In the copyright law of the United States, a work made for hire is a work subject to copyright that is created by an employee as part of his or her job, or some limited types of works for which all parties agree in writing to the WFH designation. Work for hire is a statutorily defined term, so a work for hire is not created merely because parties to an agreement state that the work is a work for hire. It is an exception to the general rule that the person who actually creates a work is the legally recognized author of that work. According to copyright law in the United States and certain other copyright jurisdictions, if a work is "made for hire", the employer—not the employee—is considered the legal author. In some countries, this is known as corporate authorship. The entity serving as an employer may be a corporation or other legal entity, an organization, or an individual.
An industrial design right is an intellectual property right that protects the visual design of objects that are not purely utilitarian. An industrial design consists of the creation of a shape, configuration or composition of pattern or color, or combination of pattern and color in three-dimensional form containing aesthetic value. An industrial design can be a two- or three-dimensional pattern used to produce a product, industrial commodity or handicraft.
A patent attorney is an attorney who has the specialized qualifications necessary for representing clients in obtaining patents and acting in all matters and procedures relating to patent law and practice, such as filing an opposition. The term is used differently in different countries, and thus may or may not require the same legal qualifications as a general legal practitioner.
Intellectual property rights (IPRs) have been acknowledged and protected in the People's Republic of China since the 1980s. The People's Republic of China has acceded to the major international conventions on protection of rights to intellectual property. Domestically, protection of intellectual property law has also been established by government legislation, administrative regulations, and decrees in the areas of trademark, copyright, and patent. This has led to the creation of a comprehensive legal framework to protect both local and foreign intellectual property. Despite this, copyright violations are common in the PRC, The American Chamber of Commerce in China surveyed over 500 of its members doing business in China regarding IPR for its 2016 China Business Climate Survey Report, and found that IPR enforcement is improving, but significant challenges still remain. The results show that the laws in place exceed their actual enforcement, with patent protection receiving the highest approval rate, while protection of trade secrets lags far behind.
Sir William Aldous was an English judge and a judge in the Gibraltar Court of Appeal.
A utility model is a patent-like intellectual property right to protect inventions. This type of right is only available in some countries. Although a utility model is similar to a patent, it is generally cheaper to obtain and maintain, has a shorter term, shorter grant lag, and less stringent patentability requirements. In some countries, it is only available for inventions in certain fields of technology and/or only for products. Utility models can be described as second-class patents.
In international law and business, patent trolling or patent hoarding is a categorical or pejorative term applied to a person or company that attempts to enforce patent rights against accused infringers far beyond the patent's actual value or contribution to the prior art, often through hardball legal tactics. Patent trolls often do not manufacture products or supply services based upon the patents in question. However, some entities which do not practice their asserted patent may not be considered "patent trolls" when they license their patented technologies on reasonable terms in advance.
A patent application is a request pending at a patent office for the grant of a patent for an invention described in the patent specification and a set of one or more claims stated in a formal document, including necessary official forms and related correspondence. It is the combination of the document and its processing within the administrative and legal framework of the patent office.
Scams in intellectual property or invention scams are a type of scam in which either inventors are lured to pay money for development of their idea but the development does not occur, or investors pay money for a non existing product or for an invention never to be developed.
The European Intellectual Property Review (EIPR) is a monthly law review published since 1978 by Sweet & Maxwell, that covers international intellectual property law. Its general editor since its 1978 inception has been Hugh Brett.
Canadian patent law is the legal system regulating the granting of patents for inventions within Canada, and the enforcement of these rights in Canada.
The Manual of Patent Office Practice (MOPOP) is a manual for patent agents and patent examiners, published by the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO). It documents the procedures and practices relative to the prosecution of patent applications under Canadian patent law for patent examiners, applicants, agents, and the public at large.
The English Reports is a collection of nominate reports of judgments of the English Courts reported between 1220 and 1866. It contains most, but not all, of the nominate reports. It reproduces many reports not from their original editions but from dependable, although not always verbatim, later editions.
A patent thicket is a concept with negative connotations that has been described as "a dense web of overlapping intellectual property rights that a company must hack its way through in order to actually commercialize new technology," or, in other words, "an overlapping set of patent rights” which requires innovators to reach licensing deals for multiple patents from multiple sources."
The Product Liability Directive85/374/EEC is a directive of the Council of the European Union that created a regime of strict liability for defective products.
The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) is an international legal agreement between all the member nations of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It sets down minimum standards for the regulation by national governments of many forms of intellectual property (IP) as applied to nationals of other WTO member nations. TRIPS was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) between 1989 and 1990 and is administered by the WTO.
In Canadian patent law, only “inventions” are patentable. Under the Patent Act, only certain categories of things may be considered and defined as inventions. Therefore, if a patent discloses an item that fulfills the requirements of novelty, non-obviousness and utility, it may nonetheless be found invalid on the grounds that it does not fall within one of the statutory categories of “invention”. Since the Patent Act, the categories of patentable subject matter have been defined and interpreted by Canadian courts.
Jonathan David Chattyn Turner is an English barrister who specialises in intellectual property and competition law. A member of 13 Old Square Chambers in London, he is the author of a textbook on the application of European Union competition law to intellectual property, Intellectual Property and EU Competition Law (2010), which has received strong reviews describing it as " authoritative" and "very obviously the last word on the subject for the time being". Turner is also a director of the Authors' Licensing and Collecting Society and of the Copyright Licensing Agency.
