Exam 7: Intellectual Property and Cyber Piracy

Wildboards Company introduces a product called a "Rollerboard" for which it is granted a registered trademark.The Rollerboard is a snowboard with a removable row of wheels along the center of the underside.With the wheels attached,the user can attain extremely high speed in hard-packed snow conditions.In addition,many users have found that they can use their snowboards on streets with the wheels attached.This new use of snowboards becomes very popular and many competing snowboard makers introduce similar products.The sport becomes known generally as rollerboarding and most people refer to all such wheeled snowboards as rollerboards.The consequence of this is that:

United Airlines,Marriott Hotels,and Weight Watchers are examples of:

Will someone who uses a short section of a copyrighted work in a critical review be subject to copyright infringement?

The "one-year 'on sale' doctrine" is also known as:

The victim of stolen trade secrets can recover any profits made by someone from the stolen trade secret.

It is easy and inexpensive to pursue a patent infringement case.

For which of the following kinds of intellectual property is a filing or registration required in order to receive protection?

Which of the following is true about trademark registration?

A doctrine that says a patent may not be granted if the invention was used by the public for more than a certain period of time prior to the filing of the patent application is known as:

The American Inventors Protection Act requires the U.S Patent and Trademark Office to take action on a patent application within 3 years in most cases.

Monty is an odd sort of fellow who spends most of his time tinkering in his garage.He is certain that someday he will invent something that will make him very wealthy.Finally,he thinks he has the million dollar idea.He has invented a device that attaches to both his phone line and through his computer to the Internet to block telemarketing calls without having to pay a service fee for the capability to the local phone company.The technology for this already existed,but Monty was the first to put it together in this way.Monty is waiting to perfect this invention before filing a patent application.Monty learns that someone else has invented a similar device after he did,but has already filed an application.Also,someone broke into Monty's garage and stole the information about the invention.Discuss Monty's legal situation.

The international copyright treaty known as the Berne Convention had what effect on placing the copyright symbol or the wordy "copyright" on a copyrighted work?

In the State Street case discussed in the text,what change was made to patent law?

Business models used for commerce on the Internet can be patented.

The United States still follows the first-to-file rule,which means the first person to file an item or process is given protection over another who was the first to invent an item or process.

The Economic Espionage Act of 1996 provides for criminal penalties for violation of its provisions.

In general,trademark protection is granted based on whether the trademark is:

Life forms may be patented under U.S.patent law.

Billy has created a device called a TowRack which is a rack for carrying sports equipment such as bikes,skis,and kayaks.What makes this item different from other racks is that it attaches to a vehicle's trailer hitch and has a single wheel to help support the weight of the rack and items attached to it.Because it is so much lighter than a regular trailer,it can be used on even the smallest of cars that are not designed to tow regular trailers.Because of the success of this product,competitors introduce similar products.But because of the initial success of Billy's TowRack,all of these similar products are often referred to as TowRacks.Billy has also written a book about using "TowRacks" and safe driving techniques for driving with TowRacks and would like to obtain a copyright for the book.Discuss Billy's legal situation.

What changes should be made to copyright law to reflect the ease with which much creative material can be reproduced and distributed over the Internet? What concerns are there with any such law?