The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to intellectual property:

Intellectual property 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, cop ...

– intangible assets such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property rights include copyright, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights, trade dress, and in some jurisdictions trade secrets. They may be sometimes called

intellectual rights 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, ...

. ''See outline of patents for a topical guide and overview of

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...

s.''

Types

Some examples of intellectual property include: * Artistic work **

Literature Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...

Music Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspe ...

Painting Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...

Sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable ...

Computer program A computer program is a sequence or set of instructions in a programming language for a computer to execute. Computer programs are one component of software, which also includes documentation and other intangible components. A computer program ...

Indigenous intellectual property Indigenous intellectual property is a term used in national and international forums to describe intellectual property that is "collectively owned" by various Indigenous peoples, and by extension, their legal rights to protect specific such prop ...

Internet domain name A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. As ...

* Invention *

Trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a type of intellectual property consisting of a recognizable sign, design, or expression that identifies products or services from a particular source and distinguishes them from othe ...

Service mark A service mark or servicemark is a trademark used in the United States and several other countries to identify a service rather than a product. When a service mark is federally registered, the standard registration symbol ® or "Reg U.S. ...

Trade secret Trade secrets are a type of intellectual property that includes formulas, practices, processes, designs, instruments, patterns, or compilations of information that have inherent economic value because they are not generally known or readily ...

Rights

Authors' rights "Author's rights" is a term frequently used in connection with laws about intellectual property. The term is considered as a direct translation of the French term ''droit d’auteur'' (also German ''Urheberrecht''). It was first (1777) promoted ...

Copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educatio ...

* Database right * Industrial design rights (or registered designs) * Intellectual rights to magic methods *

Moral rights Moral rights are rights of creators of copyrighted works generally recognized in civil law jurisdictions and, to a lesser extent, in some common law jurisdictions. The moral rights include the right of attribution, the right to have a work ...

Passing off Passing off is a common law tort which can be used to enforce unregistered trade mark rights. The tort of passing off protects the goodwill of a trader from misrepresentation. The law of passing off prevents one trader from misrepresenting go ...

Patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...

s * Personality rights *

Related rights In copyright law, related rights (or neighbouring rights) are the rights of a creative work not connected with the work's actual author. It is used in opposition to the term "authors' rights". ''Neighbouring rights'' is a more literal translation ...

Plant breeders' rights Plant breeders' rights (PBR), also known as plant variety rights (PVR), are rights granted to the breeder of a new variety of plant that give the breeder exclusive control over the propagating material (including seed, cuttings, divisions, tissue ...

Trade dress Trade dress is the characteristics of the visual appearance of a product or its packaging (or even the design of a building) that signify the source of the product to consumers. Trade dress is an aspect of trademark law, which is a form of intelle ...

Law

* Fashion law *

Integrated circuit layout design protection Layout designs (topographies) of integrated circuits are a field in the protection of intellectual property. In United States intellectual property law, a "mask work" is a two or three-dimensional layout or topography of an integrated circuit ...

* Plant variety protection * Supplementary protection certificate

Copyright

Berne Convention The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, was an international assembly held in 1886 in the Swiss city of Bern by ten European countries with the goal to agree on a set of leg ...

Copyright Clause The Copyright Clause (also known as the Intellectual Property Clause, Copyright and Patent Clause, or the Progress Clause) describes an enumerated power listed in the United States Constitution ( Article I, Section 8, Clause 8). The clause, w ...

of the U.S. Constitution * History of copyright law *

Philosophy of copyright The philosophy of copyright considers philosophical issues linked to copyright policy, and other jurisprudential problems that arise in legal systems' interpretation and application of copyright law. One debate concerns the purpose of copyrigh ...

Sound recording and reproduction Sound recording and reproduction is the electrical, mechanical, electronic, or digital inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording ...

* Statute of Anne

Patents

s * History of patent law * Biological patent *

Software patent A software patent is a patent on a piece of software, such as a computer program, libraries, user interface, or algorithm. Background A patent is a set of exclusionary rights granted by a state to a patent holder for a limited period of time, u ...

Utility model A utility model is a patent-like intellectual property right to protect inventions. This type of right is available in many countries but, notably, not in the United States, United Kingdom or Canada. Although a utility model is similar to a patent ...

Procedures

Patent application 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 re ...

* Patent infringement and enforcement *

Patent licensing A license (or licence) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreeme ...

Patent prosecution Patent prosecution describes the interaction between applicants and their representatives, and a patent office with regard to a patent, or an application for a patent. Broadly, patent prosecution can be split into pre-grant prosecution, which i ...

