Lecture 4

Question 1

4 kinds of Intellectual Property

Answer 1

• Copyright
• Patent
• Trademark
• Trade secret

Question 2

Trademark Covers

Answer 2

-company/product/service name, logos, other branding
-Applicant must be quite specific about what the trademark covers. Apple owns a trademark for computers. Apple Records owns a similar trademark, but for music.
-A trademark not defended in court against infringement may be lost (use it or lose it)
This is only true of trademarks. It is not true of copyrighted or patented material

Question 3

Trademark Registered with:

Answer 3

US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO)

Question 4

Trade Secret Covers:

Answer 4

-the colonels secret recipe – whatever your workplace has thought of that nobody else has, that it doesn’t want anybody else knowing

Question 5

Trade Secret Registered with:

Answer 5

• not registered. Protected with NDA contracts instead.

- NDA = non-disclosure agreement

Question 6

Lasts

Answer 6

• as long as the secret is kept. Infringers can be sued

- If you leak something, though, your workplace can lose trade-secret status on it

Question 7

Patent Covers

Answer 7

an invention, including novel business methods

Question 8

Patenet Registered with:

Answer 8

• USPTO
• This is a complex process, partly due to the need to establish that the invention is actually new (demonstrated propr ar may derail a patent app)

Question 9

Patent Lasts:

Answer 9

• 20 years from earliest claimed filing date (In the US)
• Extensions are sometimes possible
• If you can prove a new use for the drug this is the case

Question 10

Copyright Covers:

Answer 10

• “original works of authorship…fixed in a tangible medium of expression”
• Yes the internet is tangible for copyright purposes. Just because you can find something on the open web, doesn’t mean it’s not copyrighted

Question 11

Copyright Registered with

Answer 11

• US Copyright Office
• This is optional (it isn’t always) but you can’t recover statutory damages (the big bucks) or attorney fees in an infringement lawsuit unless you registered
• If you notice an infringement of your work, register it right away

Question 12

Copyright Lasts:

Answer 12

• life of author +70 years

- Corporate – authored works: 95 years from publication or 120 years from creation

Question 13

Licenses

Answer 13

• A copyright, trademark, or patent can be licensed to any person or org. that doesn’t own it
• This allows the licensor to do things with the material that otherwise wouldn’t be legal
• It’s a legal contract
• As a contract, a license can say whatever both parties want it to!

Question 14

What’s copyrightable?

Answer 14

Creative/original writing, photos, film, video, website content, software, art music, choreography, architecture

Question 15

what’s not copyrightable?

Answer 15

• Words, titles (too short), ideas (until you capture/express them somehow), recipes, methods, inventions
• Facts and compilations of facts, no matter how much effort it took to compile them (this is different in Europe!)

Question 16

complications with music

Answer 16

-Complication 1: separate copyrights in the composition and its performance
-Complication 2: in the US sound recordings don’t fall under federal copyright law
-Complication 3: compulsory licensing
-If you want to cover a song, you pay a license fee to
ASCAP or similar agency and you can record your
cover

Question 17

work for hire

Answer 17

• If you make a copyrightable item at work
• Or if you’re a contractor or freelancer
• Your employer, not you, owns the copyright in that work

Question 18

The Public Domain

Answer 18

-An original work that:
-Is not copyrightable by law (federal-government-
created-work) OR
-Has had its copyright term expire
-Is legally in the “public domain”
-Copyright law no longer applies; anyone can do anything with the work

Question 19

first sale rule

Answer 19

• If you legally buy a physical object containing copyrighted material (book, CD, or DVD), you can do what you like with that physical object
• There is no first sale right in copyrighted digital info!

Question 20

Fair use

Answer 20

• Copyright law does not prohibit all copying
• Copying without asking permission or getting a license may be legal under the fair use doctrine of US copyright law (section 107)

Question 21

Four factor fair use dealing

Answer 21

-Nature of the use
-The more socially-useful, the more likely the judge will
think it’s fair
-Nature of the work
-The more factual the work, the more likely a use is
fair; the more creative the work, the less likely a use is
fair
-Amount of the work used
-Rule of thumb use only what you absolutely need to
-Effect of this use of the work on the market for the work
-The more the use harms the copyright owner’s
income, the less likely the judge will think it’s fair