Chapter 11 Intellectual Property Practice Flashcards

These flashcards define key vocabulary and legal concepts from Chapter 11 on Intellectual Property, covering trade secrets, patents, trademarks, and copyrights.

Property

Establishes a relationship of legal exclusion between an owner and other people regarding limited resources, making a resource legally "proper" to the owner.

Intellectual Property

An exclusive right to knowledge-based assets that gives incentive to create new things, new ways of doing things, and new inventions generally.

U.S. Constitution, Article 1, Section 8

Grants Congress the power to "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts" by securing exclusive rights for limited times to authors and inventors for their writings and discoveries.

Public Domain

The status of information or inventions after an intellectual property right expires or if formal requirements were not met, meaning anyone can use the information.

Trade Secret

Any form of knowledge or information that has economic value from not being generally known and has been the subject of reasonable efforts by the owner to maintain secrecy.

Uniform Trade Secrets Act (UTSA)

A statute adopted by all states except New York and North Carolina to establish the legal requirements for trade secret cases.

Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA)

A $2016$ federal law that provides a single federal statute for trade secret protection, including a civil seizure mechanism and whistleblower immunity.

Trade Secret Audit

A process of identifying a business's confidential knowledge-based resources such as formulas, plans, and research.

Misappropriation

The act of improperly acquiring secret information through burglary, espionage, or hacking, or disclosing information one had a duty to keep secret.

Injunction

An order by a judge either to do something or to refrain from doing something, such as ordering a person to stop using a misappropriated trade secret.

Economic Espionage Act (EEA)

The federal law under which criminal trade secret prosecutions take place, providing for fines up to $\$5$ million for organizations and up to $10$ years' imprisonment for individuals.

Patent

A statutory right firmly associated with an inventive act that conveys the power to exclude others from making, using, selling, or importing the covered invention.

Utility Patent

A patent for useful, functional inventions with a term of $20$ years from the filing date.

Design Patent

A patent for the new and original appearance of an article of manufacture with a term of $15$ years from the issue date.

Plant Patent

A patent for new varieties of asexually reproduced plants with a term of $20$ years from the filing date.

America Invents Act (2011)

A revision to U.S. patent law that switched the system from "first-to-invent" to a "first-inventor-to-file" system.

Novelty

A requirement for patentability indicating that an invention is new and different from the prior art.

Nonobviousness

The ability of an invention to produce surprising or unexpected results as measured against someone with ordinary skill in the prior art.

Utility

The requirement that a valid invention must do something useful, which is required for utility and plant patents.

Patent Trolls

A pejorative term for non-practicing patent owners, often investment firms, that purchase patent rights and threaten to sue existing companies to force settlements.

Trademark

Any mark, word, picture, or design attached to goods to indicate their source and distinguish them from others.

Lanham Act of 1946

The federal law that provides the primary framework for registration and protection of trademarks.

Service Mark

A mark associated with a service, such as LinkedIn, rather than physical goods.

Certification Mark

A mark used by someone other than the owner to certify the quality, point of origin, or other characteristics of goods or services (e.g., Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval).

Collective Mark

A mark representing membership in a certain organization or association, such as the National Football League logo.

Trade Dress

The color or shape associated with a product or service, such as Coca-Cola's red color scheme or a restaurant's distinctive décor.

Official Gazette

The publication where the PTO places proposed marks to give existing owners notice and an opportunity to object.

Secondary Meaning

A public meaning that is different from a mark's meaning as a person's name or descriptive term, making the term distinctive and eligible for protection.

Likelihood of Confusion

The legal standard for trademark liability, determined by whether a defendant's use of a mark creates confusion about the identity of the user.

Generic

A status where a mark loses its distinctiveness and is no longer protected as a trademark because it describes a general class of products.

Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act of 1999

Federal law providing remedies for instances where a trademarked domain name is registered in "bad faith."

ICANN

An international organization that administers the Internet's addressing system and handles dispute resolution for domain name registrations.

Federal Trademark Dilution Act (1995)

Prohibits using a mark the same as or similar to another's "famous" trademark in a way that dilutes its significance, reputation, and goodwill.

Blurring

Occurs when a firm uses another's trademark in a way that reduces the distinctiveness of a famous mark.

Tarnishment

Occurs when a firm uses a trademark in a way that creates a negative impression about a famous company.

Copyright

A property right giving the owner a monopoly for a limited period to exclude others from copying and marketing original expression.

Berne Convention

An international agreement that protects copyrights across different countries.

Work-for-hire

A copyrightable work created by an employee within the scope of employment, where the employer is automatically considered the owner and author.

Piracy

Large-scale, willful copyright infringement that carries criminal penalties.

Fair Use

A legal defense for the use of copyrighted materials for purposes like criticism, comment, teaching, scholarship, or research.

Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)

A $1998$ federal law making it illegal to circumvent technical protection measures and providing safe harbors for Internet service providers.

TRIPS (Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights)

A $1994$ treaty part of the WTO that requires member countries to protect various forms of intellectual property.

Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT)

An international treaty allowing for a preliminary international patent examination before pursuing rights in multiple countries.

Madrid System

A system allowing trademark owners to pursue rights in several different countries simultaneously.