February 20, 2025 • 39 mins
Our latest podcast episode dives into the intriguing journey of Tom Bridgewater, CIPA Honorary Informals Representative who transformed his physics and robotics expertise into a rewarding career in intellectual property. Tom shares valuable insights about the challenges of transitioning to IP, the importance of supportive training, and the role of organizations like CIPA in fostering community among members.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Lee Davis and Gwilym Roberts are the two IPs in a pod
and you are listening to apodcast on intellectual property
brought to you by the CharteredInstitute of Patent Attorneys.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
How are you mate?
Here we are in series, whateverit is.
We're a few podcasts in now.
So do you feel you've foundyour podcasting legs again?
I've fallen off.
Oh no, you're not fed up withit, are you mate?
Here?
We are in series, whatever itis.
We're a few podcasts in now.
So do you feel you've foundyour podcasting legs again?
They've fallen off.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Oh no, you're not fed up with it, are you?
I'm not fed up with podcasting,but I mean, I think in terms of
A gastropod, there you go, it'dbe a gastropodcast if your legs
fell off.
Could you walk on your stomach.
That's a thing, anyway.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Thank you have exciting since the last time we
recorded a podcast, because Ihave okay, well, that's just I
have.
That won't be as exciting asyours, so let's go straight to
you well, no, it might be thesame exciting thing, because we
were at the same event.
We had our inaugural councildinner, when we, um, when we
take all council members away toa secret location, have, uh, a
nice dining experience but alsohave the opportunity to talk
(01:00):
about all things seepa andstrategy and stuff like that,
and I got the opportunity tostand up and make a few remarks
and, um, I might have hammed itup a bit, did you think?
I?
Speaker 1 (01:09):
hammed it.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
I didn't notice Mr Willy Wonka under the room at
any point, lee oh, it'sinteresting you say that,
because I did actually take on acharacter, but it wasn't Willy
Wonka.
Oh okay, was it Robert De Niro?
No, have you?
Have you ever seen a knight'stale?
The film oh yes, I know so Itook on the incarnation of
(01:31):
jeffrey chaucer in that movie.
I don't know why.
For some, for some bizarrereason, as I stood up, I thought
I'm going to do this paulbettany, wasn't it paul bettany
played.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I'm going to do this in the style of paul bettany in
a knight's tale you know, and Idon't know why it was, it was
kind of jeffrey wonka is where Iput it, but nearly jeffrey
that's going to be my new onlineidentity.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
I'm going to go and sort of take that now.
Oh, jeffrey, jeffrey wonka.
Other than that, how?
Speaker 1 (01:54):
you doing.
You're right, I'm good.
Thank you, yeah, so I didn'tshare my exciting thing, which
is I've been um standing on oneleg.
Turns out it's more difficultthan I thought why I can't do it
.
The personal trainer said standon one leg, and then he fell
over, so I've got to startworking on my leg standing.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
You just you have to eat lots of crustaceans and turn
pink, don't you?
Before you can do that properly.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Yes, that would do it .
Yeah, in water.
Yeah, there we go.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Water, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, slightly murky water
, yeah, but let's not go there.
So cool podcast today because,just like SEPA, our student
group, the Informals, renewsitself on a regular basis and
takes on a new leadership, andwe've got the new honorary
secretary of the Informals withus today, tom Bridgewater.
Tom hello, how are you?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Hey, nice to see you both.
Yeah, I'm great.
Thanks, and I think you did avery good job of Geoffrey
Chaucer in the Knight's Tale.
I totally got that.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
So we normally ask our guests to kick off by
telling us a bit about them.
So I mean, obviously I've seenyou appear at council a couple
of times now, so we know youexist, but apart from that we
don't know a lot about you, tom.
So who are you?
What do you do?
Speaker 4 (03:12):
Sure.
So I started the profession in2020 right in the midst of
lockdown, which was aninteresting way to start.
I immediately joined the superinformals committee, but I'll
kind of I'll do the before andthen get on to the, to the
theory.
So before that I was aresearcher, so I originally
studied physics and then wentand did my PhD in robotics uh,
in Bristol, and spent, you know,a few years doing the PhD and
(03:36):
then a year being a researcherbefore I kind of thought I want
to try something a bit differentand I heard about this cool job
where you get to be a sciencelawyer and I thought, oh, yeah,
I'll give that a go and appliedLuckily, got the place I applied
for.
I did it very late in the year,so there was only really a
couple of places hiring at thatpoint, but luckily they took me
(03:58):
on and I joined Venoshipleyabout four years ago.
And then, yeah, hopped onto theSuper Informals Committee,
started as a sports coordinator,so I brought back the Super
Five Aside football tournamentafter the pandemic, which was a
challenge.
There were a lot of teamsdropping out because their HR
department said it probablywasn't a good look to be playing
(04:21):
football close together justafter a pandemic and then moved
to the London regional sec role,which was great fun, get to
organize lots of socials andmeet lots of different attorneys
from different firms.
And then recently, as you say,I joined.
I've kind of taken over fromAshley from last year as the
(04:42):
onsec, which is really excitingbecause now I get to sit
actually on big council, which,uh, was actually the main reason
I wanted to do the role.
It was kind of a curiosity inwhat big council get up to and
I've recently moved firm as well.
So it's been a busy year andswapped from, swapped from vena
shipley across to lewis silken,which is a law firm rather than
(05:02):
a patent firm.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
Quite a different experience imagine there's a
huge amount to unpack there, butI'm absolutely convinced that
william will want to start withthe physics that's fair enough,
do you like?
Speaker 1 (05:12):
physics, love physics .
It's great, isn't it?
What do you say?
The robotics side, the phd, wasthat to the math side, the
engineering side, where did youkind of focus?
Speaker 4 (05:23):
I'll give you the the not at all succinct title of
the thesis, which was remotecharacterization of nuclear cave
environments utilizing aheterogeneous swarm of
autonomous robots, which isgobbledygook, for I sent a bunch
of robots into a nuclearenvironment that was sealed when
(05:44):
they built it to come out witha map of what the environment
looked like so it could aid indecommissioning the nuclear
power plant.
So they have these rooms innuclear facilities where there's
a lot of sort of pipe work thatgoes through and it's
relatively radioactive in there.
So they seal it when they buildit and it turns out that a lot
(06:08):
of contractors don't exactlyfollow the specification to the
letter.
So they don't exactly knowwhat's inside anymore and they
have to drill a little hole it'sonly allowed to be six inches
in diameter and then theymaintain a negative pressure in
there so that nothing can getout.
And so they want to know what'sinside.
And they tasked me with oh, canyou think of a way that we
(06:31):
could send a heterogeneous swarmie the robots are different
into the into that environmentto come out with a map?
And I kind of I broke it upinto sort of locomotion sensing
and control, and my main focuswas on the control of the robots
.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
That's amazing.
I mean, it sounds like the bestvideo game ever.
For a start.
Why Swarm?
Why can't you just send onerobot in?
Because of?
Speaker 4 (06:55):
the size of the hole.
So because it can only be sixinches, you've only got a sort
of limited sensing capacity thatyou can.
So if you want to send in a bigrobot, like they did to say,
for kashima or something thathas, you know, lots of payload,
it can sense lots of differentthings radioactivity, humidity,
etc you're you can't, you'rekind of scuppered and you kind
of want different modalities interms of locomotion, because you
(07:18):
want them to maybe be able toclimb, because a lot of pipe
work, but also see the floor.
So you of you just want them tobe able to do different things
and also communicate to eachother.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Why can't you just have one really long, six-inch
and diameter robot and then I'mdone.
I'm done after that?
That's a fair question.
Speaker 4 (07:39):
They do.
They actually did have sort ofsnake-like robots that they
would send in, but they'relimited, right, if you've got a
really long robot and it needsto move around quite a complex
network of pipes, then it'slimited in how it can move.
So you need the smaller,smaller ones to actually be able
to move around in that area.
But, to be honest, my focus wason the control more than the,
(08:02):
than the locomotion, because itwas the bit that was interesting
to me and I kind of got to tiemy physics into it.
So, to be a swarm, you're notallowed to have centralized
control.
That's kind of the thing thatdefines a swarm over sort of a
group of robots.
So the idea is that you getemergent behavior in the robots
from implementing simple rules.
(08:22):
So I was trying to do a thingwhere it is interesting.
Yeah, I can talk about it for along time.
I probably probably should,should, not not bore you too
much.
But uh, I'll just say thisisn't your viva, but go on, yeah
, yeah, oh, my viva was actually, it was that was.
I'll get back to that.
Um, so you, yeah, you go, yougo into.
(08:44):
My idea was that you could useanalogs of you know the
fundamental forces of nature tocontrol the robots.
So you have.
You know, the electrostaticforce is a strong, attractive
force that draws you to theplace where you want to go
mapping, and maybe you have agravitational force.
In fact, actually I usegravitational force to attract
(09:04):
you to the place you wanted tomap an electrostatic force to
push you away from obstacles,and then a strong nuclear force
to kind of keep you as you gotcloser to the to the thing, give
you a real stronger attraction.
So all to say, basically, Ijust programmed these robots to
act like particles, which wasquite fun is that your idea to
do that, or is that a done thingto kind of use?
Speaker 1 (09:25):
I I can see how that I can imagine that's a work.
It sounds like quite a creativeway of doing it uh, it exists.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
So virtual forces exist for controlling robots,
but doing it in that exactmanner, trying to do it using
the physical forces in that way,didn't exist previously.
That's brilliant, leo.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Stop there thank you for answering a really stupid
question, really seriously justthen as well.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
I appreciate that I won't pretend that I understood
much of that, but it wasfascinating.
It's always.
It's always good to watch twophysics geeks go at it oh, he's
winning on the geek, sorry whatcame after that?
Then, tom, were you straightinto the mode of IP or did you
do any real work first?
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Well, it depends whether you consider a research
associate real work.
I actually, when I when Iinterviewed for my first job in
IP, one of the interviewersasked me how will it feel to
have your first real job?
To which I I said I won't Iwon't swear here, but but I told
him you know I had had a realjob.
It was, yeah, I was a researchassociate.
(10:29):
I was studying human-robotinteraction for a year before I
started.
So it was looking at whether ornot humans trust robots in the
same way that they trust otherhumans and kind of taking that
in looking at how they want arobot to approach risk.
That was so.
I did that for a year and thenentered ip what was wrong with
(10:51):
that?
Speaker 1 (10:51):
did you sorry?
That's interesting.
I mean, a lot of people do saythey move from academia you know
it's great, but they want tokind of apply a little bit more.
It sounds like you wereapplying your science quite a
lot.
What was the shift out ofacademia occasioned by?
Speaker 4 (11:04):
so I felt like there were two aspects one was that I
you work on one thing for a longtime, and what I'd heard about
working in patents was that youget to see lots of different
technologies in various fieldsand you kind of get to learn
about lots of different thingsmore regularly, and and so that
(11:24):
attracted me away from it.
And also because you can onlyreally publish positive results.
And I find, I don't know, Ifound it a little irritating to
kind of constantly be askingquestions you already knew the
answer to because you wanted topublish.
so you could, like you know theresearch.
You could do a bunch ofresearch that was actually
(11:45):
interesting to you, but if youthen found out that the answer
was no, there's no real journalfor negative results.
So I found that a bitfrustrating and kind of wanted
to get away from it right backto you lee sorry cheers, that's
sorry.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Cheers, that's fine.
You can interrupt me wheneveryou want, because I'm only going
to ask like boring, very sortof like separee-centric
questions, so you can take uswherever you want to go, gwilym.
So back to the world of findingyourself in IP.
Tom, how did that feel?
Talk us through your first fewdays.
What did it feel like tosuddenly be working in an IP
(12:17):
firm?
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Yeah, it was weird because it was COVID time.
So I started in 2020, and Ithink my girlfriend met my boss
before I did.
I think I'm allowed to say thisbecause he told me about it,
but my partner's a dentist andmy boss at the time went in to
(12:41):
see the dentist to have a toothtaken out, and it just happened
to turn out to be my girlfriendseeing him, and so she spent a
couple of hours with him and Ispent no time in person with him
because it was the middle oflockdown.
So that was definitely a weirdstarting point, but in terms of
actually in the profession, itwas a huge change.
It was going from being quitegood at something to having no
(13:04):
idea what was going on at all.
As you probably both know, it'skind of a trial by fire, in
that you're just given work todo and you kind of go figure out
how to do it and then get itvery wrong, and that is an
interesting way to learn, notsomething I've quite experienced
before.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
A lot of entries for the journal of negative results.
Speaker 4 (13:28):
So from that stroke I think on the plus side yeah, a
lot, a lot of red lines which Ididn't know how to do when I
started in the profession.
So you know how people put ontheir CV I'm proficient in word,
or whatever.
I was not proficient in word.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
I, for the for the first uh, maybe three, four
weeks of the in being in theprofession, when I was making
amendments, I was coloringthings in red and underlining
them rather than using trackchanges, because I didn't know
it existed, so I sped up quite alot when someone told me about
that there's an interestinginsight there isn't there the
(14:04):
presumption, the expectationthat people come with those
skills that perhaps you wouldconsider to be the sorts of
things that everyone has, andperhaps also a an indictment of
training as it is?
Can I go because I was going to?
Speaker 1 (14:17):
yeah sorry, I saw you about to talk, so I no, no,
that's fine.
I was gonna say I think I'm Ithink I've might banged on about
this a little bit in the past,on this podcast actually which
is that we're a funny bunch whenit comes to training and it is
a it is a very negativeexperience.
You mostly say what you'redoing wrong.
I mean, we've got the wonderfultraining manual, lovely
positive results there, we'vegot the informal lectures and
we've got loads of reallywilling attorneys who really
(14:38):
want to train the nextgeneration, as it were.
But even so, I sometimes feellike it is quite difficult
because it's mostly wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
That was it, that was it there?
Do that again.
She's a strange way.
It's a bit like AI training, Isuspect, isn't it?
You're just going to wait forthe reinforcement rather than
giving teaching at the outset.
(14:59):
It's a bit outcome-driven.
What do you think, tom?
You're the guest.
Speaker 4 (15:04):
I think that's true.
I think there's very much.
You're sometimes trying tofigure out exactly why it's
wrong and sometimes it can besubstantive You've got something
wrong with the law butsometimes it can be stylistic,
in that there's a lot of redline through how you've written
an argument, but actually theyhaven't changed the substance of
the argument, they've changedhow it's expressed, just because
(15:25):
they prefer a certain way ofwriting.
When I started, my boss wasfantastic.
He was able to put a lot oftime aside.
We would have, you know, one,two, sometimes even three hour
meetings where he'd really I'dwrite the response and instead
of giving me back red line, hewould take me through him fixing
(15:47):
it, which was great because Icould ask why he was changing
things, what, what exactly I'ddone wrong.
Sometimes it wasn't that I'ddone something wrong, it was the
stylistic thing that Imentioned.
And, yeah, I think that was areally positive way of training.
And I find I think it reallyjust depends how much time your
(16:07):
training partner can actuallymake for you, because at the end
of the day, they have to trainyou but they also have to do
their job and I think it can beprobably quite a hard thing to
balance.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Lee, is it time for a patent law school model?
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Yeah, you would look that way.
So you know that I come in withan educational background and
the first thing that I look forwas something that I recognised
as being normal sort of training.
And I think you quicklyunderstand that we're operating
in a world that's very differentfrom most other professions in
that we're bringing in peoplewho are already highly skilled
(16:40):
and have undertaken sort ofsignificant amounts of higher
education to get to the pointsthat they they are in their, in
their lives and in theirlearning firms work in many and
varied in different ways, inmany different formats, and it
would be difficult, I think, tohomogenize, if that's the right
word, the training in into somekind of school effect.
So we're probably doing thebest we can with a with a mixed
(17:04):
economy training model thatwe've got.
There's lots of things we cando to improve and we talk about
these all the time, but that wasa.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
That was a long way of saying no, I don't think so,
willem no, I mean, I don'teither actually, but I think I
think it takes too long.
I think we could streamline itpersonally.
But uh, I think you might callan intellectual apprenticeship.
Uh, in a sense, you know,because you're not learning,
you're learning a trade in yourown way.
It's just a more of a braintrade than a finger trade, but
there's so much kind ofpractical knives to it it's very
(17:33):
difficult to get, to get taughta lot of it except through
experience.
So I do think it's got quicker.
So one quick.
I know I'm banging on today, soI always remember remarking that
because I came in right at theend of the old, old training
model, which is you spent thefirst year going down to the
library and photocopying stuff.
That was pre-intern.
This is the time for theinternet on.
Genuinely it was bizarre.
(17:53):
So you go through microficheand get copies of patents and
things and that was literallyyour training for about a year.
It wasn't training at all, itwas just.
You were just cheap labor.
So that that's one of thereasons I think, historically,
why the period is so long totrain up is because it builds in
an entire year of photocopying,which obviously doesn't happen
anymore.
Speaker 4 (18:09):
But anyway, does that mean?
Did you do a year ofphotocopying and then sit the
the foundation exams or go toone of these Queen Mary style
courses?
Yeah, I did, queen Mary after ayear of photocopying, so you
were learning things really fromfirst principles at that point.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
Well, I was going to photocopy.
I mean, if they'd had a paperon that I would have nailed it.
You know, double-sided stapled,you name it.
I don't know if I've everphotocopied something.
Now he's feeling old.
Speaker 4 (18:39):
I'm feeling old as old.
I'm an old now, apology, no, Ido.
I, in terms of sort of the, thestandardizing of training, I
think it's.
It's a really hard thing, but Ieven within firms, because I,
when I was at my previous firm,it was really clear that
different people were kind ofbeing taught to work in
different ways and had differentworkloads.
(18:59):
Right, I didn't have that muchdrafting, but I had, and I was
kind of operating in a way thatI'd be given a response to do,
I'd do the response, I'd hand itback, whereas other people were
kind of given more drafting andmore.
Here's your case number.
You're in charge of this case,come and talk to me when you
need help, and so, even withinone firm, it seems like it's not
(19:22):
, it's not sort of completelystandardized, and I do think
that some level of making sureeveryone's get equal training is
definitely something we shouldtry and work towards, because
you can't you have the examsthat say whether or not you're
fit to practice, but it you knowyou can study for those and
they're not not that reflectiveof real, real practice, and so
(19:43):
making sure everyone's kind ofgetting this, a similarish
experience, is quite important,I think should we talk a little
bit about the sepa experience,because obviously you'd have
been also new to the world ofsomething like sepa professional
body and I know that that canbe it we do in the earliest
times in a in a new student'slife.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
In fact we've got one next week we have our student
induction days, so we do ourbest to try and enable our
students to understand what SEPAis, what it does, how it can
support them, how it works sortof more broadly in the best
interest of the profession andthe IP system.
