Intellectual Property Rights Essay

HOW TO PROTECT INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS IN NIGERIA

There must be measures to ensure that individual ideas and works are protected from piracy and undue advantage. The available measures one can take to protect his individual intellectual property (original ideas, concepts, products, etc.) include the following:

i. Copyright ii. Patent iii. Trademark iv. Royalty (Payment)

I. Copyright:

Copyright is a branch of law granting authors the exclusive privilege to reproduce, distribute, perform, or display their creative works. The goal of copyright law is to encourage authors to invest effort in creating new works of art and literature. Copyright is one branch of the larger legal field known as intellectual property, which also includes trademark

These rights are (1) only the copyright owner may reproduce or make copies of the work; (2) only the copyright owner may prepare adaptations of the work, such as translating a novel into another language or adapting the novel into a screenplay; (3) only the copyright owner may distribute copies of the work to the public; (4) only the copyright owner may perform the work in public; and (5) only the copyright owner may display the work in public.

Not all of these rights are granted to every type of copyrighted work. This depends on the nature of the work involved. Copyright in Literary and Musical works for example guarantee the exclusive right to do any of the following acts in Nigeria:

a) Reproduction of the work in any material form;

b) Publication of the work;

c) Performance in public;

d) Production, reproduction, performance or publication of any translation of the work;

e) Making of any cinematograph film or record in respect of the work;

f) Distribution to the public, for commercial purposes, of copies of the work, by way of rental, lease, hire, loan or similar arrangement.

g) Broadcasting or communication of the work to the public by loudspeaker or any other similar device;

h) Making any adaptation of the work (NgEX.com Reports - Intellectual Property Protection in Nigeria, Page 8 of