| When I explain what intellectual property is to my children, I tell them that intellectual property includes all kinds of things that our minds create, like inventions related to making a safer skate board ramp, songs that we listen to, and things that we identify with a brand, like Tobasco hot sauce made on Avery Island, Louisiana.� We went to visit Avery Island a couple weeks ago, and my boys read about how a patent was obtained in approximately 1870 for Tobasco hot sauce.� They were excited to tell several others on our tour about patent protection and how a patent protects an inventor from someone else being a "copycat" and lets an inventor get paid for "thinking up" the invention.� They then went on to explain that the name "Tobasco" is a registered mark which means that people all over the United States recognize the Tobasco name with the hot sauce.� And then, when the Superbowl ad with the mosqito was shown, the boys explained that the creative ideas in the television ad, like having the mosquito explode, were intellectual property protected by copyrights and "other stuff" that keep other hot sauce companies from mimicking Tobasco's ad.� I was excited to hear this from my children, especially when they wanted to get their friends to help file for a game that we play called "Shmoo". � Please feel free to contact me at bambi@bfwpatents.com if you want to share your intellectual property experience(s) or if have a general question about intellectual property. |
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