Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, copyrights, trademarks, and trade secrets. The modern concept of intellectual property developed in England in the 17th and 18th centuries. The term "intellectual property" began to be used in the 19th century, though it was not until the late 20th century that intellectual property became commonplace in most of the world's legal systems.
Open-source licenses are software licenses that allow content to be used, modified, and shared. They facilitate free and open-source software (FOSS) development. Intellectual property (IP) laws restrict the modification and sharing of creative works. Free and open-source licenses use these existing legal structures for an inverse purpose. They grant the recipient the rights to use the software, examine the source code, modify it, and distribute the modifications. These criteria are outlined in the Open Source Definition.
A virtual economy is an emergent economy existing in a virtual world, usually exchanging virtual goods in the context of an online game, particularly in massively multiplayer online games (MMOs). People enter these virtual economies for recreation and entertainment rather than necessity, which means that virtual economies lack the aspects of a real economy that are not considered to be "fun". However, some people do interact with virtual economies for "real" economic benefit.
Ownership is the state or fact of legal possession and control over property, which may be any asset, tangible or intangible. Ownership can involve multiple rights, collectively referred to as title, which may be separated and held by different parties.
Commercial software, or seldom payware, is a computer software that is produced for sale or that serves commercial purposes. Commercial software can be proprietary software or free and open-source software.
Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner LLP, commonly known as Finnegan, is an international intellectual property law firm based in Washington, DC, United States. Finnegan was founded on March 1, 1965, by Marc Finnegan and Douglas Henderson in Washington, DC. It is one of the largest law firms focusing exclusively on the practice of intellectual property (IP) law, practicing all aspects of patent, trademark, copyright, and trade secret law, including counseling, prosecution, licensing, and litigation. Finnegan, also represents clients on IP issues related to U.S. and European patents and trademarks, international trade, portfolio management, the Internet, e-commerce, government contracts, antitrust, and unfair competition.
Virtual currency, or virtual money, is a digital currency that is largely unregulated, issued and usually controlled by its developers, and used and accepted electronically among the members of a specific virtual community. In 2014, the European Banking Authority defined virtual currency as "a digital representation of value that is neither issued by a central bank or a public authority, nor necessarily attached to a fiat currency but is accepted by natural or legal persons as a means of payment and can be transferred, stored or traded electronically." A digital currency issued by a central bank is referred to as a central bank digital currency.
Cameron "Cammy" Myler is an American luge athlete who was a member of the U.S. National Luge Team from 1985 to 1998 and competed on four Winter Olympics teams.
Fish & Richardson P.C. is a global patent, intellectual property litigation, and commercial litigation law firm with more than 400 attorneys and technology specialists across the US and Europe. Fish is active in both patent litigation and patent prosecution services among Fortune 100 companies. Fish has been named the #1 patent litigation firm in the U.S. for 12 consecutive years.
Nutter McClennen & Fish LLP is a long-standing law firm in Boston, Massachusetts. The firm has a wide variety of practice areas including intellectual property, technology, business, and real estate law. Nutter was co-founded by Samuel D. Warren II and Louis Brandeis. Brandeis practiced at the firm until his appointment to the Supreme Court. Nutter has won several awards and has achieved various notable rankings. It has ranked first for its summer associate program and has received high rankings for midlevel associate satisfaction.
Intellectual property valuation is a process to determine the monetary value of intellectual property assets. IP valuation is required to be able to sell, license, or enter into commercial arrangements based on IP. It is also beneficial in the enforcement of IP rights, for internal management of IP assets, and for various financial processes.
Harness IP is a law firm headquartered in Troy, Michigan. In October 2021, the firm announced it has adopted Harness IP as its new name. The firm previously went by the abbreviated Harness Dickey.
Kevin Jerome Greene is an American lawyer and professor of contract music law and entertainment law at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles, California. Professor Greene was among the first legal scholars to examine the treatment of African-American art forms, such as the blues, under intellectual property law.
McKool Smith is a U.S. trial firm with more than 130 trial lawyers across seven offices in Austin, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Marshall, New York City, and Washington, DC. The firm represents clients in disputes involving commercial litigation, intellectual property (IP), bankruptcy, and white collar defense matters.
Ian Ballon is an American Internet and intellectual property litigator, author of books on Internet law and executive director of Stanford University Law School's Center for E-Commerce. He is the author of the 4-volume legal treatise, E-Commerce and Internet Law: Treatise with Forms 2d edition, the leading legal reference book on Internet law, which was first published in 2000. A second edition was published in 2008 and is updated annually. He is also an intellectual property litigator with Greenberg Traurig LLP, a firm of approximately 1800 lawyers.
THQ Nordic GmbH is an Austrian video game publisher based in Vienna. Formed in 2011, it is a publishing subsidiary of Embracer Group. Originally named Nordic Games, as was the parent company, both companies were renamed THQ Nordic in August 2016 after the parent company had acquired the "THQ" trademark in 2014. THQ Nordic's core portfolio comprises assets that were acquired from other developers and publishers, such as from JoWooD Entertainment and its subsidiaries DreamCatcher Interactive and The Adventure Company in 2011, THQ in 2013, and NovaLogic in 2016. THQ Nordic has acquired and established several subsidiary studios, including Black Forest Games, Bugbear Entertainment, Gunfire Games, HandyGames, Piranha Bytes, Purple Lamp, and Rainbow Studios.
Atari Games Corp. v. Nintendo of America Inc., 975 F.2d 832, is a U.S. legal case in which Atari Games engaged in copyright infringement by copying Nintendo's lock-out system, the 10NES. The 10NES was designed to prevent Nintendo's video game console, the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), from playing unauthorized game cartridges. Atari, after unsuccessful attempts to reverse engineer the lock-out system, obtained an unauthorized copy of the source code from the United States Copyright Office and used it to create its 10NES replica, the Rabbit. Atari then sued Nintendo for unfair competition and copyright misuse, and Nintendo responded that Atari had engaged in unfair competition, copyright infringement, and patent infringement.
The protection of intellectual property (IP) of video games through copyright, patents, and trademarks, shares similar issues with the copyrightability of software as a relatively new area of IP law. The video game industry itself is built on the nature of reusing game concepts from prior games to create new gameplay styles but bounded by illegally direct cloning of existing games, and has made defining intellectual property protections difficult since it is not a fixed medium.
Tetris Holding, LLC v. Xio Interactive, Inc., 863 F.Supp.2d 394, was a 2012 American legal case related to copyright of video games, confirming that a game's look and feel can be protected under copyright law. Tetris Holding is a company that holds the copyright to the original Tetris game from 1985 and licenses those rights to game developers. Xio Interactive is a game developer that released Mino in 2009, a mobile game based on the gameplay of Tetris. Mino was downloaded millions of times, and Tetris Holding filed a DMCA notice and eventually a lawsuit against Xio for copyright infringement.
Spry Fox, LLC v. Lolapps, Inc., No. 2:12-cv-00147, was a court case between two video game developers, where Spry Fox alleged that the game Yeti Town, developed by 6waves Lolapps, infringed on their copyrighted game Triple Town. While the case was settled out of court, preliminary opinions by Judge Richard A. Jones affirmed that a video game's "look and feel" may be protected by copyright, affirming the federal district court decision in Tetris Holding, LLC v. Xio Interactive, Inc. from earlier the same year.
