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Intellectual
Property on the Internet
Abstract
There are many forms of
Intellectual Property. The below Discussion provides a brief
overview of the most common and how they may be present on the
Internet.
Discussion
Intellectual Property
comes in several different forms. Trade secrets, internal
business processes, etc. can all be considered Intellectual
Property. Unless someone from an organization works to
document those trade secrets, processes, etc. on the Internet, it is
not likely that you will ever have a problem with that form of
Intellectual Property making to the public eye.
Other common forms of
Intellectual Property include patents, copyrights, trademarks.
Each of these forms of Intellectual Property can easily make their
way onto the Internet.
Patents are normally
thought of as inventions such as the incandescent light bulb.
However, patents can also cover designs and business
processes. For example, say your company has derived a new
method of using data in a unique and innovative way. You may
qualify for a business process patent. Further, let's say you
put this new innovation on the Internet. If you have not
followed proper procedure and filed, or have an Provisional Patent
filing, you may have lost your rights to that patent. The risk
this situation highlights is becoming more and more common.
However, the most common forms of Intellectual Property on the
Internet are Trademarks and Copyrights.
The United States Patent
and Trademark Office defines a trademark to be: "A word,
phrase, symbol or design, or a combination of words, phrases,
symbols or designs, that identifies and distinguishes the source of
the goods of one party from those of others." A Trademark
is not a Copyright.
Trademarks can be filed
for Good and Services. The International Schedule of Classes
of Goods and Services defines Classes 1-34 as Good and 35-45 for
Services. In filing for a Trademark, you can apply for more
than one class. What many do not realize is that if a
Trademark for Company A exists in one or more classes that same
Trademark can be owned by another company in a different class as
each class forces the different utility of what is being
trademarked.
Copyrights are a very
common form of Intellectual Property and can be applied to almost
any creative work. For example, a web site can have a
copyright, so can a sculpture, a music score, a song, a photograph,
a painting, an article, a newspaper, etc. The list is
substantial and the the Copyright system, which is overseen by the
Library of Congress, allows for changes in original works and for
serial publication [e.g., magazines].
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