From the course: Understanding Intellectual Property

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Copyrights vs. trademarks

Copyrights vs. trademarks

From the course: Understanding Intellectual Property

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Copyrights vs. trademarks

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- Copyrights versus trademarks. A really common question people have is: What's the difference between a copyright and a trademark? People come to see me and they say, "I've chosen this cool brand, and I would like to copyright it." Well, it turns out you can't copyright the brand. You have to trademark the brand. The difference is substantial. Copyrights protect an original work of authorship that's been fixed in a tangible form. So it's a book, it's a poem, it's music, it's artwork. That's copyright. Copyright protects a work of art, a work of authorship, once it's been fixed in a tangible form. It protects the medium of expression, the actual thing you've created. Trademark protects the brand identity. So if you sell a product or service, you have a name for that, and the name for that is your trademark. You don't copyright that. You can't copyright a name. You can't trademark something that you would otherwise copyright in most cases. So these are completely distinct. Even though…

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