on teaching aides.

Before, teachers in the sleepy town of Sogod had to travel for two hours to access the Internet in Cebu City.  “I always go to Cebu City to research on things I need for teaching,” relates Vivien Coming, a single mother and a pre-school teacher in her mid-20s.

On the Internet, Vivien says that it is easy to find teaching aids, educational games, and stories that she shares with co-teachers and students.  So, the long road trip was a sacrifice that she willingly endured because she saw the value of the Internet to her line of work as an educator.
 
So when she learned that a community e-Center had been set up in Sogod, she thought that it was a “gift from heaven.”

“We are very happy to have a community e-Center here in Sogod. It makes research so much easier, and I no longer have to incur huge travel costs,” Vivien said.

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THE HOLIDAY season is already here in the Philippines, where we celebrate as early as the –ber months kick in. If you’re in retail, now’s the time to put up your Christmas window display if you haven’t done so already.

According to interior designer Ellaine Estrella-Elevado, the window display is very important especially for retail stores. “It attracts people to go inside the store and check out what they are offering or selling for the season. And for the holiday season, having Christmas decors in a store not only enhances people’s feelings of Christmas; subconsciously, it puts them in the Christmas spirit of giving or shopping,” she says.

The window display is thus a marketing tool.
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IT IS disheartening to hear and read about families losing homes in the U.S., companies being denied access to credit, and retirement funds losing in value.

But here in the Philippines, it is not so bad. At TriNoMa mall last Friday, people milled about, going in and out of stores and lugging shopping bags with them. Agents for credit cards were still handing out application forms in the mall. Several other malls in Metro Manila were also on sale this past weekend and people trooped to shop at a discount there and at village bazaars.

As JP Morgan said, the Philippines may weather the financial crisis even if it has significant exposure to an emerging global recession. This is because of internal buffers built in the system. Indeed as the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas has assured the public, the banking system is adequately capitalized.

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Photo courtesy of Dylac

By Mark Ruiz

The humble sari-sari store is the smallest kind of store in the Philippines, but it can also be one of the most powerful.

It’s normally started by a simple Nanay from a humble background who wants to augment the family income. After all, the sari-sari store is a relatively simple business to start. It’s home-based, which means that there’s no rent nor major construction expenses. In most cases, it’s literally a hole in the wall.

All the Nanay needs to get started is a little capital–just a couple of thousand pesos will be enough to buy the initial goods. These items are then sold with a little margin, more inventory is bought, these in turn are sold, and so on and so forth. The virtuous cycle of sari-sari store retailing has begun.
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