The (unclear) relationship between a personalised price term and the unfair contractual terms directive

Given the persistent advance of technology and data science, it is predictable that the practice of price personalisation will become more common and sophisticated. It is therefore up to the Law to intervene and regulate this new commercial practice in order to ensure consumer protection. In this context, transparency requirements can play a key role. In this sense, the European legislator implemented a new pre-contractual information duty, which will be included in the Consumer Rights Directive - new Article 6(ea). Under this new paragraph, the consumer has to be informed if the price was personalised on the basis of automated decision-making. Even though this requirement is very welcome, it raises several questions. Thus, part of this work will be dedicated to its detailed analysis, namely its scope, form, content and level of detail, as well as its importance for the consumer’s life. In addition, we will also offer the interpretation that we consider the most adequate. Since this new transparency requirement is not applied in an isolated manner, it is important to take into consideration its relationship with the remaining legal instruments, namely the Directive on unfair terms in consumer contracts (UCTD). Although it contains already a transparency requirement, we believe that both can be interpreted in a cohesive way. Under the UCTD, it is clear that if a personalised price term is not transparent, it will be subject to the unfairness test of Article 3, requiring, to that end, some effort and adaptation by national courts. On the contrary, if the term is transparent, we argue that, based on a teleological interpretation, it is still possible to submit the personalised price term to this assessment. In the final part of our work, we decided to address the consequences of the declaration of the unfair nature of a personalised price term. In the light of the UCTD, this term will have to be eliminated which, in turn, will lead, in our view, to the nullity of the entire contract. Exceptionally, if such an annulment gives rise to some particularly unfavourable consequences for the consumer, the performance of the contract should continue, with the replacement of the personalised price term - either by a new price negotiated by the parties or by a supplementary rule of national law (at the limit, in the absence of such a rule, by the nonpersonalised price).Atendendo ao avanço persistente da tecnologia e da ciência dos dados é previsível que a personalização de preços se torne mais comum e sofisticada. Com efeito, incumbe ao Direito acompanhar e regular esta nova prática comercial, a fim de garantir a proteção do consumidor. Neste contexto, as exigências de transparência podem desempenhar um papel essencial. Neste sentido, o legislador europeu aprovou um novo dever de informação précontratual, que será incluído na Diretiva relativa aos Direitos dos Consumidores – novo Artigo 6(ea). Nos termos do mesmo, a circunstância do preço ter sido personalizado com recurso a automatização terá de ser informada ao consumidor. Pese embora este requisito seja muito bem-vindo, a verdade é que o mesmo levanta diversas questões. Desta forma, parte do presente trabalho será dedicada à sua análise detalhada, designadamente ao seu escopo, forma, conteúdo e nível de detalhe, bem como a sua relevância para a vida do consumidor. Adicionalmente, iremos oferecer a interpretação que consideramos mais adequada. Uma vez que este novo requisito de transparência não se aplica de forma isolada, importa ter presente a sua relação com os restantes instrumentos jurídicos, nomeadamente com a Diretiva relativa às cláusulas abusivas nos contratos celebrados com os consumidores (UCTD). Embora a mesma também preveja um requisito de transparência, cremos que ambos podem ser interpretados de forma coesa. No âmbito da UCTD, é evidente que se a uma cláusula de preço personalizado não é transparente, a mesma estará sujeita ao teste de carácter abusivo do Artigo 3º, sendo necessário, para o efeito, algum esforço e adaptação por parte dos tribunais nacionais. Na eventualidade da cláusula ser transparente, consideramos que, com base numa interpretação teleológica, será possível os tribunais nacionais submeterem a cláusula de preço personalizado a este teste. O nosso trabalho termina, assim, com a análise das consequências da declaração de caracter abusivo. No nosso entender, a cláusula de preço personalizado deverá ser excluída e o contrato deverá ser considerado nulo. Excecionalmente, se da nulidade do contrato surgirem consequências particularmente desfavoráveis para o consumidor, a execução do mesmo deverá continuar, com a substituição da cláusula de preço personalizado - quer por um novo preço negociado pelas partes, quer por uma regra supletiva de direito nacional (no limite, na ausência de tal regra, pelo preço não personalizado)