Legal requirements

Patentable subject matter Patentable, statutory or patent-eligible subject matter is subject matter which is susceptible of patent protection. The laws or patent practices of many countries provide that certain subject-matter is excluded from patentability, even if the inv ...

Novelty Novelty (derived from Latin word ''novus'' for "new") is the quality of being new, or following from that, of being striking, original or unusual. Novelty may be the shared experience of a new cultural phenomenon or the subjective perception of an ...

Utility (patent) In United States patent law, utility is a patentability requirement. As provided by , an invention is "useful" if it provides some identifiable benefit and is capable of use and "useless" otherwise. The majority of inventions are usually not cha ...

Inventive step and non-obviousness The inventive step and non-obviousness reflect a general patentability requirement present in most patent laws, according to which an invention should be sufficiently inventive—i.e., non-obvious—in order to be patented. In other words, " he ...

Industrial applicability In certain jurisdictions' patent law, industrial applicability or industrial application is a patentability requirement according to which a patent can only be granted for an invention which is susceptible of industrial application, i.e. for an in ...

* Person having ordinary skill in the art *

Prior art Prior art (also known as state of the art or background art) is a concept in patent law used to determine the patentability of an invention, in particular whether an invention meets the novelty and the inventive step or non-obviousness criteria ...

* Inventorship * Sufficiency of disclosure *

Unity of invention In most patent laws, unity of invention is a formal administrative requirement that must be met by a patent application to become a granted patent. Basically, a patent application can relate only to one invention or a group of closely related in ...

By region or country

Australian patent law Australian patent law is law governing the granting of a temporary monopoly on the use of an invention, in exchange for the publication and free use of the invention after a certain time. The primary piece of legislation is the Patents Act 1990. ...

Canadian patent law Canadian patent law is the legal system regulating the granting of patents for inventions within Canada, and the enforcement of these rights in Canada. A 'patent' is a government grant that gives the inventor—as well as their heirs, executors ...

* Patent law of the People's Republic of China * European patent law *

Japanese patent law Japanese patent law is based on the first-to-file principle and is mainly given force by the of Japan. Article 2 defines an invention as "the highly advanced creation of technical ideas utilizing the law of nature". English translation The d ...

United States patent law Under United States law, a patent is a right granted to the inventor of a (1) process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter, (2) that is new, useful, and non-obvious. A patent is the right to exclude others, for a limited ...

Trademarks

Geographical indication A geographical indication (GI) is a name or sign used on products which corresponds to a specific geographical location or origin (e.g., a town, region, or country). The use of a geographical indication, as an indication of the product's source, ...

* Protected designation of origin *

(including service marks)

General topics

Anti-copyright Criticism of copyright, or anti-copyright sentiment, is a dissenting view of the current state of copyright law or copyright as a concept. Critics often discuss philosophical, economical, or social rationales of such laws and the laws' implem ...

* Arrow information paradox * Background, foreground, sideground and postground intellectual property * Copyright for Creativity *

Copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the copyright holder, s ...

** Copyfraud ** Industrial espionage **

File sharing File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images and video), documents or electronic books. Common methods of storage, transmission and dispersion include r ...

Music piracy Music piracy is the copying and distributing of recordings of a piece of music for which the rights owners (composer, recording artist, or copyright-holding record company) did not give consent. In the contemporary legal environment, it is a form ...

** Patent troll ** Plagiarism ** Scams in intellectual property * Digital rights management * Exhaustion of intellectual property rights **

Exhaustion doctrine under U.S. law :''See also Exhaustion of intellectual property rights for a general introduction not limited to U.S. law.'' The exhaustion doctrine, also referred to as the first sale doctrine, is a U.S. common law patent doctrine that limits the extent to whic ...

First-sale doctrine The first-sale doctrine (also sometimes referred to as the "right of first sale" or the "first sale rule") is an American legal concept that limits the rights of an intellectual property owner to control resale of products embodying its intellec ...

* Free culture movement *

Free software movement The free software movement is a social movement with the goal of obtaining and guaranteeing certain freedoms for software users, namely the freedoms to run the software, to study the software, to modify the software, and to share copies of the s ...

* Free content *

Intangible asset An intangible asset is an asset that lacks physical substance. Examples are patents, copyright, franchises, goodwill, trademarks, and trade names, as well as software. This is in contrast to physical assets (machinery, buildings, etc.) and fin ...

Intellectual capital Intellectual capital is the result of mental processes that form a set of intangible objects that can be used in economic activity and bring income to its owner ( organization), covering the competencies of its people ( human capital), the value rel ...

Intellectual rights 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, ...

