In law, particularly in common law jurisdictions, intellectual property refers to a legal entitlement, which sometimes attaches to the expressed form of an idea or of other intangible subject matter. In general terms this legal entitlement sometimes enables its holder to exercise exclusive control over the use of the intellectual property. The term intellectual property reflects the idea that the subject matter of intellectual property is the product of the mind or the intellect, and that once established, such entitlements are treated, as far as possible, as equivalent to tangible property, and may be enforced as such by the courts. The most well known forms of intellectual property include copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets. Patents and trademarks fall into a particular subset of intellectual property known as industrial property.
The use of the term intellectual property is often predicated on considerations such as the ‘free rider problem’ or rationalized by problematizing the fact that owners of computers have the ability to produce and distribute perfect copies of digital works. Proponents of the term tend to address exclusive rights policy by valorizing the incentives afforded to authors and inventors in granting them a right to exact a fee from those who wish to manufacture their inventions or publish their expressive works.
The incentives granted for patent rights have sometimes served the public benefit purpose and promoted innovation by ensuring that someone who devoted, say, ten years of penury while struggling to develop vulcanized rubber or a workable steamship, could recoup her or his investment of time and energy. Using monopoly power, the inventor could exact a fee from those who wanted to make copies of his or her invention. Set it too high, and others would simply try to make a competing invention, but set it low enough and one could make a good living from the fees...............