Role of Networking in Innovation Promotion and Cluster Modernization: “House of the Future” Case

This paper stresses the potential of innovative business cooperation networks in promoting regional competitiveness. It is based on the case study of a cooperation network, named “House of the Future”, carried out in the framework of a project where the University of Aveiro has an important role. It suggests success factors in the development of co-operation networks between firms from various sectors and a university. The aim of the “House of the Future” initiative is to promote an innovative approach to inter-organizational cooperation joining together firms from a number of different industrial activities related with the habitat meta-sector. This collaborative effort can function as an experiment for the design of regional innovation policies.

Age and growth of the pink dentex Dentex gibbosus (Rafinesque, 1810) caught off the Madeira Archipelago

A total of 146 otoliths were extracted for age readings from 68 females (23.2-90.1 cm TL), 76 males (22.0-81.3 cm TL) and 2 undetermined (30.3-38.0 cm TL), between April 2004 and December 2007. The maximum age obtained from whole otoliths was 11 years. Differences in the growth rhythms were observed between the sexes (females: L∞=134.4, K=0.092 and t0=−0.406; males: L∞=135.9, K=0.078 and t0=−0.894; and all fish were: L∞=149.8, K=0.078 and t0=−0.784). Pink dentex attain 50% of their maximum theoretical length during their fourth year of life. The weight-length relationship (W = q Lfb) were determined separately for each sex and for all fish: for females q=0.01094 and b=3.033, for males q=0.10002 and b=3.047 and for all, q=0.01027 and b=3.046. According to the F-test, there were no significant differences between the weight-length relations obtained for females and males (F-test, F=2.2526, p=0.06646)

Orhan Pamuk and the construction of Turkey’s national memory in Istanbul. Memories of a City

Pamuk‘s Istanbul. Memories of a City (2005), more than a book of individual memoirs, is a review of significant moments of Turkey‘s history, through which the writer addresses issues of national representation and identity. By analysing how Pamuk‘s book revises Turkey‘s cultural memory when the country‘s membership in the EU is considered a controversial key issue to the stability of Europe in the future, my aim is to examine to what extent the debate on Turkey‘s membership in the EU perpetuates Western representations of the oriental world in cultural and ideological terms.Istanbul. Memories of a City (2005), mais do que um livro de memórias, constitui-se numa revisão de momentos significativos da história da Turquia, através da qual o escritor problematiza questões de representação da nação e da sua identidade. Ao analisar como o livro de Pamuk revisita a memória cultural da Turquia, quando a adesão do país à União Europeia é considerada um assunto chave para a estabilidade da Europa no futuro, o meu objectivo é examinar em que medida o debate sobre a referida adesão reproduz as representações que o ocidente tem feito do mundo oriental em termos culturais e ideológicos.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Archives, portuguese film and the visual re-writing of Salazarism

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Banksy’s ‘Dismaland’ or art as an agent of change

This paper will discuss the subversive cultural and political meanings deriving from the construction and dismantlement of Dismaland, a temporary art installation created by Banksy in 2015 that addressed a wide range of evils of globalization from the effects of climate change to the refugee crisis. By considering the exhibition first and foremost as “form of resistance to sanctioned imagery” (Anna Wactawek, 2011: 73), I will examine how through the creation of a utopia in reverse Banksy (i) challenged the construction of the social in visual terms; (ii) questioned modes of reception; and (iii) advocated social consciousness in an epoch of indifference towards the Other.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Postcolonial readings of suicide in George Orwell and Chinua Achebe