How's it felt being a member ofSIPA?
Speaker 4 (20:19):
well, I mean, I I'll be honest, I don't.
I never feel I feel like Idon't fully appreciate what SIPA
do.
And I still feel like I don'tfully appreciate what SIPA do,
which is part of the reason thatI wanted to start, as the ONSEC
is, so I could go along tothese council meetings and get
an actual, you know proper, ideaof of what's going on in terms,
(20:40):
I guess, by super member.
I was a student member from thebeginning but I didn't really
know what that meant.
But being an informalscommittee member meant that I
kind of at least had an idea ofwhat we did for students.
I still don't necessarily havethe best idea of what we do for
you know, I suppose the terms,fellows, is that is that right?
(21:01):
Yeah, yeah, I'm not I that I'mstill learning, but in terms of
students, I think, I think whatwe do is great.
I think it's really importantthat we we do all this regional
sec and we really kind of dividethe regions into quite granular
regions so we can provide anopportunity for them to meet
each other and socialize.
And for me, that was a hugedeal when I started because,
(21:24):
again, as I said, I startedduring the lockdown and there
was no, no real way to meetpeople.
So joining the committee partlyfor me was so I could meet
people and then kind of helppeople meet each other, and
that's been fantastic, that'sone of the Willem knew what
Super does because he's a fellow.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
he should know it's a membership organisation.
Well done, well done.
I've trained him well, it's not, and it's.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I know what it is.
Mostly he just says what itisn't, normally, with some swear
words in the middle of it.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
But it's not a representative body it's not a
representative body, it's a.
It's a membership organization.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I think it is a representative body.
It's not a trade union.
That's.
It's a representative body, nota trade union.
I see that's what it isn't.
Also hang on.
There's another thing it alsoused to have a regulatory role,
but now it's delegated that yeah, that's absolutely right.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
And um, yeah, the regulatory role was always a big
part of c for personality andand now it isn't.
But I mean it's interesting,tom, because obviously it's my
job to try and help our membersunderstand what it is that we do
.
And it's probably the mostdifficult part of the job
because you are.
You are different things todifferent types of member at
different times and sooccasionally it needs something
big to come along.
(22:31):
William's going to get reallybored now because I'm going to
say cptpp, but it needs.
It needs something big to comealong, like the cptpp campaign
we did over a couple of years,where everyone can recognize
that here is this thing that'scoming along and it's big for
the profession and it could bepotentially injurious to us.
And CIPA steps in and it doesits kind of campaigning and its
work and it gets us to aposition whereby we're more
(22:53):
comfortable with how the UKjoining something like CPTPP
might look like and it won'timpact badly on the profession.
Everyone will go, oh, wow,amazing.
And then everyone then forgetsimmediately what SEPA is and
what it does, because it willmean different things to
different people.
That is one of the great butalso disturbing things about
working in a professional body,I think.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
It's a bit like aircraft pilots you don't really
notice until you're about tocrash the aeroplane and suddenly
someone says where's super whenyou need them.
So I think one of the things Ithink I've been quite noticeable
is how, when there was a crisis, everyone said what's super
doing about it?
But it is there when you needit.
There's doing tons and tons allthe time as well yeah, I don't
actually even know what the cppis.
Speaker 4 (23:30):
I don't have the letters down.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
it's easy for you to say I don't think we've.
I don't think we've got time totalk about CPTPP, the
Comprehensive and ProgressiveAgreement for Trans-Pacific
Partnership, which was sort oflike a trading bloc that the UK
wanted to join and has now infact joined, whereby the IP
(23:54):
provisions of the CPTPP weredifferent enough from the EPC
that could have potentiallycaused some conflict and some
issues for us and ultimately,questions about our role in the
EPC if we were potentiallycaused some conflict and some
issues for us and ultimately,questions about our role in the
EPC if we were committed to theCPTPP.
So we just had to navigate that.
We had to help governmentnavigate its way through that so
that it could join the CPTPPwithout any unintended
consequences.
And that's a difficult gigbecause government just want to
(24:15):
get trade deals over the line.
That's what they want to do andthey don't want a bunch of
geeky people coming along andsaying, oh yeah, but you really
need to focus on this reallyniche bit of IP law and get that
right, otherwise you're goingto potentially damage something
else.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
But they listened to us and we got there the UN's up
in front of all kinds ofimportant select committees or
something.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Oh yeah, no, I gave gave evidence to parliament,
which was quite cool oh wow, inin the houses of parliament yeah
, unfortunately it was on zoomtom, because it was again.
It was.
It was covid times.
So, um, which also helps you alittle bit, doesn't it?
Because you can have some notesdiscreetly hidden and stuff
like that.
So there is, there is theadvantage that you look like you
know what you're talking about,when in fact you've got a
screen behind you with lots ofstatements on it that you know
(24:56):
that you need to to get overthat would have been a really
good idea for this podcast.
Actually, I should have no, wenever do notes so so you are.
You are now the new on tech ofthe informals and a bit like the
super president.
Each year, obviously, the onsetcomes in with some sort of
thoughts or ideas about whatthey want to achieve in their
time and office what, what'syours?
(25:17):
What, what are the biggies onyour radar?
Speaker 4 (25:19):
well, one of them is really boring, which is just
streamlining the relationshipbetween the informals and the,
you know, the big supercommittee, because I think
there's somewhat of a smalldisconnect in between what we
think we do and what big councilthinks we do, because I think
traditionally there were someparts that were run by the
(25:41):
informals, like the ip ball andother bits like that, that we no
longer think are part of us,but I think, because of the way
it used to be ran, cpa did thinkwere part of us.
So we kind of just want to kindof get our terms of reference
down and understand what ourrole is and how we can kind of
help our student members andalso interact with big seeper,
(26:05):
so that we we kind of I don'tknow have that, have that all
down, which is not the mostinteresting role, but I just I
feel like that relationship isreally important and that we
really want to tie that down.
And then the other the otherone is I have this idea or
desire to bring back dragon boatracing, um, which I don't know.
(26:25):
I don't know a lot about it,but I hear, I hear lots of
people talking about the olddays where there was dragon boat
racing.
It was a really good event andused to row down the thames and
I, I, we, I kind of want to seeif something like that could be
brought back, or at least some.
I want to have some new eventthat we offer, either between us
(26:45):
and Big SEPA Council or as aninformals event, just to kind of
almost.
Well, you said it in yourspeech at the SEPA Council
actually is kind of puttingmembers first, and I feel like
we could be doing more in termsof networking our trainee
members and even maybeintegrating that with you know,
(27:05):
the fellows.
So having a big event wherethey can all meet each other and
have a good day out but alsomeet other people in the
profession, that's kind of whatI want to do.
So it's two things streamliningand a big old event.
Speaker 3 (27:20):
So really really important policy interconnecting
, getting stuff sorted androwing down the Thames.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
You got it.
I've done dragon boatingactually.
I did it when I went toSingapore and we had a guest,
vandita, who's a big fan ofdragon boating actually, so she
told me to do it when I went toSingapore.
It is brilliant, really cool.
We should do it.
I think we can just decide thatnow, can't we?
Speaker 3 (27:42):
yeah, so every day is a school day, isn't it?
And it's the first time I'vebeen see for over 13 years now.
It's the first time anyone'sever said to me cp used to do
dragon boat racing.
I've never heard that.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
I've never heard that really oh yeah, I wonder where
where this is, because I've yeah, I've been spoken to about it
by a few.
Speaker 3 (27:58):
It doesn't mean that we didn't used to do it.
It just means that no one'sever said it to me.
Speaker 4 (28:02):
No, but in the last 13 years.
I would be surprised if it wasprior to that, that's
interesting, it must be.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
Maybe there were fatalities or something.
Perhaps that's why we don't doit.
It's kind of scuppered.
My plan, which is to ask youabout it yeah, no wait, wasted
on me, but there will be one ortwo, as I think.
Maybe ask ian, who looks afterthe journal.
There will be some peoplewho've been around for long
enough that they will know thatthis has happened and will
possibly even have some gen onit.
Speaker 4 (28:28):
So I'll see what I can find out for you yeah,
otherwise it might be a pipedream, but you know that's fine,
you could.
If you achieve one of your twogoals, then then you're doing a
good job.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
Absolutely yeah, that's 50% success.
Right, yeah, that's a pass, andarguably the most important 50%
, unless, of course, you reallywant to go dragon boating down
the Thames, which I really wantto do now.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
Honestly, it'd be amazing, it'd be brilliant, it's
a great idea.
Speaker 3 (28:53):
Except in my head I've now got some kind of like
tyrene warfare thing going onwhere we do a bit of ramming and
um, but that's probably not notallowed although it could be,
could be fun we could do thatwith sitmar well, I think.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
I think they used to have teams from different.
I think the epo entered a teamone year.
In fact, I was told that theepo entered a team, absolutely
destroyed everyone else, andthat was one of the reasons that
they stopped it, because theygot really good at it oh, I've
never heard any of this.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
Leave that's any help no, it's just um.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
And now, if we're going to get really, really
competitive, I'm thinking aboutother things.
So my uh, a pub not terriblyfar from me which is on a really
good stretch of water, do thisfor charity annual raft race
thing.
But the rafts over the yearshave got more and more
extraordinary in their designand construction and the way
people go about it.
