Remembering Nathan ‘Natty’ Robb
MONTEGO BAY, St James —
Tributes continue to come in for prominent attorney-at-law and former president of the Montego Bay Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MBCCI) Nathan “Natty” Robb who died last week after suffering from a stroke.
President of the Global Services Association of Jamaica (GSAJ), Gloria Henry, saluted Robb for being what she described as a “very passionate Montegonian”, noting that he would always go beyond the call of duty for the city of Montego Bay.
“Nathan Robb was a very passionate Montegonian who would always extend himself to support any cause that would benefit the city and its people. He was steadfast about the development of downtown Montego Bay and would argue in favour of projects that enhanced the development of that business community and its members,” said Henry, who is also a former president of the MBCCI.
“He was instrumental in the establishment of a local branch of the Firearm Licensing Authority in the region and was a strong voice supporting the lobby for a justice centre. He was not afraid to articulate his views, even if they were controversial. I extend condolences to his family, management and staff at Clark, Robb and Company.”
Chairman of the Tourism Enhancement Fund (TEF), Godfrey Dyer, who is also a former MBCCI president, told the Jamaica Observer West that Robb “was somebody that everybody appreciated.”
“Mr Robb was a gentleman of very strong opinion, he said what he meant and meant what he said. Very good gentleman, someone you could depend on. He was somebody that everybody appreciated,” said Dyer.
Robb also served as chairman of the Montego Bay Community College and is being hailed by former fellow board member and manager of the Jamaica Observer, Western Region, Cheddi Van Creighton, for his commitment to the development of the tertiary institution.
Van Creighton also noted that Robb’s sense of humour “lightened the load” in a lot of board meetings.
“I can tell you that Nathan was funny; he had a great sense of humour that, you know, lightened the load when you have to be sitting in those board meetings for an extended period. To have somebody like Nathan to break up the monotony with his humour was something that you had to see to believe. He was an extremely funny individual,” said Van Creighton.
Van Creighton, who was also Robb’s vice-president during his tenure at the MBCCI, recounted a memory he shared with the late attorney at a Montego Bay Community College retreat.
“We had a retreat for the Montego Bay Community College, where we were meeting over the course of a weekend, and I can tell you there was one particular occasion where he had us rolling from one joke for the entire weekend. After he [said] that joke, we started every meeting with the continuation of that joke. As professional as he was and businesslike as he was, anybody who did not know him would not know that [he] was one of the most humourous people out there,” said Van Creighton.
Businessman and MBCCI director Anthony Pearson, who shared many years of friendship with Robb, told the Observer West that they both had a “love for a good pen.” This mutual love, he said, made for good conversations and laughter between the two men.
“What certainly stood out is our mutual love for a good pen. He had this passion for pens, and I guess we kind of shared that similar passion for the Montblanc pen and up to recently there is this new one that is out, and I was fortunate to acquire it and he saw it in my pocket, took it out and made good mention that he also had one. So, that is something that we always spoke about, who is coming out with a new pen, and I guess who got it first,” Pearson noted.
Robb also had a passion for wrist watches said attorneys-at-law Shelly-Ann Hyman and Michael Hemmings.
The attorneys told the Observer West that this passion made for good conversations during breaks at court.
“He was really passionate about watches. The last time that I saw him, he was at court, and he was explaining to us the benefits of buying a solid watch, but the problem was Nathan was the only person in the room who could afford that watch. He kept saying to us ‘if you are going to buy a watch, you have to buy a good watch and it has to be worth it.’ I would have to sell both kidneys and probably my arms to purchase that watch, but I had to laugh because of how passionate he was about it,” said Hyman.
“He always had on a timeless piece. I heard he had [a] 50th anniversary Rolex up for sale, of which I had an interest. He said, ‘Hemmings write down the price you would pay me for it on this piece of paper.’ I did, he smiled and said in a deep voice, ‘you are cooking with gas. I will call to discuss it further.’ This was a mere month ago. He will be truly missed,” said Hemmings.
Immediate past president of the Cornwall Bar Association, attorney-at-law Lambert Johnson, said Robb, a Cornwall College old boy, was a passionate ‘Man of Might’, who “brought great honour and glory” to his alma mater.
