Since June 8, 1995, the United States Patent Office has offered inventors the option of filing a provisional application (or a “provisional”). According to the patent office, a provisional patent application was designed to provide a lower cost for a first patent filing in the United States and to give U.S. applicants parity with foreign […]
A design patent protects an ornamental design for an article of manufacture. In other words, the design patent protects only the appearance of an article, but not its structural or functional features. The procedures relating to granting of design patents are the similar to those of utility patents. A design patent has a term of […]
The foundation of United States patent law is based on a quid pro quo between the applicant and the government. The government grants a monopoly for the invention in exchange for a technology disclosure which should increase the public’s collective knowledge. Once the patent expires, anyone is then free to practice the invention. Furthermore, because […]
A patent is a government grant or intellectual property right that allows its owner to exclude others from making, using, selling, or importing the claimed invention. Patents are probably the strongest of all intellectual property protection because: A patent protects the underlying concept of an invention. In a computer program, for instance, this usually […]
The term copyright generally refers to the right to make copies. The roots of copyright law can be traced back to the Statute of Anne of 1710 (which was the first English copyright act). This law gave authors the exclusive right to make copies of their books. Today’s copyright law goes much farther in protecting […]
A trademark is a legal mechanism which gives the owner the right to use a word, name, or symbol to identify and distinguish goods of the owner from goods manufactured or sold by others. Trademarks are also used to indicate the source of the goods. In short, a trademark is a brand name. A service […]
In the United States, intellectual assets can be protected in a variety of ways. This post will briefly discuss the more popular forms of intellectual property protection under United States law. Other countries may have other forms of protection in addition the protections discussed in this post. Perhaps the most widely used form of intellectual […]
According to Wikipedia, Intellectual Property is “a number of distinct types of legal monopolies over creations of the mind, both artistic and commercial, and the corresponding fields of law.” Wikipedia’s definition distinguishes between specific legal rights and the intellectual work itself. According to Wikipedia’s definition, only the former is intellectual property. The intellectual work itself […]