First, you need to know what the various forms of intellectual property are and how they can help you protect what is yours.

Patents

Patents protect inventions that are useful, original, and an improvement upon an existing machine or invention. Today they can be used to protect everything from new and unique computer components to specially engineered geniuses of plant species. There is even a statute that allows for the protection of unique manners of transacting business know as a business method patent. So the easiest way of thinking about patents is that they protect inventions.

Trademarks

Trademarks are your brand identifiers. They tell consumers who produced the product (e.g., Coca Cola used for soda) or who is providing the service (e.g., McDonalds for restaurant services). They can include any word, name, symbol, or device, or any combination thereof used, or intended to be used, in commerce to identify and distinguish the goods or services of one manufacturer or seller from goods manufactured or sold by others and to indicate the source of the goods. In short, they’re the way the consumer identifies what they are buying and who is providing the goods or services behind what they purchase.

Copyrights

Copyrights protect original works of artistic expression including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. They include protection for books, articles, music, lyrics, plays, screen plays, scripts, dance routines, works of art, statutes, movies, television broadcasts, albums, CDs, and even components of a web site. A copyright gives the author and/or owner of the work the exclusive right to reproduce the artistic creation.