“I was very happy I was able to share the same alma mater with him because he too was a Cornwall College old boy and so, I know by the way he conducted himself, he has brought great honour and glory to Cornwall College. He deeply loved his school, like me, and he would have done any and everything that he could to ensure that the name of Cornwall College was kept in the cloud,” Johnson said.
It was a privilege to work with Robb, said Johnson, who highlighted that the late attorney was exceptional at what he did, as he was passionate about the law and was always eager to work with young lawyers.
“Working with him, he was, while not the perfectionist, he always wanted things done properly and in a certain fashion. He was always open to a discussion to ensure that if you did not understand something, he would provide guidance and if there was any attitude for compromise or discussion to ensure that matters would move forward, he would be the first to suggest it. He loved working with young counsels, he loved the law and he embodied what it was to be an exceptional attorney,” he told the Observer West.
3 Most Common Types Of Intellectual Property And What To Know About The Varying Levels Of Protection
The term “intellectual property” is a bit like the term “organic.” Most people have some idea of what it means, but aren’t exactly clear on the specifics.
Nearly every law student takes a class called “Property,” which relates to laws and regulation of “real property,” (i.e., land). One way that real property owners designate the boundaries of their land is by putting a fence around it. If an unauthorized person enters the protected land, it is called trespassing. Similarly, intellectual property forms a virtual fence around the property it protects. If an unauthorized person crosses the fence, it is called infringement.
The three most common types of intellectual property are patents, trademarks and copyrights, and they each provide different and varying levels of protection.
Patents
Patents, specifically, utility patents as opposed to design patents, protect inventions that are new and nonobvious over existing technology known as prior art. An issued patent describes the features of an invention and how it works in significant written and illustrated detail. Despite what may be described about an invention, a utility patent only protects what is claimed, (i.e., what is provided in the numbered sentences at the end of a patent). The claims form a virtual fence around an invention and allow the patent owner to prevent others from making, using or selling the invention protected by the fence without authorization. Generally, utility patents provide protection for 20 years from the date of filing.
As an example of a claim, assume someone has invented the pencil and has described their pencil in detail in the patent. A claim at the end of the patent may recite “A writing instrument comprising an elongate body and a marking material protruding from the elongate body.” If an unauthorized entity now makes, uses or sells a pencil that has these claimed features, the patent owner could sue for patent infringement. Notice how the pencil claim could also cover other writing instruments such as a pen or even a tube of lipstick, both of which may have an elongate body and a marking material protruding from the elongate body.
Trademarks
Trademarks, commonly brand names and logos, are source identifiers that are intended to protect the public from confusion about the origin of goods and services. Trademark protection, unlike patent and trademark protection, can last forever provided the trademark owner renews their protection at appropriate intervals. The mere mention of famous trademarks like Coca-Cola, Rolex and Honda immediately bring to mind not only particular goods, but also characteristics and a certain level of quality, high or low, associated with those goods. When a consumer buys a Rolex, the expectation is for the watch to operate with precision as a fine piece of machinery and last a long time.
If an unauthorized user sells a watch with the Rolex name, but having characteristics and quality that are significantly lower than a genuine Rolex, a purchaser may be confused and may purchase the counterfeit Rolex for a high price expecting it to be a Rolex when it is in fact of much poorer quality. While fewer people buying a Rolex from a street vendor may be confused as to the expected quality of that watch, there are reasonably high-quality superfakes, which contribute to an estimated 40 million counterfeit watches sold globally each year, the net profit of which is roughly $1 billion, according to TechCrunch.
Copyrights
Finally, copyrights protect works of authorship, such as novels, music and lyrics, paintings and software, among many others. Providing protection to authors fosters and induces creativity and original ideas and allows those who create original works to profit from their works. Copyrights last for the life of the author plus 70 years, or in cases of a work-made-for-hire, the shorter of 95 years from publication or 120 years from creation.
With a significant amount of content being available seemingly for free on the internet, there are countless examples of unauthorized users reproducing such content for their own benefit, only to have to pay substantial monetary damages to the copyright owner who successfully enforces their rights. As a practical tip, when using someone else’s creative work for your own purposes, think about what rights the author may have and whether you may need their permission to use their work. By proceeding blindly, you may be taking an unnecessary risk of committing copyright infringement and may have to face the legal and monetary consequences that follow.
Originally published in L.A. BIZ
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
Why Is There a Domino’s Logo on This Rolex?
