Your Right To Your Intellectual Property

An artist, musician, or writer, or an inventor or company with a trademark, all own the intellectual property they have created unless they have signed a contract superceding that right (for instance, a writer sells rights to his or her book, or a drug inventor working for a pharmaceutical company may have signed away his right to inventions to his or her employer). When you create something, you have a right to all the proceeds from that intellectual property. If someone has infringed on your right to your intellectual property, you should contact an intellectual property lawyer – which includes copyright lawyers and patent attorneys. When you create intellectual property, it belongs to you and only you have the right to say what’s going to be done with it. I had an instance of this once. I wrote a poem and submitted it to a magazine, from whom I never heard back. When I did a Google search on my name (something you should do often if you worry about your right to your intellectual property), the poem I’d submitted popped up! I was angry, to say the least,

and contacted the editor to ask him to take it off. He behaved as if I’d insulted him, and told me that he only wanted to make sure people got to read my creation. But it was my creation, not his. My intellectual property. He had no right to post my poem online without my permission. Never hesitate to confront someone who has stolen your right to your intellectual property. If you post images online, take the time to learn how to put a watermark in, and learn how to search online for those watermarks. If you write anything, do a regular search for your name. With the internet, it’s very easy for people to steal your intellectual property, whether they have a right to do so or not.