So I'm now thinking how perhapsmaybe in addition to or instead
(29:44):
of dragon boat racing, weshould have some kind of
eclectic raft buildingcompetition and race.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
That could be quite fun the pattern of things would
get soapbox racing, but on waterattorneys would get too
embedded in the.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
Have we invented something new or novel here?
Rather than just cracking onand building it?
We can do the whole thing undernda.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
It'd be fine, just to under nda.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
That's not a problem, that's a legal solution well
until you put it on the waterand then, and then you've got
public disclosure you'll bepleased to know, tom, given our
little conversation before westarted, that we're nearly at 40
minutes, which makes whichmakes you an exciting guest, an
interesting guest oh man, I'vemade it so but before, before we
sort of sign off, there's twothings that we normally.
(30:25):
First of all, we ask you ifthere's anything else you want
to say, because obviously you'vetold us lots, um, but there
might there might be questionswe've forgotten to ask you or
things that you thought, oh yeah, must get that in.
So anything else you want toadd?
Speaker 4 (30:34):
I don't think so cool .
Speaker 3 (30:35):
Cool, okay, then.
Speaker 4 (30:36):
Yeah, I guess I haven't mentioned moving firm,
but I don't know if that's thatinteresting.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
I had one question on that, if that's okay, just
quickly.
Actually, which is just what'sit?
Like you said, it was a bitdifferent working in a law firm
versus a straight kind ofboutique IP firm.
First of all, why the move forthat different model and
secondly, what's different?
Speaker 4 (30:55):
Yeah, I mean I moved because I wanted to do different
work.
As I said, I didn't get a lotof drafting and we had a client
who you could only write yourresponses in a really specific
way, which was fantastic fortraining.
But I kind of wanted to trysomething a bit different and I
suppose, flexed my slightlycreative muscle in writing my
own arguments rather thanwriting it in this specific way
(31:22):
arguments rather than writing itin this specific way.
And another aspect this jobkind of came up and my original
boss who trained me the guy thatI said was great and put aside
all that time for me he hadmoved across to this firm a year
before and this opportunityopened up and I saw it was there
and I thought, wow, okay, Icould have the possibility to
work with him and thepossibility to do all this new
kind of work.
And it is fantastic.
(31:45):
I'd never worked anythinginfringement before and after
having sat the infringementvalidity paper, which is
notoriously difficult, Iactually got the opportunity to
work on some infringement cases.
One of them, without anyobviously disclosing any
confidential information, wasabout hoverboards which required
(32:05):
us to buy some hoverboards,take them apart, look inside to
see whether you know thearrangement of the stuff was
infringing, but then afterwardswe just got to ride some
hoverboards around the office,which was great fun.
So everyone there is lovely andyou get such a bigger variety
of work than just the kind ofprosecution that I was doing
before.
So that was the reason I movedand actually it's been a really
(32:28):
really good move, a reallypositive experience.
Speaker 3 (32:31):
So I think we're there.
I think we're there, we'rethere abouts, but wait.
So Gwilym and I have thislittle thing, tom, where we do a
slightly tangential closingquestion and where we do a
slightly tangential closingquestion and normally I come up
with them.
Sometimes william comes up withthem.
I ought to check.
Have you got one?
I've got one, good, but it's abit boring.
Not boring, but it's a bitobvious, I would say uh have you
got one?
Speaker 1 (32:49):
I've got a silly one.
Obviously I'm happy to let's gowith yours.
I'll tell you what one was yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
So so the way this works then, tom, is I'll ask
william, I'll then ask you, andthen william, I throw it back at
me.
Um, I haven't actually thoughtabout my answer in advance this
time, william.
The question is so ordinarily,tom, I've already come up with a
really clever answer and Iframe my question around it, so
that makes me look really eitherincredibly naturally funny or
intelligent or any of thosethings.
Uh, this time around it's justcome about because of where we
(33:16):
started the conversation on thepodcast.
So, guillem, I was wondering,um, if there's anything in your
life that sort of likefrustrates you, annoys you, um,
grates with you, and if youcould invent yourself a little
micro robot to um to do itinstead, what, what would that
thing be?
Speaker 1 (33:31):
yeah, that's my question, uh, but but um robots,
the only difference thing ofrobots swarm, so I think okay
let's, let's go with the swarm.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
That makes it even more difficult for me.
Tom tom obviously can't answerthis from a nuclear perspective.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
It has to be, something else and I mean I
think, I mean I'm not convincedI wouldn't want just a 20 foot
six inch wide robot as well.
That's, that's another option.
But if I'm gonna have a swarm,a dishwasher swarm, in back it,
clear it.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
I'd have one stacking robot because you're doing the
washing, because I'm, becauseyour dishwasher does that.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
You know that yeah yeah, they're stacking and
unstacking.
So, one week, gravitationallyattracted in gravitationally,
bring the plates and everythingto the right place.
Another one be, and it's justas if you repulsed out with all
the, all the clean stuff.
And there'll be a third onewhich is to put your way, which
be gravitationally attracted tothe drawers to put them all away
.
And then you'd need a specialone, I reckon, for cutlery.
That's a swarm.
(34:22):
That's four already, and I'dlove to see some emergent
behaviors because, as far as I'mconcerned, I'd love to see how
they actually if it's anythinglike the emergent behaviors in
my family, when we're doing adishwasher, they just yell at
each other.
I've been paying attention, bythe way paying attention.
Speaker 4 (34:35):
That was, that was that was.
Speaker 3 (34:36):
You could write a thesis on that well, so what
would you do to make your lifeimmediately better?
Tom, and obviously, knowingthat this is your expertise,
you're gonna have a cracker.
Speaker 4 (34:46):
So well, I well the problem is there already exists
a solution to the problem I have, which is I hate mopping and
hoovering, and there alreadyexists mopping and hoovering
robots.
Speaker 3 (34:55):
So that's the actual, honest answer.
Speaker 4 (34:57):
But if I I was going to invent something, which I
think was the kind of core ofthe question, something to help
with the cat, something to ourcat, as I said, she, she, she's
a bit of a.
She comes in here, she meows atme, she, she's a really sort of
hoity toity cat and I think itwould be great to have a robot,
you know, a swarm one robot thatcan brush her, one robot that
(35:18):
can clean her poo, one robotthat can brush her, one robot
that can clean her poo, onerobot that can feed her and just
generally make her feel, youknow, well, taken care of, and
then not not come and bother mewhile I'm working so that's
really good because mine grillI'm, if you're interested, if
you're going to ask me the samequestion oh yeah, what's your
robot?
Speaker 3 (35:35):
so mine is pet related too and it's only really
just come to me whilst we'vebeen thinking.
But, as, as Grillam and anyonewho listens to the podcast knows
, I have a tortoise and andtortoises are notoriously
difficult to hibernate.
I know that sounds daft.
They're not.
Obviously.
You chuck them in a box andchuck them somewhere reasonably
cold and they just stay there.
But but the way that theclimate's changing, it's getting
(35:57):
more and more difficult becauseyou just can't chuck them down
your shed or in an outbuilding,because it will either be too
warm and they'll be awake allthe time and they'll be burning
energy, or so cold that theyfreeze to death.
Uh.
So those sorts of days havegone.
So we hibernate albert in uh,in a beer fridge, and but you
have to monitor them.
So every day I have to go andcheck the temperature.
(36:17):
I mean, I've got an internaland external thermostat and you
kind of have to go and tickletheir feet just to make sure
they move, and occasionally youtake a look at the head just to
make sure that he's still gotclear eyes and stuff like that.
Yeah, it'd be lovely.
So I'd have a little swarm ofrobots that would probably live
in the fridge with him andforever be monitoring his every
lack of movement rather thanmovement and the ecosystem that
(36:39):
he's living within, and thenreport that to me in some way,
shape or form, and over timeperhaps they would learn enough
about hibernation behavior thatI would never need to worry
again.
So I just I just pop him in thefridge and I could shut the
door and he's all looked after.
So that's what I'd do.
Could just get a robot tortoise.
I think that's probably a greatplace to end it.
Gullum't it.
That's where, where, where,where else to go beyond that and
(37:01):
I you know that now I'm nowgoing to start thinking about it
, making a robot tortoise.
That's I, I, I will have, Iwill have one by the summer, or
at least something that lookslike a robot tortoise, even if
it doesn't work like like a croctom.
Thanks so much for coming on.
Apologies, it's got a bit daftat times, but that tends to be
(37:21):
the way it goes.
Um, thank you.
Thank you for having me good.
Good luck with the year ahead.
Uh, it's great having you onsuper council.
It's always good to have thesort of student perspective on
council.
It sort of keeps council freshand vibrant and in touch with um
where the profession's going,and I think that's a really
important feature of only ontech on council.
Good thanks, forcil Gwilym.
Thanks for appearing on thepodcast again with me.
I don't know how many we're upto now, but it seems like we've
(37:43):
done so many of these that we'restarting to get quite good at
them.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
I just enjoy wanting to be interested.
Just something occasionally,not about IP, is quite fun
actually.
Speaker 3 (37:52):
You learn so much, don't you?
You learn so much every day ofthe school day yeah um, yeah, if
you've listened to the podcastI'm not talking to either of you
two now, I'm talking to ourlisteners.
If you've listened to thepodcast and you've enjoyed it,
uh, leave us a little reviewsomewhere in the internet web
thingy so that other people canfind us, because, uh, we're keen
to grow the listenership andthe best way to do that is if
you, kind people, tell the restof the world about who we are,
(38:13):
what we do.
