Copyright Law Blog

California Business Law Attorney’s Guide to Making Money in the Future – Patents

July 30th, 2009 at 06:44am Under trademark law

In these difficult economic times, new businesses are much riskier to try, but there is no more lucrative an area even in the current conditions than for an inventor or designer who can create a new invention or process and who can afford to have it patented.

Whether you live in San Diego, Orange County, Los Angeles, Long Beach, Santa Barbara, Rancho Cucamonga, Ontario, Temecula, Anaheim, Irvine, Huntington Beach, Laguna Beach, Newport Beach, Santa Ana, Encinitas or Palm Springs conditions are much the same throughout California. Business is slow and much of what little real estate is selling are the foreclosed homes.

As a Business Lawyer in Southern California, people are always asking me for the next great area of business in which they can make money and what legal restrictions there might be in the future. When asked these questions the one place I don’t turn to is those newsletters that tell you how much money you would have made if you had followed their advice and invested in certain stocks or gone into the cell phone business.

For the most part, however, you can almost certainly bet that their advice is wrong, so you can likely assume that the opposite of their advice would offer a better chance of success.

Many newsletters are still focused on getting into businesses that rely on the consumer having discretionary cash to purchase unnecessary items. That’s probably not just bad advice, it’s lousy advice. Television commercials telling you that you can make tens of thousands a month working from home are a way to take your money for seminars, books and other materials that most likely in the end will cost you more than you’ll ever make, once you add in your start up costs.

On the other hand, one or two of the ideas being touted may be the fad of the future, no matter how little money people have to spend. For instance, if people will buy expensive clothes for their dogs, does that mean that they’ll buy little prom dresses for their infants? Hard to say.

However, if the high heeled shoes cause injuries to those infants, you can see the lawsuits coming already.

What’s the next item we can’t do without or that we like just fine now, but would pay an extra $50 to have a designer version of that item? That depends as much on good marketing and a good business plan as the good idea. If you have that and the resources to start production, create a website, hire a search engine optimizer to help your website get noticed on search engines and then know how to create publicity for your product, you are halfway home. But all of that costs money, lots of money, or lots and lots of time. But if the design is unique, it may make much more sense to apply for a design patent and then to license or sell your patent outright to another manufacturer.

One item that makes business run is credit. But all you hear in the news is how hard it is now to get credit for a house, for a business, for anything. You can therefore almost certainly count on new businesses popping up that offer their services in finding you credit. While this area of business is already regulated, as more and more scammers get into this business, you can be certain that more regulation will follow.

The difficulty with this type of business is that you may find it difficult not to be brushed with the same paint brush as the unscrupulous businesses who will guarantee to find a person credit for a fee and then either take the money and run or simply offer excuses why it was impossible for them to find their customer the credit they promised.

An area where there appears to be an opportunity in these times is helping others and in doing so, you may help yourself. Consumers need real help to survive this economic mess. Web sites that actually provide a service such as locating cheap gas, coupons for groceries, clothing sales or other basic necessities may be the one area in which there could be demand by the consumer. This type of service will require a lot of free advice, however, time and people to gather this information and it still could be difficult to recoup your investment.

Perhaps the best way that still exists to make a lot of money is if you can develop an idea for an invention. Utility patents are very expensive to obtain using a lawyer. Most charge from $7,500 on up depending upon the complexity. However, you can obtain a provisional patent or a design patent for substantially less and as soon as the application has been accepted (as opposed to when the patent is granted, which takes much longer) you can begin to market your invention to other companies and either license your patent pending invention to them or sell it outright.

So start thinking about what hasn’t yet been invented, or improved upon in an important way, and if you need assistance with obtaining a patent, trademark or copyright, call us or visit us at our website where you can access much more information about intellectual property.

La Quinta, Garden Grove and Corona Del Mar California Copyright Lawyer Looks at Copyright Infringements in Conversations

July 10th, 2009 at 12:40pm Under copyright infringement

No matter where you live or try to make a living in Southern California, from Westminster and Mission Viejo to Murrieta and Temecula, from San Diego to Orange County, from Fullerton to Fontana, from Irvine to Anaheim and Rancho Cucamonga to Ontario, from Palm Springs to Indio, to La Quinta, Garden Grove and Corona del Mar, the law is the same for everyone because copyright law in the U.S. is governed by international treaties and administered by the Library of Congress.

While everything you write down is automatically protected by copyright treaties that countries like the U.S. have signed, there’s a reason why the same does not apply to words you speak. Otherwise, this would be the result in cities such as San Bernardino, Chula Vista,  El Cajon, Fontana, Moreno Valley, Garden Grove, Palmdale, Victorville and even Santa Monica.

Children at school would face this dilemma:

“You hit me harder than I hit you,” one child would say.

“No, you hit me harder than I hit you,” the other would reply.

“You can’t say that,” the first child would say.

 ”I already have that phrase copyrighted. You just infringed my copyright. You owe me big time.”

“You just infringed my copyright on ‘You owe me big time,’ the second child might respond. “Now you’re in big trouble.”

“But you just infringed my copyrighted phrase, “Now you’re in big trouble,” the first child might respond. I said that in second grade.

“Just how many times have you said my phrase?”

At this point, the second child would be wise not to say anything further before talking to an attorney.

A whole law firm of lawyers would probably have to be called in, the school might be named as a defendant for not warning the school children not to infringe other children’s copyrighted phrases, and its very possible that parent’s fortunes could be at risk if their children were not insured against copyright infringements.

In bars and nightclubs the results could be even more disastrous.

“What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?” a man might ask a woman.

At which point the woman would probably start calling an attorney on her cell phone who would notify the man of how much he would need to pay for using that line.

If the man followed up his initial approach with, “You look familiar. Haven’t I seen you before?” the damages he would have to pay to settle the copyright infringement case would be double.

Even lawyers would not be immune to such results.

Every time a lawyer stood up in court and uttered the usual “Objection,” damages would have to be paid to someone.

The jury member who announced to the court at the conclusion of a case, “Not guilty, your honor,” would also have to fork out some money.

While the words you write down may be copyrighted, individual words and common phrases are not owned to the exclusion of everyone else.

What is protected by copyright are literary works, i.e. books, music, plays, even advertising. While it is true that a slogan that can be used in advertising and those advertising materials can be copyrighted, the slogan may also be trademarked for use on products. However, the owner of a trademark may not sue others for using that trademarked phrase in daily conversation.

If you have a copyright or intellectual property matter in Orange County, San Diego, in the Inland Empire, Palm Springs or anywhere in Southern California, we have the knowledge and resources to be your La Quinta Copyright Lawyers, and Corona del Mar and Newport Beach Intellectual Property Attorneys. For this reason, be sure to hire a California law firm with copyright lawyers who are ready to serve you in areas such as Garden Grove, Corona and Santa Monica so you are properly represented when you need to be.

If you have an intellectual property matter and need to know your rights, call the Law Offices of R. Sebastian Gibson, or visit our website at http://www.sebastiangibsonlaw.com  and learn about your rights and options. You can also call us to speak directly to Sebastian Gibson on the phone about your legal matter.