Last week we celebrated two notable days. The World Book and Copyright Day was on Thursday, the World Intellectual Property Day was on Sunday.
The connection between 23 April and books was first made in 1923 by booksellers in Catalonia, Spain as a way to honor the author Miguel de Cervantes who died on that day. This became a part of the celebrations of the Saint George’s Day (also 23 April) in the region, where it has been traditional since the medieval era for men to give roses to their lovers and since 1925 for the woman to give a book in exchange. Half the yearly sales of books in Catalonia are at this time with over 400,000 sold and exchanged for over 4 million roses. In 1995, UNESCO decided that the World Book and Copyright Day would be celebrated on this date because of the Catalonian festival and because the date is also the anniversary of the birth and death of William Shakespeare.
Following a statement made at the Assembly of the Member States of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in September 1998, the Director General of the National Algerian Institute for Industrial Property (INAPI) proposed on April 7, 1999 the institutionalization of an international day for intellectual property. In October 1999, the General Assembly of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) approved the idea of declaring a particular day as a World Intellectual Property Day.