* Intellectual property brokering * Intellectual property education * Intellectual property infringement * Intellectual property valuation *

IPR-Helpdesk The IP Helpdesk is a project funded by the European Commission (EC) and a source and guide to patent information. The project was launched in 1998 (at the same time as Espacenet) to be a central reference point for intellectual property inquiries a ...

* Legal aspects of computing * License **

Public copyright license A public license or public copyright licenses is a license by which a copyright holder as licensor can grant additional copyright permissions to any and all persons in the general public as licensees. By applying a public license to a work, pro ...

All rights reserved "All rights reserved" is a copyright formality indicating that the copyright holder ''reserves'', or holds for its own use, all the rights provided by copyright law. Originating in the Buenos Aires Convention of 1910, it is unclear if it has any ...

All rights reversed All rights reversed is a phrase that indicates a release of copyright or a copyleft licensing status. It is a pun on the common copyright disclaimer "All rights reserved", a copyright formality originally required by the Buenos Aires Conventio ...

Anti-copyright notice An anti-copyright notice is a specific statement that is added to a work in order to encourage wide distribution. Such notices are legally required to host such specific media; under the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic ...

Copyleft Copyleft is the legal technique of granting certain freedoms over copies of copyrighted works with the requirement that the same rights be preserved in derivative works. In this sense, ''freedoms'' refers to the use of the work for any purpose ...

** Free license **

Share-alike Share-alike (🄎) is a copyright licensing term, originally used by the Creative Commons project, to describe works or licenses that require copies or adaptations of the work to be released under the same or similar license as the original. Cop ...

Limitations and exceptions to copyright Limitations and exceptions to copyright are provisions, in local copyright law or the Berne Convention, which allow for copyrighted works to be used without a license from the copyright owner. Limitations and exceptions to copyright relate to a ...

Fair dealing Fair dealing is a limitation and exception to the exclusive rights granted by copyright law to the author of a creative work. Fair dealing is found in many of the common law jurisdictions of the Commonwealth of Nations. Fair dealing is an en ...

Fair use Fair use is a doctrine in United States law that permits limited use of copyrighted material without having to first acquire permission from the copyright holder. Fair use is one of the limitations to copyright intended to balance the interests ...

** Freedom of panorama ** Right to quote *

List of intellectual property law journals This list includes notable journals and magazines concerned with intellectual property (IP) law and business, and their various sub-fields, such as copyright, patent and trademark laws. The list also includes official journals and gazettes of pate ...

Orphan works An orphan work is a copyright-protected work for which rightsholders are positively indeterminate or uncontactable. Sometimes the names of the originators or rightsholders are known, yet it is impossible to contact them because additional details ...

Public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly waived, or may be inapplicable. Because those rights have expired, ...

* Reverse engineering * Societal views on intellectual property * Societal views on patents * Soft intellectual property * Soft IP

Legal agreements and government enforcement

* Adelphi Charter *

Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights 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 establishes minimum standards for the regulation by nat ...

(TRIPS) *

Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement es, Acuerdo Comercial Anti-Falsificación , image = Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement map (English).svg , image_width = 260 , caption = , type = Plurilateral agreement , date_drafted ...

(ACTA) * China International Copyright Expo *

Doha Declaration The Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health was adopted by the WTO Ministerial Conference of 2001 in Doha on November 14, 2001. It reaffirmed flexibility of TRIPS member states in circumventing patent rights for better access to ...

* EU Directive on the enforcement of intellectual property rights * French Intellectual Property Code *

Intellectual property issues in cultural heritage (IPinCH) The Intellectual Property Issues in Cultural Heritage (IPinCH) Project is a seven-year international research initiative based at Simon Fraser University, in British Columbia, Canada. IPinCH's work explores the rights, values, and responsibilities ...

Intellectual property organization Intellectual property organizations are organizations that are focused on copyrights, trademarks, patents, or other intellectual property law concepts. This includes international intergovernmental organizations that foster governmental cooperatio ...

(including a list of intellectual property organizations) *

International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants The International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants or UPOV (french: link=no, Union internationale pour la protection des obtentions végétales) is a treaty body (non-United Nations intergovernmental organization) with headquar ...

(UPOV) *

Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property The Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, signed in Paris, France, on 20 March 1883, was one of the first intellectual property treaties. It established a Union for the protection of industrial property. The convention is c ...

* Plant Variety Protection Act (U.S.) *

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is a federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. ICE's stated mission is to protect the United States from the cross-border crime and illegal immigration tha ...

World Intellectual Property Organization The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO; french: link=no, Organisation mondiale de la propriété intellectuelle (OMPI)) is one of the 15 specialized agencies of the United Nations (UN). Pursuant to the 1967 Convention Establishi ...

(WIPO) * World Intellectual Property Day (April 26)