Copyright, patent, and trademark are all different types of intellectual property (IP). Although the three types of IP are very different, people often confuse them. We provide you below a description of copyright, patents, and trademarks, including a brief discussion of how these forms of IP differ from each other.
Copyright
Copyright applies to work that is expressed in some way. Rights exist in items such as literary, artistic, musical and dramatic work as well as films, sound recordings and typographical arrangements. It gives the author specific rights in relation to the work, prohibits unauthorised actions, and allows the author to take legal action against instances of infringement or plagiarism.
Patents
The primary goal of the patent law is to encourage innovation and commercialization of technological advances. Patent law incentivizes inventors to publicly disclose their inventions in exchange for certain exclusive rights. These inventions can include new and useful processes, machines, manufactures, compositions of matter as well as improvements to these. Certain computer programs may fall within the subject matter protected by both patents and copyrights. In this respect, the patent system compliments copyright protection by providing protection for functional aspects of the software, which are not protected by copyright.
Unlike with copyright protection, to get patent protection one must first apply for and be granted a patent. Unlike the copyright registration process, the patent application process is expensive, complex, difficult, and time consuming and generally should not be attempted without the assistance of an experienced patent attorney or agent.
Trademarks
A trademark can be a name, word, slogan, design, symbol or other unique device that identifies a product or organisation.
Trademarks are registered at a national or territory level with an appointed government body and may take anywhere between 6 and 18 months to be processed. Registering in countries such as the US, the UK etc. will protect your mark in that country only, but within the European Union exists a European Trademark which covers the mark in all EU countries.
There is also the Madrid System that provides a facility to submit trademarks applications to many countries at the same time.
Registered trademarks may be identified by the abbreviation ‘TM’, or the ‘®’ symbol. (it is illegal to use the ® symbol or state that the trademark is registered until the trademark has in fact been registered).
Comparative overview
In most countries, the national patent office will also administer trademarks.
With the exception of innovative designs, patents are closely associated with inventions and processes that are useful. By contrast, copyrights are often used to protect expressive arts such as novels, paintings, music, phonorecords, photography, software, and films.
While it is possible to get a patent on technologies used in the arts, copyrights are normally the mechanism for one artist to “own” his or her own creations, and prevent other artists from “stealing” it. For example, an inventor could apply for a utility patent on an innovative camera lens used to create a movie. But the author of the script would receive copyright protection and the cameraman could receive a separate copyright in the cinematography.
An exception to the general rule is that patents, which protect the design of products, can overlap with copyrights. These two legal protections overlap when functional objects embody a distinctive or pleasing visual appearance.
Intelllectual Property matters are truly challenging aspects of law and discerning between different types is not easy, but with the professional advice of our team you are on the right path to get the most suitable IP protection.