Um, I'll see you on the nextone, tom, I'll see you either at
council or I know this dates itbut if you're the president's
reception tonight, I'll see youthere, see you soon Outro Music.
Lee Davis and Gwilym Roberts are the two IPs in a pod
and you are listening to apodcast on intellectual property
brought to you by the CharteredInstitute of Patent Attorneys.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
How are you mate?
Here we are in series, whateverit is.
We're a few podcasts in now.
So do you feel you've foundyour podcasting legs again?
I've fallen off.
Oh no, you're not fed up withit, are you mate?
Here?
We are in series, whatever itis.
We're a few podcasts in now.
So do you feel you've foundyour podcasting legs again?
They've fallen off.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Oh no, you're not fed up with it, are you?
I'm not fed up with podcasting,but I mean, I think in terms of
A gastropod, there you go, it'dbe a gastropodcast if your legs
fell off.
Could you walk on your stomach.
That's a thing, anyway.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Thank you have exciting since the last time we
recorded a podcast, because Ihave okay, well, that's just I
have.
That won't be as exciting asyours, so let's go straight to
you well, no, it might be thesame exciting thing, because we
were at the same event.
We had our inaugural councildinner, when we, um, when we
take all council members away toa secret location, have, uh, a
nice dining experience but alsohave the opportunity to talk
(01:00):
about all things seepa andstrategy and stuff like that,
and I got the opportunity tostand up and make a few remarks
and, um, I might have hammed itup a bit, did you think?
I?
Speaker 1 (01:09):
hammed it.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
I didn't notice Mr Willy Wonka under the room at
any point, lee oh, it'sinteresting you say that,
because I did actually take on acharacter, but it wasn't Willy
Wonka.
Oh okay, was it Robert De Niro?
No, have you?
Have you ever seen a knight'stale?
The film oh yes, I know so Itook on the incarnation of
(01:31):
jeffrey chaucer in that movie.
I don't know why.
For some, for some bizarrereason, as I stood up, I thought
I'm going to do this paulbettany, wasn't it paul bettany
played.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I'm going to do this in the style of paul bettany in
a knight's tale you know, and Idon't know why it was, it was
kind of jeffrey wonka is where Iput it, but nearly jeffrey
that's going to be my new onlineidentity.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
I'm going to go and sort of take that now.
Oh, jeffrey, jeffrey wonka.
Other than that, how?
Speaker 1 (01:54):
you doing.
You're right, I'm good.
Thank you, yeah, so I didn'tshare my exciting thing, which
is I've been um standing on oneleg.
Turns out it's more difficultthan I thought why I can't do it
.
The personal trainer said standon one leg, and then he fell
over, so I've got to startworking on my leg standing.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
You just you have to eat lots of crustaceans and turn
pink, don't you?
Before you can do that properly.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Yes, that would do it .
Yeah, in water.
Yeah, there we go.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Water, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, slightly murky water
, yeah, but let's not go there.
So cool podcast today because,just like SEPA, our student
group, the Informals, renewsitself on a regular basis and
takes on a new leadership, andwe've got the new honorary
secretary of the Informals withus today, tom Bridgewater.
Tom hello, how are you?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Hey, nice to see you both.
Yeah, I'm great.
Thanks, and I think you did avery good job of Geoffrey
Chaucer in the Knight's Tale.
I totally got that.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
So we normally ask our guests to kick off by
telling us a bit about them.
So I mean, obviously I've seenyou appear at council a couple
of times now, so we know youexist, but apart from that we
don't know a lot about you, tom.
So who are you?
What do you do?
Speaker 4 (03:12):
Sure.
So I started the profession in2020 right in the midst of
lockdown, which was aninteresting way to start.
I immediately joined the superinformals committee, but I'll
kind of I'll do the before andthen get on to the, to the
theory.
So before that I was aresearcher, so I originally
studied physics and then wentand did my PhD in robotics uh,
in Bristol, and spent, you know,a few years doing the PhD and
(03:36):
then a year being a researcherbefore I kind of thought I want
to try something a bit differentand I heard about this cool job
where you get to be a sciencelawyer and I thought, oh, yeah,
I'll give that a go and appliedLuckily, got the place I applied
for.
I did it very late in the year,so there was only really a
couple of places hiring at thatpoint, but luckily they took me
(03:58):
on and I joined Venoshipleyabout four years ago.
And then, yeah, hopped onto theSuper Informals Committee,
started as a sports coordinator,so I brought back the Super
Five Aside football tournamentafter the pandemic, which was a
challenge.
There were a lot of teamsdropping out because their HR
department said it probablywasn't a good look to be playing
(04:21):
football close together justafter a pandemic and then moved
to the London regional sec role,which was great fun, get to
organize lots of socials andmeet lots of different attorneys
from different firms.
And then recently, as you say,I joined.
I've kind of taken over fromAshley from last year as the
(04:42):
onsec, which is really excitingbecause now I get to sit
actually on big council, which,uh, was actually the main reason
I wanted to do the role.
It was kind of a curiosity inwhat big council get up to and
I've recently moved firm as well.
So it's been a busy year andswapped from, swapped from vena
shipley across to lewis silken,which is a law firm rather than
(05:02):
a patent firm.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
Quite a different experience imagine there's a
huge amount to unpack there, butI'm absolutely convinced that
william will want to start withthe physics that's fair enough,
do you like?
Speaker 1 (05:12):
physics, love physics .
It's great, isn't it?
What do you say?
The robotics side, the phd, wasthat to the math side, the
engineering side, where did youkind of focus?
Speaker 4 (05:23):
I'll give you the the not at all succinct title of
the thesis, which was remotecharacterization of nuclear cave
environments utilizing aheterogeneous swarm of
autonomous robots, which isgobbledygook, for I sent a bunch
of robots into a nuclearenvironment that was sealed when
(05:44):
they built it to come out witha map of what the environment
looked like so it could aid indecommissioning the nuclear
power plant.
So they have these rooms innuclear facilities where there's
a lot of sort of pipe work thatgoes through and it's
relatively radioactive in there.
So they seal it when they buildit and it turns out that a lot
(06:08):
of contractors don't exactlyfollow the specification to the
letter.
So they don't exactly knowwhat's inside anymore and they
have to drill a little hole it'sonly allowed to be six inches
in diameter and then theymaintain a negative pressure in
there so that nothing can getout.
And so they want to know what'sinside.
And they tasked me with oh, canyou think of a way that we
(06:31):
could send a heterogeneous swarmie the robots are different
into the into that environmentto come out with a map?
And I kind of I broke it upinto sort of locomotion sensing
and control, and my main focuswas on the control of the robots
.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
That's amazing.
I mean, it sounds like the bestvideo game ever.
For a start.
Why Swarm?
Why can't you just send onerobot in?
Because of?
Speaker 4 (06:55):
the size of the hole.
So because it can only be sixinches, you've only got a sort
of limited sensing capacity thatyou can.
So if you want to send in a bigrobot, like they did to say,
for kashima or something thathas, you know, lots of payload,
it can sense lots of differentthings radioactivity, humidity,
etc you're you can't, you'rekind of scuppered and you kind
of want different modalities interms of locomotion, because you
(07:18):
want them to maybe be able toclimb, because a lot of pipe
work, but also see the floor.
So you of you just want them tobe able to do different things
and also communicate to eachother.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Why can't you just have one really long, six-inch
and diameter robot and then I'mdone.
I'm done after that?
That's a fair question.
Speaker 4 (07:39):
They do.
They actually did have sort ofsnake-like robots that they
would send in, but they'relimited, right, if you've got a
really long robot and it needsto move around quite a complex
network of pipes, then it'slimited in how it can move.
So you need the smaller,smaller ones to actually be able
to move around in that area.
But, to be honest, my focus wason the control more than the,
(08:02):
than the locomotion, because itwas the bit that was interesting
to me and I kind of got to tiemy physics into it.
So, to be a swarm, you're notallowed to have centralized
control.
That's kind of the thing thatdefines a swarm over sort of a
group of robots.
So the idea is that you getemergent behavior in the robots
from implementing simple rules.
(08:22):
So I was trying to do a thingwhere it is interesting.
Yeah, I can talk about it for along time.
I probably probably should,should, not not bore you too
much.
But uh, I'll just say thisisn't your viva, but go on, yeah
, yeah, oh, my viva was actually, it was that was.
I'll get back to that.
Um, so you, yeah, you go, yougo into.
(08:44):
My idea was that you could useanalogs of you know the
fundamental forces of nature tocontrol the robots.
So you have.
You know, the electrostaticforce is a strong, attractive
force that draws you to theplace where you want to go
mapping, and maybe you have agravitational force.
In fact, actually I usegravitational force to attract
(09:04):
you to the place you wanted tomap an electrostatic force to
push you away from obstacles,and then a strong nuclear force
to kind of keep you as you gotcloser to the to the thing, give
you a real stronger attraction.
So all to say, basically, Ijust programmed these robots to
act like particles, which wasquite fun is that your idea to
do that, or is that a done thingto kind of use?
Speaker 1 (09:25):
I I can see how that I can imagine that's a work.
It sounds like quite a creativeway of doing it uh, it exists.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
So virtual forces exist for controlling robots,
but doing it in that exactmanner, trying to do it using
the physical forces in that way,didn't exist previously.
That's brilliant, leo.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Stop there thank you for answering a really stupid
question, really seriously justthen as well.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
I appreciate that I won't pretend that I understood
much of that, but it wasfascinating.
