Inventor's Guide to Trademarks and Patents, The

Inventor's Guide to Trademarks and Patents, The

by Craig Fellenstein, Jaclyn Vassallo, Rachel Ralston
Released October 2004
Publisher(s): Pearson
ISBN: 9780131463837

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Book description

This is the complete guide to intellectual property: thinking concepts for discovering it, creating it, protecting it, and profiting from it.

Whether you're an individual inventor or an innovator inside a small-medium business or large enterprise, you need a deep, business-focused understanding of intellectual property: patents, trademarks, service marks, copyrights, trade secrets, and the entire invention process. In this book, Craig Fellenstein teaches his own critical techniques that have helped him to earn several patents.

Drawing on his expertise in mentoring invention and patent teams, Fellenstein introduces best practices for managing the process of creating and, protecting, intellectual property.

Coverage includes

  • How inventors think: a complete case study teaching how to conceptualize ideas for new patentable inventions--causing discovery of new patent ideas

  • Validating your invention's uniqueness: critical skills, practical search tools, and the principles of "prior art"

  • Refining and strengthening your inventions

  • Preparing patents that professional evaluators will view favorably

  • Multiple submissions: discovering and filing for follow-on patents that flow from your original ideas

  • Getting a strong patent that will be more likely to withstand any potential challenges after issuance

  • Establishing effective incentives for the creation of new intellectual property

  • Harvesting and commercializing inventions: practical lessons for inventors

  • Using "invention teams" to systematize and accelerate the innovation process

  • Different ways to protect your intellectual property: patents, trademarks, service marks, trade secrets, and copyrights



    •

    Table of contents

    1. Copyright
    2. IBM Press
    3. Acknowledgments
    4. About the Author
    5. Preface
    6. Patents, Copyrights, and Trademarks—A Look Back
      1. The History of Inventions
      2. An Example of an Early Patent
      3. A Timeline of Inventions
      4. The History of Copyrights
      5. The History of Trademarks
    7. Formulating the Idea
      1. Ideas: Are They Copyrights, Patents, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, or Engineering Innovations?
      2. Problem, Solution, and Novelty and Uniqueness Test
      3. Think Beyond Those “Skilled in the Art”
      4. Management of Innovation
    8. Search Strategies, Techniques, and Search Tools to Validate the Uniqueness of Any Invention
      1. Search Engines
      2. Performing a “Search” in Five Easy Steps
      3. Meta-Search Engines
      4. Specialty Databases
      5. U.S. Patents and Trademarks Office Search Example
      6. Web Sources for Conducting Patent Searches
      7. Patent Law Links
    9. Invention Teams
      1. Invention Team Core Members and Objectives
      2. Invention Team Processes
      3. Inventor Mentoring and Strengthening of Ideas
    10. Invention Evaluation Teams
      1. How to Start an Invention Evaluation Team
      2. Evaluation Team Roles and Responsibilities
    11. Defining a Patent: The Problem, Solution, and Novelty
      1. The Skill of Problem Identification
      2. The Skills of Solution Development
      3. The Skills of Novelty Harvesting
      4. Idea Farming
    12. Mining Intellectual Property Assets
      1. How to Articulate Multiple Related Problems
      2. How to Articulate Multiple Solutions for Multiple Problems
    13. Intellectual Property
      1. Patents
      2. Copyright
      3. Trademarks
      4. For More Information on Intellectual Property
    14. Property Protection: Copyrights, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, Patents, and Publishing Intellectual Property
      1. The Value of a Copyright, and How to Initiate It
      2. The Value of a Trademark (and Service Mark), and How to Initiate It
      3. The Trade Secret and How to Exercise Control
      4. The Patent and How to Initiate It
      5. The Significance of Publishing Intellectual Property
      6. The Considerations of Intellectual Property Protection
      7. More Reading
    15. Case Study Patents for Further Research
      1. Apparatus and Method for Blocking Television Commercials and Displaying Alternative Programming
      2. Apparatus and Method for Blocking Television Commercials and Delivering Micro-Programming Content
      3. Apparatus and Method for Blocking Television Commercials with a Content Interrogation Program
      4. Apparatus and Method for Blocking Television Commercials and Providing an Archive Interrogation Program
    16. Trade Secrets
      1. Uniform Trade Secrets Act
    17. Inventor Resources
      1. Legal Advice Is Always Recommended
    18. Index

    Product information

    • Title: Inventor's Guide to Trademarks and Patents, The
    • Author(s): Craig Fellenstein, Jaclyn Vassallo, Rachel Ralston
    • Release date: October 2004
    • Publisher(s): Pearson
    • ISBN: 9780131463837