Definition of Intellectual Property: It May Not Be What You Think

Merriam Webster says "intellectual property: property (as an idea, invention, or process) that derives from the work of the mind or intellect : an application, right, or registration relating to this."

Intellectual property rights give the creator or holder exclusive rights to the intellectual property for varying lengths of time, depending upon the type of intellectual property.

In the United States, Intellectual Property rights are overseen by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, and the United States Copyright Office.

Worldwide, the officiating body is the World Intellectual Property Organization, for all those countries participating.

Intellectual property is property of the mind, according to WIPO, World Intellectual Property Organization and they say:

Intellectual property is divided into two categories: Industrial property, which includes inventions (patents), trademarks, industrial designs, and geographic indications of source; and Copyright, which includes literary and artistic works such as novels, poems and plays, films, musical works, artistic works such as drawings, paintings, photographs and sculptures, and architectural designs. Rights related to copyright include those of performing artists in their performances, producers of phonograms in their recordings, and those of broadcasters in their radio and television programs.

Again quoting WIPO, "intellectual property shall include rights relating to:

• literary, artistic and scientific works,
• performances of performing artists, phonograms and broadcasts,
• inventions in all fields of human endeavor,
• scientific discoveries,
• industrial designs,
• trademarks, service marks and commercial names and designations,
• protection against unfair competition"

Most people have a general understanding of what is meant by copyright, patents and trademark, but the other areas covered by WIPO are not as well known. Most of this information can be found in greater detail in the WIPO Intellectual Property Handbook: Policy, Law and Use, Chapter two.

Copyright protects intellectual property of a creative or artistic nature. Copyright often lasts 50 to 70 years after the creator's death. In some countries, your copyright must be registered to become effective. In the United States, copyright is established as soon as a work is created; in the case of software, or a digital drawing, even as soon as it is saved to the hard drive. However, registering your copyright gives you additional rights. In this article, you can read about the steps to get a copyright registered.

Patents cover inventions. These can be utility patents, design patents, and plant patents. The process of filing for a patent can be time consuming, and somewhat costly. In this article you can find the steps to patent your invention, and in this article, steps in the patent approval process are explained.

Trademarks are symbols, words or phrases that identify a product or company. It must be registered like a patent to protect it from use by others. Unlike most forms of intellectual property, trademarks don't expire as long as the requirements for filing for its continual use are met. In the US trademarks are applied for at the United States Patent and Trademark Office. TM is generally used next to a trademark to indicate that it is a registered trademark.

One area, which falls under trademarks, is trade names. A company can own several trademarks in their business. However, they usually have one Trade Name, to distinguish themselves from their competitors. The name is independent of whatever the products are which the company sells under a particular trademark. Trade Names can be long, and also need to indicate information about the type of enterprise. They need to include incorporated, or Company, or Ltd. for a limited company.

An example is the General Electric Company. General Electric Company is the registered trade name, with the registered trademarks General Electric, GE, and their monogram. They also own such trademarks as imagination at work and ecomagination, among others.

Other areas under the umbrella concept of trademarks are franchises, such as Burger King, and famous character names, such as Tarzan, Mickey Mouse, and Charlie Chaplin. These can come from literature, pictorial matter or actual people, and are all used as recognizable figures in merchandising. However, there are protections for live people against unauthorized use of their names, images or other characteristics, which are above the rights to intellectual property. This is generally covered under such rights as those to privacy and protection against libel or defamation.

Trade secrets often consist of information which could be patentable, such as the formula for Coca Cola™. However, patents expire, whereas a trade secret, if it is not discovered, can continue to be used exclusively by a company for an indeterminate length of time, so some companies make the decision that it is better for the company not to patent the information. Protection for trade secrets generally falls under the intellectual property rights for Protection Against Unfair Competition. Usually, if a trade secret is independently discovered, its intellectual property rights are lost.