It's always.
It's always good to watch twophysics geeks go at it oh, he's
winning on the geek, sorry whatcame after that?
Then, tom, were you straightinto the mode of IP or did you
do any real work first?
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Well, it depends whether you consider a research
associate real work.
I actually, when I when Iinterviewed for my first job in
IP, one of the interviewersasked me how will it feel to
have your first real job?
To which I I said I won't Iwon't swear here, but but I told
him you know I had had a realjob.
It was, yeah, I was a researchassociate.
(10:29):
I was studying human-robotinteraction for a year before I
started.
So it was looking at whether ornot humans trust robots in the
same way that they trust otherhumans and kind of taking that
in looking at how they want arobot to approach risk.
That was so.
I did that for a year and thenentered ip what was wrong with
(10:51):
that?
Speaker 1 (10:51):
did you sorry?
That's interesting.
I mean, a lot of people do saythey move from academia you know
it's great, but they want tokind of apply a little bit more.
It sounds like you wereapplying your science quite a
lot.
What was the shift out ofacademia occasioned by?
Speaker 4 (11:04):
so I felt like there were two aspects one was that I
you work on one thing for a longtime, and what I'd heard about
working in patents was that youget to see lots of different
technologies in various fieldsand you kind of get to learn
about lots of different thingsmore regularly, and and so that
(11:24):
attracted me away from it.
And also because you can onlyreally publish positive results.
And I find, I don't know, Ifound it a little irritating to
kind of constantly be askingquestions you already knew the
answer to because you wanted topublish.
so you could, like you know theresearch.
You could do a bunch ofresearch that was actually
(11:45):
interesting to you, but if youthen found out that the answer
was no, there's no real journalfor negative results.
So I found that a bitfrustrating and kind of wanted
to get away from it right backto you lee sorry cheers, that's
sorry.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Cheers, that's fine.
You can interrupt me wheneveryou want, because I'm only going
to ask like boring, very sortof like separee-centric
questions, so you can take uswherever you want to go, gwilym.
So back to the world of findingyourself in IP.
Tom, how did that feel?
Talk us through your first fewdays.
What did it feel like tosuddenly be working in an IP
(12:17):
firm?
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Yeah, it was weird because it was COVID time.
So I started in 2020, and Ithink my girlfriend met my boss
before I did.
I think I'm allowed to say thisbecause he told me about it,
but my partner's a dentist andmy boss at the time went in to
(12:41):
see the dentist to have a toothtaken out, and it just happened
to turn out to be my girlfriendseeing him, and so she spent a
couple of hours with him and Ispent no time in person with him
because it was the middle oflockdown.
So that was definitely a weirdstarting point, but in terms of
actually in the profession, itwas a huge change.
It was going from being quitegood at something to having no
(13:04):
idea what was going on at all.
As you probably both know, it'skind of a trial by fire, in
that you're just given work todo and you kind of go figure out
how to do it and then get itvery wrong, and that is an
interesting way to learn, notsomething I've quite experienced
before.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
A lot of entries for the journal of negative results.
Speaker 4 (13:28):
So from that stroke I think on the plus side yeah, a
lot, a lot of red lines which Ididn't know how to do when I
started in the profession.
So you know how people put ontheir CV I'm proficient in word,
or whatever.
I was not proficient in word.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
I, for the for the first uh, maybe three, four
weeks of the in being in theprofession, when I was making
amendments, I was coloringthings in red and underlining
them rather than using trackchanges, because I didn't know
it existed, so I sped up quite alot when someone told me about
that there's an interestinginsight there isn't there the
(14:04):
presumption, the expectationthat people come with those
skills that perhaps you wouldconsider to be the sorts of
things that everyone has, andperhaps also a an indictment of
training as it is?
Can I go because I was going to?
Speaker 1 (14:17):
yeah sorry, I saw you about to talk, so I no, no,
that's fine.
I was gonna say I think I'm Ithink I've might banged on about
this a little bit in the past,on this podcast actually which
is that we're a funny bunch whenit comes to training and it is
a it is a very negativeexperience.
You mostly say what you'redoing wrong.
I mean, we've got the wonderfultraining manual, lovely
positive results there, we'vegot the informal lectures and
we've got loads of reallywilling attorneys who really
(14:38):
want to train the nextgeneration, as it were.
But even so, I sometimes feellike it is quite difficult
because it's mostly wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
That was it, that was it there?
Do that again.
She's a strange way.
It's a bit like AI training, Isuspect, isn't it?
You're just going to wait forthe reinforcement rather than
giving teaching at the outset.
(14:59):
It's a bit outcome-driven.
What do you think, tom?
You're the guest.
Speaker 4 (15:04):
I think that's true.
I think there's very much.
You're sometimes trying tofigure out exactly why it's
wrong and sometimes it can besubstantive You've got something
wrong with the law butsometimes it can be stylistic,
in that there's a lot of redline through how you've written
an argument, but actually theyhaven't changed the substance of
the argument, they've changedhow it's expressed, just because
(15:25):
they prefer a certain way ofwriting.
When I started, my boss wasfantastic.
He was able to put a lot oftime aside.
We would have, you know, one,two, sometimes even three hour
meetings where he'd really I'dwrite the response and instead
of giving me back red line, hewould take me through him fixing
(15:47):
it, which was great because Icould ask why he was changing
things, what, what exactly I'ddone wrong.
Sometimes it wasn't that I'ddone something wrong, it was the
stylistic thing that Imentioned.
And, yeah, I think that was areally positive way of training.
And I find I think it reallyjust depends how much time your
(16:07):
training partner can actuallymake for you, because at the end
of the day, they have to trainyou but they also have to do
their job and I think it can beprobably quite a hard thing to
balance.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Lee, is it time for a patent law school model?
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Yeah, you would look that way.
So you know that I come in withan educational background and
the first thing that I look forwas something that I recognised
as being normal sort of training.
And I think you quicklyunderstand that we're operating
in a world that's very differentfrom most other professions in
that we're bringing in peoplewho are already highly skilled
(16:40):
and have undertaken sort ofsignificant amounts of higher
education to get to the pointsthat they they are in their, in
their lives and in theirlearning firms work in many and
varied in different ways, inmany different formats, and it
would be difficult, I think, tohomogenize, if that's the right
word, the training in into somekind of school effect.
So we're probably doing thebest we can with a with a mixed
(17:04):
economy training model thatwe've got.
There's lots of things we cando to improve and we talk about
these all the time, but that wasa.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
That was a long way of saying no, I don't think so,
willem no, I mean, I don'teither actually, but I think I
think it takes too long.
I think we could streamline itpersonally.
But uh, I think you might callan intellectual apprenticeship.
Uh, in a sense, you know,because you're not learning,
you're learning a trade in yourown way.
It's just a more of a braintrade than a finger trade, but
there's so much kind ofpractical knives to it it's very
(17:33):
difficult to get, to get taughta lot of it except through
experience.
So I do think it's got quicker.
So one quick.
I know I'm banging on today, soI always remember remarking that
because I came in right at theend of the old, old training
model, which is you spent thefirst year going down to the
library and photocopying stuff.
That was pre-intern.
This is the time for theinternet on.
Genuinely it was bizarre.
(17:53):
So you go through microficheand get copies of patents and
things and that was literallyyour training for about a year.
It wasn't training at all, itwas just.
You were just cheap labor.
So that that's one of thereasons I think, historically,
why the period is so long totrain up is because it builds in
an entire year of photocopying,which obviously doesn't happen
anymore.
Speaker 4 (18:09):
But anyway, does that mean?
Did you do a year ofphotocopying and then sit the
the foundation exams or go toone of these Queen Mary style
courses?
Yeah, I did, queen Mary after ayear of photocopying, so you
were learning things really fromfirst principles at that point.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
Well, I was going to photocopy.
I mean, if they'd had a paperon that I would have nailed it.
You know, double-sided stapled,you name it.
I don't know if I've everphotocopied something.
Now he's feeling old.
Speaker 4 (18:39):
I'm feeling old as old.
I'm an old now, apology, no, Ido.
I, in terms of sort of the, thestandardizing of training, I
think it's.
It's a really hard thing, but Ieven within firms, because I,
when I was at my previous firm,it was really clear that
different people were kind ofbeing taught to work in
different ways and had differentworkloads.
(18:59):
Right, I didn't have that muchdrafting, but I had, and I was
kind of operating in a way thatI'd be given a response to do,
I'd do the response, I'd hand itback, whereas other people were
kind of given more drafting andmore.
Here's your case number.
You're in charge of this case,come and talk to me when you
need help, and so, even withinone firm, it seems like it's not
(19:22):
, it's not sort of completelystandardized, and I do think
that some level of making sureeveryone's get equal training is
definitely something we shouldtry and work towards, because
you can't you have the examsthat say whether or not you're
fit to practice, but it you knowyou can study for those and
they're not not that reflectiveof real, real practice, and so
(19:43):
making sure everyone's kind ofgetting this, a similarish
experience, is quite important,I think should we talk a little
bit about the sepa experience,because obviously you'd have
been also new to the world ofsomething like sepa professional
body and I know that that canbe it we do in the earliest
times in a in a new student'slife.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
In fact we've got one next week we have our student
induction days, so we do ourbest to try and enable our
students to understand what SEPAis, what it does, how it can
support them, how it works sortof more broadly in the best
interest of the profession andthe IP system.
How's it felt being a member ofSIPA?
