| Patent Claims and the Definiteness Requirement |
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| An applicant for a patent must include in the specification accompanying the application for the patent one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his or her invention. Patent claims serve two functions. First, they define the invention for the purpose of applying the conditions of patentability, the statutory bars, and the disclosure requirements. Second, they define the invention for the purpose of determining infringement. More... |
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| Copyright Law |
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| The Copyright Act defines a "collective work" as an assemblage into a collective whole of a number of individual contributions, each of which constitutes a separate and independent work, and gives as examples periodicals, anthologies, and encyclopedias. A collective work is also referred to as a "compilation." More... |
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| The Digital Perfomance Right in Sound Recordings Act of 1995 |
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| The Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings Act of 1995 (DPRA) created a new limited performance right for certain digital transmissions of sound recordings. More... |
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| Patents |
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| A patent is a right granted under federal law that allows the patent owner to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale, or importing the subject matter of the patent without the inventor's permission for a period of 20 years from the time of the patent application. An activity involving the patented invention that violates that right is said to infringe the patent, for which the patent owner may bring a lawsuit to collect monetary damages and to stop the infringing activity. There are several defenses to patent infringement. One defense that will completely insulate an alleged infringer from liability is patent misuse. More... |
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| Regional Patent Offices |
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| The issuance of a patent by the United States Patent and Trademark Office provides patent protection to an inventor only within the United States. Because each country has its own patent laws, other countries do not provide patent protection to a U.S. patentee, nor does the United States provide patent protection to a foreign patentee. Originally, if a U.S. inventor wished to obtain patent protection in other countries, he or she was required to obtain patents from each country in which patent protection was desired, which obviously entailed substantial time and expense. Eventually, however, international cooperation helped streamline the process of obtaining patents in other countries in many cases. More... |
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