A Copyright Primer for Startups

     Jessica VanderVeen and I co-authored a blog post "A Copyright Primer for Startups" that was just published on the Startup Iceland blog.

      Here is a short snippet from that post.

In our previous post, we discussed what a trademark is, how you select one, and how you protect it. In this post, we examine copyright protection. Again, this post concerns a startup business’s intellectual property from a U.S. perspective, and although U.S. law (17 U.S.C. § 101), is different from Icelandic law, this information generally is applicable in Iceland.

And how might copyright protection be relevant for a startup? Here are some scenarios discussing the relevancy of copyright.

Scenario 1. You launched your revolutionary computer software product. All of a sudden a competitor appears that is doing the same thing you are. One of your team members screams, “they cannot do that because we have a copyright”. Is that correct?

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- Henry Park