“You see this watch?” a smug, young and skinny Alec Baldwin asks during his “Always Be Closing” speech at the beginning of Glengarry Glen Ross. He waves his gold Rolex DayDate in front of Ed Harris’s face before setting it down on his desk. “That watch costs more than your car. I made $970,000 last year…that’s who I am.”
Of course Baldwin’s venomous “motivational” diatribe would include a gold Rolex. It’s perfect. A character who defines himself so much by his wealth would wear the one brand that is universally synonymous with status, power and success. Baldwin’s particular model of Rolex is nicknamed the “President,” for God’s sake.
I wonder how Baldwin’s character would feel about a Rolex Air-King — the 34mm dateless three-hander that, until being discontinued in 2014 (and subsequently revived at a large diameter), was Rolex’s entry-level watch — loudly branded with the familiar red-and-white logo of the world’s second-largest pizza chain. Look on any number of online vintage watch dealers and you’ll see them pop up from time to time: Domino’s Rolexes. So how did one of the world’s foremost watchmakers end up producing a watch for the official pizza of laser-tag parties?
Other exercises in horological employee rewards? The Coca-Cola and Winn-Dixie dials.
Domino’s began incentivizing its franchisees with Rolex in 1977 when Domino’s Pizza founder and CEO Tom Monaghan gave a high-earning franchise owner the watch off his wrist. In his 1986 autobiography, Pizza Tiger, Monaghan wrote, “I wore a Bulova with our Domino’s logo on its face. A franchisee asked what he had to do to get that watch from me, and I told him, ‘Turn in a twenty-thousand-dollar sales week.’ He did it.”
After that, Managhan began giving away Seikos to top earners. Then he upped the ante with “hundreds of $800 Rolexes.” In the early days of what is now known as the Rolex Challenge, turning in $20,000 in sales one week at Domino’s would get you a Rolex. (Break $10,000 and you’d get an Hermés tie.) But as Rolex prices increased, so did the stakes. Domino’s continued to give out branded Rolexes, but a franchise needed to hit $25,000 in sales in a week — four weeks in a row. According to a Domino’s spokesperson, a franchise would pull in closer to $17,000 in sales a week, on average.
“As soon as I realized the challenges were attainable, I starting to work hard for them,” said Hannah Lantz, a Domino’s Franchisee. “I have won five times, including at the $45,000 and $50,000 level. Fifty thousand dollars is a lot of pizza per week. It required growing the staff and more preparation.”
I wore a Bulova with our logo on its face. A franchisee asked what he had to do to get that watch from me, and I told him, ‘Turn in a twenty-thousand-dollar sales week.’ He did it.
As a means of motivation, Monaghan’s use of Rolexes as incentives seem incredibly more effective than the “fuck you, look at my watch” method employed in Glengarry Glen Ross. In his essay “The CEO as a Corporate Myth-Maker,” Wayne State Literature and Folklore Professor Richard Raspa suggests that Monaghan believed “everyone who worked at Domino’s was a potential replica of the founder.” That offering employees the same kind of luxury pens, ties and watches he owned — even the one off his own wrist — would bestow them with the same kind of entrepreneurial power Monaghan possessed to turn a Ypsilanti, Michigan pizza parlor into one of the biggest fast food franchises in the world.
Christies
As for the watches themselves, the ones that show up on the secondhand market have become oddball collectibles, selling at over what you’d normally expect to pay for a vintage Air-King. (They are more easily found than Rolexes branded by companies like Winn-Dixie and Coca-Cola, which gave their watches away for years of service rather than monetary goals.) Still, the Domino’s logo is a divisive feature. An image of one on our own Instagram page garnered over 60 comments ranging from “I LOVE branded Rolexes, un-sarcastically” to “Ugh, what a travesty.”
“That Rolex gets more attention in my window than any other Rolex, except maybe the vintage Submariner,” said Steve Kivel, president of Central Watch in Grand Central Station, where a Domino’s Air-King sat in the shop window with a $3,595 price tag. “I think it’s colorful and unusual, and that is rare for a Rolex vintage watch. Anytime you have something different from the normal black- or silver-dial Rolex, it draws a lot of interest, and usually will be more valuable.”
When asked how long the watch was on sale at Central Watch, Kivel admitted it sat for several months. “Sometimes being so unique is not for everybody,” he said.
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