Intellectual Property Law
Goals
- Understand how patents, trademarks, and copyrights are used and what they protect
- Describe the importance of intellectual property law
- Explain the basic concept of legal ownership
- Describe intellectual property concerns with respect to internet use
- Describe the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and what it protects
Intellectual Property (IP) law is the area of law that protects a person’s creative ideas, inventions, and innovations once they are in a physical form.
- protects people’s ownership rights in their creative ideas
- gives them the right to control the use of their creative ideas
- protects their ability to profit from those ideas
- prevents other people from exploiting a person’s creative ideas
- U.S. Constitution recognizes the importance of protecting IP
The Importance of Intellectual Property Law
- Digital Wild West is a good description for the state of the World Wide Web (WWW) today
- the web still has a frontier
- Its outer limits are unknown
- One traditional area of law that is adapting to new issues raised through technology is intellectual property (IP) law
- When materials are published on the web, they are in a physical form
- Traditional legal concepts about IP ownership and how to protect it are applied to content on the World Wide Web
- Legal Ownership And The Importance of Protecting Intellectual Property
Types of IP Recognized by Federal Law
- Patents
- used to protect inventions such as machines, processes, designs, and specialized plants
- Trademarks
- used to protect words, logos, symbols, or slogans that identify a product or service
- Copyright
- used to protect books, art, music, videos, computer programs, and other creative works
- Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DCMA)
Differences
- demonstrated in a different way
- applies to different types of creations and inventions
- give protection for different lengths of times
- different requirements for establishing and enforcing IP rights
Key Concepts
Notable Case Studies
- Trade Secrets Infringement Case
- Service Provider Liability for Copyright Infringement Case
- Digital Collections Case