Speaker 4 (20:19):
well, I mean, I I'll be honest, I don't.
I never feel I feel like Idon't fully appreciate what SIPA
do.
And I still feel like I don'tfully appreciate what SIPA do,
which is part of the reason thatI wanted to start, as the ONSEC
is, so I could go along tothese council meetings and get
an actual, you know proper, ideaof of what's going on in terms,
(20:40):
I guess, by super member.
I was a student member from thebeginning but I didn't really
know what that meant.
But being an informalscommittee member meant that I
kind of at least had an idea ofwhat we did for students.
I still don't necessarily havethe best idea of what we do for
you know, I suppose the terms,fellows, is that is that right?
(21:01):
Yeah, yeah, I'm not I that I'mstill learning, but in terms of
students, I think, I think whatwe do is great.
I think it's really importantthat we we do all this regional
sec and we really kind of dividethe regions into quite granular
regions so we can provide anopportunity for them to meet
each other and socialize.
And for me, that was a hugedeal when I started because,
(21:24):
again, as I said, I startedduring the lockdown and there
was no, no real way to meetpeople.
So joining the committee partlyfor me was so I could meet
people and then kind of helppeople meet each other, and
that's been fantastic, that'sone of the Willem knew what
Super does because he's a fellow.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
he should know it's a membership organisation.
Well done, well done.
I've trained him well, it's not, and it's.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I know what it is.
Mostly he just says what itisn't, normally, with some swear
words in the middle of it.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
But it's not a representative body it's not a
representative body, it's a.
It's a membership organization.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I think it is a representative body.
It's not a trade union.
That's.
It's a representative body, nota trade union.
I see that's what it isn't.
Also hang on.
There's another thing it alsoused to have a regulatory role,
but now it's delegated that yeah, that's absolutely right.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
And um, yeah, the regulatory role was always a big
part of c for personality andand now it isn't.
But I mean it's interesting,tom, because obviously it's my
job to try and help our membersunderstand what it is that we do
.
And it's probably the mostdifficult part of the job
because you are.
You are different things todifferent types of member at
different times and sooccasionally it needs something
big to come along.
(22:31):
William's going to get reallybored now because I'm going to
say cptpp, but it needs.
It needs something big to comealong, like the cptpp campaign
we did over a couple of years,where everyone can recognize
that here is this thing that'scoming along and it's big for
the profession and it could bepotentially injurious to us.
And CIPA steps in and it doesits kind of campaigning and its
work and it gets us to aposition whereby we're more
(22:53):
comfortable with how the UKjoining something like CPTPP
might look like and it won'timpact badly on the profession.
Everyone will go, oh, wow,amazing.
And then everyone then forgetsimmediately what SEPA is and
what it does, because it willmean different things to
different people.
That is one of the great butalso disturbing things about
working in a professional body,I think.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
It's a bit like aircraft pilots you don't really
notice until you're about tocrash the aeroplane and suddenly
someone says where's super whenyou need them.
So I think one of the things Ithink I've been quite noticeable
is how, when there was a crisis, everyone said what's super
doing about it?
But it is there when you needit.
There's doing tons and tons allthe time as well yeah, I don't
actually even know what the cppis.
Speaker 4 (23:30):
I don't have the letters down.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
it's easy for you to say I don't think we've.
I don't think we've got time totalk about CPTPP, the
Comprehensive and ProgressiveAgreement for Trans-Pacific
Partnership, which was sort oflike a trading bloc that the UK
wanted to join and has now infact joined, whereby the IP
(23:54):
provisions of the CPTPP weredifferent enough from the EPC
that could have potentiallycaused some conflict and some
issues for us and ultimately,questions about our role in the
EPC if we were potentiallycaused some conflict and some
issues for us and ultimately,questions about our role in the
EPC if we were committed to theCPTPP.
So we just had to navigate that.
We had to help governmentnavigate its way through that so
that it could join the CPTPPwithout any unintended
consequences.
And that's a difficult gigbecause government just want to
(24:15):
get trade deals over the line.
That's what they want to do andthey don't want a bunch of
geeky people coming along andsaying, oh yeah, but you really
need to focus on this reallyniche bit of IP law and get that
right, otherwise you're goingto potentially damage something
else.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
But they listened to us and we got there the UN's up
in front of all kinds ofimportant select committees or
something.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Oh yeah, no, I gave gave evidence to parliament,
which was quite cool oh wow, inin the houses of parliament yeah
, unfortunately it was on zoomtom, because it was again.
It was.
It was covid times.
So, um, which also helps you alittle bit, doesn't it?
Because you can have some notesdiscreetly hidden and stuff
like that.
So there is, there is theadvantage that you look like you
know what you're talking about,when in fact you've got a
screen behind you with lots ofstatements on it that you know
(24:56):
that you need to to get overthat would have been a really
good idea for this podcast.
Actually, I should have no, wenever do notes so so you are.
You are now the new on tech ofthe informals and a bit like the
super president.
Each year, obviously, the onsetcomes in with some sort of
thoughts or ideas about whatthey want to achieve in their
time and office what, what'syours?
(25:17):
What, what are the biggies onyour radar?
Speaker 4 (25:19):
well, one of them is really boring, which is just
streamlining the relationshipbetween the informals and the,
you know, the big supercommittee, because I think
there's somewhat of a smalldisconnect in between what we
think we do and what big councilthinks we do, because I think
traditionally there were someparts that were run by the
(25:41):
informals, like the ip ball andother bits like that, that we no
longer think are part of us,but I think, because of the way
it used to be ran, cpa did thinkwere part of us.
So we kind of just want to kindof get our terms of reference
down and understand what ourrole is and how we can kind of
help our student members andalso interact with big seeper,
(26:05):
so that we we kind of I don'tknow have that, have that all
down, which is not the mostinteresting role, but I just I
feel like that relationship isreally important and that we
really want to tie that down.
And then the other the otherone is I have this idea or
desire to bring back dragon boatracing, um, which I don't know.
(26:25):
I don't know a lot about it,but I hear, I hear lots of
people talking about the olddays where there was dragon boat
racing.
It was a really good event andused to row down the thames and
I, I, we, I kind of want to seeif something like that could be
brought back, or at least some.
I want to have some new eventthat we offer, either between us
(26:45):
and Big SEPA Council or as aninformals event, just to kind of
almost.
Well, you said it in yourspeech at the SEPA Council
actually is kind of puttingmembers first, and I feel like
we could be doing more in termsof networking our trainee
members and even maybeintegrating that with you know,
(27:05):
the fellows.
So having a big event wherethey can all meet each other and
have a good day out but alsomeet other people in the
profession, that's kind of whatI want to do.
So it's two things streamliningand a big old event.
Speaker 3 (27:20):
So really really important policy interconnecting
, getting stuff sorted androwing down the Thames.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
You got it.
I've done dragon boatingactually.
I did it when I went toSingapore and we had a guest,
vandita, who's a big fan ofdragon boating actually, so she
told me to do it when I went toSingapore.
It is brilliant, really cool.
We should do it.
I think we can just decide thatnow, can't we?
Speaker 3 (27:42):
yeah, so every day is a school day, isn't it?
And it's the first time I'vebeen see for over 13 years now.
It's the first time anyone'sever said to me cp used to do
dragon boat racing.
I've never heard that.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
I've never heard that really oh yeah, I wonder where
where this is, because I've yeah, I've been spoken to about it
by a few.
Speaker 3 (27:58):
It doesn't mean that we didn't used to do it.
It just means that no one'sever said it to me.
Speaker 4 (28:02):
No, but in the last 13 years.
I would be surprised if it wasprior to that, that's
interesting, it must be.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
Maybe there were fatalities or something.
Perhaps that's why we don't doit.
It's kind of scuppered.
My plan, which is to ask youabout it yeah, no wait, wasted
on me, but there will be one ortwo, as I think.
Maybe ask ian, who looks afterthe journal.
There will be some peoplewho've been around for long
enough that they will know thatthis has happened and will
possibly even have some gen onit.
Speaker 4 (28:28):
So I'll see what I can find out for you yeah,
otherwise it might be a pipedream, but you know that's fine,
you could.
If you achieve one of your twogoals, then then you're doing a
good job.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
Absolutely yeah, that's 50% success.
Right, yeah, that's a pass, andarguably the most important 50%
, unless, of course, you reallywant to go dragon boating down
the Thames, which I really wantto do now.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
Honestly, it'd be amazing, it'd be brilliant, it's
a great idea.
Speaker 3 (28:53):
Except in my head I've now got some kind of like
tyrene warfare thing going onwhere we do a bit of ramming and
um, but that's probably not notallowed although it could be,
could be fun we could do thatwith sitmar well, I think.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
I think they used to have teams from different.
I think the epo entered a teamone year.
In fact, I was told that theepo entered a team, absolutely
destroyed everyone else, andthat was one of the reasons that
they stopped it, because theygot really good at it oh, I've
never heard any of this.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
Leave that's any help no, it's just um.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
And now, if we're going to get really, really
competitive, I'm thinking aboutother things.
So my uh, a pub not terriblyfar from me which is on a really
good stretch of water, do thisfor charity annual raft race
thing.
But the rafts over the yearshave got more and more
extraordinary in their designand construction and the way
people go about it.
So I'm now thinking how perhapsmaybe in addition to or instead
(29:44):
of dragon boat racing, weshould have some kind of
eclectic raft buildingcompetition and race.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
That could be quite fun the pattern of things would
get soapbox racing, but on waterattorneys would get too
embedded in the.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
Have we invented something new or novel here?
