If you were to ask Steve Jobs what he thought of intellectual property shortly after the Android was released (a move he felt was ‘theft’ of the iPhone concept), you might get a different opinion from him than you would if you asked a group of scientists discussing restrictions on the use of techniques developed by one institution to study or tackle cancer. This area of law is hotly-contested, voluminous, and sometimes mysteriously intriguing. Regardless of your opinion on Intellectual Property, if you are now facing a legal claim that your company violated Intellectual Property based on American laws, it is important to learn all you can about this area of the law.
The basis of the idea of intellectual property is that intangible works are the property of their owner or creator. Stealing a champagne glass from a department store is easily recognizable as theft. What about selling your own champagne glass that is similar in design to an existing one? Is that theft? What about selling champagne glasses in general? It wouldn’t be unheard of to receive a patent claim against selling an entire category of products.
There are several basic types of intellectual property, and the distinctions are important. They determine how your case will be treated. The types of Intellectual Property are:
- Copyright
- Patent
- Trademark
- Trade Secret
- Geographical Indication
- Others (Authors, Database, Indigenous, Industrial Design, Integrated Circuit Layout, Moral Rights, Plant Breeders)
Copyright
Copyright law in the United States was designed to protect artists. Laws of this type cover both published and unpublished works. Books, articles, blog posts, poetry, literary works, music, audio, theatre, dance or body movements (choreography or pantomiming), sculptures of every medium, computer graphics, hand-drawn graphics, photographs, pictures, audio-visual works, sound recordings, derivative works, compilations, and architecture all fall in this category.
Clearly, copyright law covers huge swaths of content and works. Nowland Law has seen cases in copyright that run the gamut. One example that our office commonly sees is businesses that re-published an image on their website that had originally been taken from a website that stated “free art”’ or “free images,” and then been slapped with a copyright infringement lawsuit with demands of over $100,000. One characteristic that describes the nature of copyright protections, but also leaves many questions unanswered, is the idea-expression dichotomy.
The law will restrict republication of the expression of an idea, but not the idea itself. For example, if you want to write a book about the mechanics of a sailboat, there are hundreds of books that have been around for long periods of time that you cannot copy. They all say similar things about how these boats work, because they are describing the same concepts or ideas. When you write your book about sailboats, the words you use should be a unique expression of that idea. Said another way, plagiarism would be considered a copyright violation. How exactly can one be accused of violating copyright law?
Copyright law allows the owner of the copyright to be the sole party allowed to reproduce the work, authorize derivative works, distribute or sell the work, publicly perform or display the work, or to digitally transmit the work. If a copyright owner believes that you have committed any of those actions using their works, they may bring a claim against you.