by Desislava Stankova | Feb 23, 2015 | Biotechnology Law, News and Events
THE ENIGMA OF HUMAN ENHANCEMENT. CAN WE MEET SUPERHEROES ON THE STREET? Imagine being tall, blond, blue-eyed, young, beautiful, always in a good mood, fit, good in science, with strong talent in sports and maybe in music. What if most of the people you knew were just like that, too? Superhuman? Well, probably you had to use some technology to become that perfect (and I do not mean breast augmentation), but obviously not everybody is born flawless. It is becoming and it may become even more possible to extend human capacities beyond their normal healthy state. A movement called transhumanism grows very popular lately. Its goal is to fundamentally transform humans by developing and making widely available technologies to greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities. Technologies will include the convergence of nano, bio, information and cognitive technologies. Here are the top 5 ways we humans may be enhanced into superhumans (or posthumans as transhumanists refer the person after enhancement) in the future. What do you want to enhance about yourself? Who Wants to Live Forever? Currently the average person would live to about 80 years if in Europe, or 87 if in Japan. Or 50 in Somalia. Anyhow, it is considerably longer compared to 20-34 as in Stone Age, which may be considered the normal life span of our kind. So, obviously life span has been enhanced in the ages to reach its current expectancy. To read the full article, check Chicoverdose where it was originally...
by Desislava Stankova | Feb 16, 2015 | News and Events
It may sound cliché, but the time I spent studying at Tilburg University (UvT) was one of the most exciting periods of my life. Not only I have got to the depths of law and technology, but I have also met many incredible inspiring people from just about everywhere. The whole experience made me feel at home in Tilburg – it was the right thing to do at the right time and place. For the above reasons, it is not surprising that I was very excited when UvT contacted me recently for an alumni interview about my experience with the university and the program I have studied. It was a true pleasure to answer several questions and I hope my point of view can help prospective students on the very important decision whether to spend a year studying this particular program. My favorite question was about who or what gives me inspiration – because above all, we must be inspired and passionate about what we do, don`t you think? Interested to read my full interview on Tilburg University official website?...
by Desislava Stankova | Feb 10, 2015 | Contracting, E-Commerce, Intellectual Property, Liability and the Internet, News and Events, Privacy and Data Protection
So, you want to start an online business? It is easy, isn’t it – you get a domain, buy a hosting, setup a web site and, voila, you are cashing in 24/7. Right? Wrooong! You forgot the lawyers. There are tons of them and they can make your life hell. If you don’t want this to happen, you need to figure out some crucial stuff in the “Big L”-area. Spell it with me: L-E-G-A-L-S-T-U-F-F. E-commerce offers endless opportunities with the unlimited number of potential worldwide customers, the ease of purchasing a product from each location, the optimization of business processes. However anyone engaged in it should keep in mind that laws and rules exist online as much as they do offline. Knowing the legal aspect of e-commerce turns out to be one of the key factors about online business success. Since it is a wide topic and a professional legal advice is needed in each particular case, this post will only sketch the applicable legal requirements. B2B online relations differ from B2C ones, mainly in the more rigorous standard to ensure safety and consumer protection in B2C web businesses, but in order to summarize, these are the main legal aspects of e-commerce, particularly in the EU. Light Bulb One: Protect Your Most Precious Asset One of the very first steps to be taken is the domain name registration and its protection. It is important due to the fact that the domain name contract, which is basically a service agreement, protects the domain name in the relation between the parties to this agreement, but it could not automatically offer protection...
