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e-stuff: why knowledge is all

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There are more ways of considering digital property than there are commentators, as Roderick Ramage explains

When you put a coin in a newsvendor’s hand and take the proffered paper, you create a contract, the subject matter of which is a tangible object, a newspaper. The newspaper itself contains intangible property in the form of reports, articles, pictures, cartoons etc, the copyright in which belongs to the newspaper publisher or its contributors, which you may read but which you are not entitled to copy except for fair use or dealing. Similarly, if you buy a ticket to enter a concert hall or a motor car, you acquire a tangible object and with it some benefits in respect of intangible property. Broadly speaking, all that has changed over the millennia is the medium through which intangible property is delivered.

Knowing what you have

Tangible property consists mainly of computers (including desk- and laptops, tablets and smartphones) mobiles, 3D printers, memory devices, modems, power sources (transformers), cabling etc.

Intangible property includes almost

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Thackray Williams—Lucy Zhu

Thackray Williams—Lucy Zhu

Dual-qualified partner joins as head of commercial property department

Morgan Lewis—David A. McManus

Morgan Lewis—David A. McManus

Firm announces appointment of next chair

Burges Salmon—Rebecca Wilsker

Burges Salmon—Rebecca Wilsker

Director joins corporate team from the US

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When it comes to free legal advice, demand massively outweighs supply. 'Millions of people are excluded from access to justice as they don’t have anywhere to turn for free advice—or don’t know that they can ask for help,' Bhavini Bhatt, development director at the Access to Justice Foundation, writes in this week's NLJ
When an ex-couple is deciding who gets what in the divorce or civil partnership dissolution, when is it appropriate for a third party to intervene? David Burrows, NLJ columnist and solicitor advocate, considers this thorny issue in this week’s NLJ
NLJ's latest Charities Appeals Supplement has been published in this week’s issue
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