Rather than just cracking onand building it?
We can do the whole thing undernda.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
It'd be fine, just to under nda.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
That's not a problem, that's a legal solution well
until you put it on the waterand then, and then you've got
public disclosure you'll bepleased to know, tom, given our
little conversation before westarted, that we're nearly at 40
minutes, which makes whichmakes you an exciting guest, an
interesting guest oh man, I'vemade it so but before, before we
sort of sign off, there's twothings that we normally.
(30:25):
First of all, we ask you ifthere's anything else you want
to say, because obviously you'vetold us lots, um, but there
might there might be questionswe've forgotten to ask you or
things that you thought, oh yeah, must get that in.
So anything else you want toadd?
Speaker 4 (30:34):
I don't think so cool .
Speaker 3 (30:35):
Cool, okay, then.
Speaker 4 (30:36):
Yeah, I guess I haven't mentioned moving firm,
but I don't know if that's thatinteresting.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
I had one question on that, if that's okay, just
quickly.
Actually, which is just what'sit?
Like you said, it was a bitdifferent working in a law firm
versus a straight kind ofboutique IP firm.
First of all, why the move forthat different model and
secondly, what's different?
Speaker 4 (30:55):
Yeah, I mean I moved because I wanted to do different
work.
As I said, I didn't get a lotof drafting and we had a client
who you could only write yourresponses in a really specific
way, which was fantastic fortraining.
But I kind of wanted to trysomething a bit different and I
suppose, flexed my slightlycreative muscle in writing my
own arguments rather thanwriting it in this specific way
(31:22):
arguments rather than writing itin this specific way.
And another aspect this jobkind of came up and my original
boss who trained me the guy thatI said was great and put aside
all that time for me he hadmoved across to this firm a year
before and this opportunityopened up and I saw it was there
and I thought, wow, okay, Icould have the possibility to
work with him and thepossibility to do all this new
kind of work.
And it is fantastic.
(31:45):
I'd never worked anythinginfringement before and after
having sat the infringementvalidity paper, which is
notoriously difficult, Iactually got the opportunity to
work on some infringement cases.
One of them, without anyobviously disclosing any
confidential information, wasabout hoverboards which required
(32:05):
us to buy some hoverboards,take them apart, look inside to
see whether you know thearrangement of the stuff was
infringing, but then afterwardswe just got to ride some
hoverboards around the office,which was great fun.
So everyone there is lovely andyou get such a bigger variety
of work than just the kind ofprosecution that I was doing
before.
So that was the reason I movedand actually it's been a really
(32:28):
really good move, a reallypositive experience.
Speaker 3 (32:31):
So I think we're there.
I think we're there, we'rethere abouts, but wait.
So Gwilym and I have thislittle thing, tom, where we do a
slightly tangential closingquestion and where we do a
slightly tangential closingquestion and normally I come up
with them.
Sometimes william comes up withthem.
I ought to check.
Have you got one?
I've got one, good, but it's abit boring.
Not boring, but it's a bitobvious, I would say uh have you
got one?
Speaker 1 (32:49):
I've got a silly one.
Obviously I'm happy to let's gowith yours.
I'll tell you what one was yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
So so the way this works then, tom, is I'll ask
william, I'll then ask you, andthen william, I throw it back at
me.
Um, I haven't actually thoughtabout my answer in advance this
time, william.
The question is so ordinarily,tom, I've already come up with a
really clever answer and Iframe my question around it, so
that makes me look really eitherincredibly naturally funny or
intelligent or any of thosethings.
Uh, this time around it's justcome about because of where we
(33:16):
started the conversation on thepodcast.
So, guillem, I was wondering,um, if there's anything in your
life that sort of likefrustrates you, annoys you, um,
grates with you, and if youcould invent yourself a little
micro robot to um to do itinstead, what, what would that
thing be?
Speaker 1 (33:31):
yeah, that's my question, uh, but but um robots,
the only difference thing ofrobots swarm, so I think okay
let's, let's go with the swarm.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
That makes it even more difficult for me.
Tom tom obviously can't answerthis from a nuclear perspective.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
It has to be, something else and I mean I
think, I mean I'm not convincedI wouldn't want just a 20 foot
six inch wide robot as well.
That's, that's another option.
But if I'm gonna have a swarm,a dishwasher swarm, in back it,
clear it.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
I'd have one stacking robot because you're doing the
washing, because I'm, becauseyour dishwasher does that.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
You know that yeah yeah, they're stacking and
unstacking.
So, one week, gravitationallyattracted in gravitationally,
bring the plates and everythingto the right place.
Another one be, and it's justas if you repulsed out with all
the, all the clean stuff.
And there'll be a third onewhich is to put your way, which
be gravitationally attracted tothe drawers to put them all away
.
And then you'd need a specialone, I reckon, for cutlery.
That's a swarm.
(34:22):
That's four already, and I'dlove to see some emergent
behaviors because, as far as I'mconcerned, I'd love to see how
they actually if it's anythinglike the emergent behaviors in
my family, when we're doing adishwasher, they just yell at
each other.
I've been paying attention, bythe way paying attention.
Speaker 4 (34:35):
That was, that was that was.
Speaker 3 (34:36):
You could write a thesis on that well, so what
would you do to make your lifeimmediately better?
Tom, and obviously, knowingthat this is your expertise,
you're gonna have a cracker.
Speaker 4 (34:46):
So well, I well the problem is there already exists
a solution to the problem I have, which is I hate mopping and
hoovering, and there alreadyexists mopping and hoovering
robots.
Speaker 3 (34:55):
So that's the actual, honest answer.
Speaker 4 (34:57):
But if I I was going to invent something, which I
think was the kind of core ofthe question, something to help
with the cat, something to ourcat, as I said, she, she, she's
a bit of a.
She comes in here, she meows atme, she, she's a really sort of
hoity toity cat and I think itwould be great to have a robot,
you know, a swarm one robot thatcan brush her, one robot that
(35:18):
can clean her poo, one robotthat can brush her, one robot
that can clean her poo, onerobot that can feed her and just
generally make her feel, youknow, well, taken care of, and
then not not come and bother mewhile I'm working so that's
really good because mine grillI'm, if you're interested, if
you're going to ask me the samequestion oh yeah, what's your
robot?
Speaker 3 (35:35):
so mine is pet related too and it's only really
just come to me whilst we'vebeen thinking.
But, as, as Grillam and anyonewho listens to the podcast knows
, I have a tortoise and andtortoises are notoriously
difficult to hibernate.
I know that sounds daft.
They're not.
Obviously.
You chuck them in a box andchuck them somewhere reasonably
cold and they just stay there.
But but the way that theclimate's changing, it's getting
(35:57):
more and more difficult becauseyou just can't chuck them down
your shed or in an outbuilding,because it will either be too
warm and they'll be awake allthe time and they'll be burning
energy, or so cold that theyfreeze to death.
Uh.
So those sorts of days havegone.
So we hibernate albert in uh,in a beer fridge, and but you
have to monitor them.
So every day I have to go andcheck the temperature.
(36:17):
I mean, I've got an internaland external thermostat and you
kind of have to go and tickletheir feet just to make sure
they move, and occasionally youtake a look at the head just to
make sure that he's still gotclear eyes and stuff like that.
Yeah, it'd be lovely.
So I'd have a little swarm ofrobots that would probably live
in the fridge with him andforever be monitoring his every
lack of movement rather thanmovement and the ecosystem that
(36:39):
he's living within, and thenreport that to me in some way,
shape or form, and over timeperhaps they would learn enough
about hibernation behavior thatI would never need to worry
again.
So I just I just pop him in thefridge and I could shut the
door and he's all looked after.
So that's what I'd do.
Could just get a robot tortoise.
I think that's probably a greatplace to end it.
Gullum't it.
That's where, where, where,where else to go beyond that and
(37:01):
I you know that now I'm nowgoing to start thinking about it
, making a robot tortoise.
That's I, I, I will have, Iwill have one by the summer, or
at least something that lookslike a robot tortoise, even if
it doesn't work like like a croctom.
Thanks so much for coming on.
Apologies, it's got a bit daftat times, but that tends to be
(37:21):
the way it goes.
Um, thank you.
Thank you for having me good.
Good luck with the year ahead.
Uh, it's great having you onsuper council.
It's always good to have thesort of student perspective on
council.
It sort of keeps council freshand vibrant and in touch with um
where the profession's going,and I think that's a really
important feature of only ontech on council.
Good thanks, forcil Gwilym.
Thanks for appearing on thepodcast again with me.
I don't know how many we're upto now, but it seems like we've
(37:43):
done so many of these that we'restarting to get quite good at
them.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
I just enjoy wanting to be interested.
Just something occasionally,not about IP, is quite fun
actually.
Speaker 3 (37:52):
You learn so much, don't you?
You learn so much every day ofthe school day yeah um, yeah, if
you've listened to the podcastI'm not talking to either of you
two now, I'm talking to ourlisteners.
If you've listened to thepodcast and you've enjoyed it,
uh, leave us a little reviewsomewhere in the internet web
thingy so that other people canfind us, because, uh, we're keen
to grow the listenership andthe best way to do that is if
you, kind people, tell the restof the world about who we are,
(38:13):
what we do.
Um, I'll see you on the nextone, tom, I'll see you either at
council or I know this dates itbut if you're the president's
reception tonight, I'll see youthere, see you soon Outro Music.
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