By transforming suicide into an ethical, semantic and politicai parameter, in this essay I reflect on the deficits of colonization through the comparative analysis of two novels Burmese Days by George Orwell and Things Fali Apart by Chinua Achebe. My aim is to examine how writers address forgotten histories and simultaneously discuss the history of a forgetting.Ao transformar o suicídio num parâmetro ético, semântico e político, pretendo, neste ensaio, reflectir sobre os défices do processo de colonização através da análise comparada dos romances Burmese Days de George Orwell e de Things Fali Apart de Chinua Achebe. O meu objectivo é examinar como os escritores, através do texto literário, problematizam histórias esquecidas, ao mesmo tempo que discutem a história do esquecimento. &nbsp

Transgenerational crises of identity: growing up as colonial subjects in V. S. Naipaul's The Mimic Men and Luís Cardoso's The Crossing: a Story of East Timor

Despite belonging to distinct literary traditions, Luís Cardoso and V. S. Naipaul converge in their postcolonial reflection on what empires do to human beings in their books Crónica de uma Travessia and The Mimic Men. By focusing on the memories of two young islanders who grew up in colonies belonging respectively to the Portuguese and British empires, both writers address the crisis of identity faced by generations of colonial subjects as a result from imperial education and missionaries' work. This essay aims at examining how different imperial educational systems created and fed a sense of transtemporal alienated imagined identity, whose fragmented and artificial nature makes the colonized feel like exiles both in their own homelands and in the metropolis. By analysing the fathers' influence on Cardoso's and Naipaul's protagonists, the ideological and epistemological consequences of the lie underlying the civilizing mission will be highlighted and discussed.Apesar de pertencerem a tradições literárias distintas, Luís Cardoso e V. S. Naipaul convergem no que diz respeito à reflexão pós-colonial sobre o que os impérios fazem aos seres humanos nos seus livros Crónica de uma Travessia e The Mimic Men. Ao centrar a sua atenção nas memórias de dois jovens ilhéus que cresceram em colónias pertencentes respectivamente aos impérios português e britânico, os escritores problematizam a crise de identidade enfrentada por gerações de colonos e que resulta da educação implementada pelo império e pelo trabalho dos missionários. Este ensaio pretende examinar como diferentes sistemas educacionais imperiais criaram e alimentaram um sentido de identidade imaginada, que é transtemporal e alienada, e cuja natureza artificial e fragmentada fez com que os colonizados se sentissem exilados tanto na sua terra natal como na metrópole. Através da análise da influência das figuras paternas nos protagonistas de Cardoso e de Naipaul, serão discutidas as consequências ideológicas e epistemológicas da mentira subjacente à missão civilizador

The archive, gender roles and the deconstruction of Salazarism in Alberto Seixas Santos' Brandos Costumes

Among the films that appeared in the aftermath of the April 1974 Revolution, Alberto Seixas Santos’s Brandos Costumes is a singular case. By assuming an essayistic character through which the daily life of Portuguese people is analyzed from a domestic perspective, Brandos Costumes is one of the first films to openly discuss gender and social roles during Salazarism. This essay examines how the use of archival footage contributes, on the one hand, to the discussion of gender roles, and, on the other, to the experimental essayistic nature of Brandos Costumes. I base my argument on the premise that archival images are used to defy the authority of the truth conveyed by Salazar’s regime.No quadro dos filmes que apareceram logo após a Revolução de 1974, Brandos Costumes de Alberto Seixas Santos é um caso singular. Ao assumir um caráter ensaístico, através do qual a vida quotidiana dos portugueses é analisada a partir de uma perspetiva doméstica, Brandos Costumes é um dos primeiros filmes a discutir abertamente os papéis sociais e de género durante o Salazarismo. Este ensaio examina como o uso de imagens de arquivo contribui, por um lado, para a discussão de papéis de género, e, por outro, da natureza ensaística experimental do filme, tendo por base a premissa de que as imagens de arquivo são utilizadas para desafiar a autoridade da verdade transmitida pelo regime de Salazar.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio