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Intellectual Property
 "The increasing piracy of movies, software and music hinders the ability of artists to be compensated for their hard work…” Senator Diane Feinstein.
In recent years intellectual property has received a lot more attention because ideas and innovations have become the most important resource, replacing land, energy and raw materials. As much as three-quarters of the value of publicly traded companies in America comes from intangible assets, up from around 40% in the early 1980s. “The economic product of the United States”, stated Alan Greenspan, former Chairman of America's Federal Reserve, has become “predominantly conceptual”. Intellectual property forms part of those conceptual assets.”
Legally, the intellectual-property system covers four areas: copyrights (used to protect artistic, musical or literary works); trademarks (for things like brands); patents (for inventions); and an ill-defined category of “trade secrets”, for practices that are kept confidential. The system provides legal protection against counterfeiters and copiers and is vital to many fields, such as biotechnology and nanotechnology. And it matters not only to companies: universities, too, have recently become big patent holders and licensers.
In regard to music, movies, and books, the legal situation is as follows: “The Register of Copyrights (US) will issue regulations and establish procedures for pre-registration of a work being prepared for commercial distribution and that has not yet been published in order to increase the registration of copyrighted material and provide a clear civil remedy for infringement.
A work being prepared for commercial distribution is defined as:
A computer program, a non-dramatic musical work, a motion picture or other audiovisual work, or a sound recording, if at the time of the unauthorized distribution the copyright owner has a reasonable expectation of commercial distribution, and copies of the work have not been commercially distributed; or
A motion picture, if at the time of the unauthorized distribution, the motion picture has been made available for viewing in a motion picture exhibition facility, or has not been made available in copies for sale to the general public in the United States in a format intended to permit viewing outside a motion picture exhibition facility.
Protecting the work of artists, then, is important to all of us. As Senator Feinstein has concluded: “Giving artists the economic incentive to produce cutting edge works is critical to our country.”
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