Dear Rich: Nolo’s Patent, Copyright & Trademark Blog

'Spect! Wow, the Dear Rich Staff is impressed. We answered this question two months ago and then the other day, we saw this advertisement on BART. ......

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Dear Rich: I would like to ask about pre-licensed sample packs. I purchased a CD with vocal samples, in the licensing agreement there was information that "You can use the sounds in any type of non commercial music production without......

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Dear Rich: I'm creating a cartoon world which contains several coined words describing things, actions and types of creatures, a little bit like Tolkien's "Lord Of The Rings". Does copyright give me the exclusive right to use these words in......

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Dear Rich: I have a question about one of your posts, titled Reselling Apple Products from February of 2009. I am interested in opening an online store and selling Apple products. However, I am not interested in becoming an authorized......

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Dear Rich: My question is in regards to what some people call the, "Taggie" blankets. I see that a lot of people make and sell them on etsy.com. I've heard that there was some sort of controversary with this is...and that......

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Dear Rich: I want to use the melody (we will do the lyrics) of the 1977 Elvis Costello song Watching the Detectives in a promotional video. It is for a medical device company. Term is 9 months (this year). Do......

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My nephew has come up with a new nickname for the NBA player Jonas Jerebko from Sweden ("The Swedish Eagle"). He and his buddy have come to games with a self designed t-shirt that sports an eagle-like bird with a......

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I work for a non-profit and my board members are obsessed with getting photo releases - but as they don't have a good one and they often want to photograph events with LOTS of people - they refrain from taking......

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Dear Rich: You show a lot of odd pictures of the Dear Rich Staff. It seems a little frivolous to dispense legal advice and yet attribute it to fictitious sources. We agree that people who dispense legal advice should not hide......

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Dear Rich: I'm optioning theatrical rights from an author's heirs. I'm using a boilerplate option contract to option the rights. Before I enter into the contract, should the heirs have to provide right of title from the Copyright Office and......

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Dear Rich: Our company offers a website directory service for advertisers. The advertisers can supply a photo but some of them now want to supply artwork. As long as the image came from clip-art, or some other publicly "royalty-free" stock......

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Dear RIch: I am an independent inventor and I am seeking an Intellectual property agent to represent me and my invention to the market. I currently have about 9 months left before I know whether the United States Patent office......

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Dear Rich: I am equestrian artist that will be adding a t-shirt line to my portfolio. My graphic designer has created my horseshoe graphic, which I own and I have created one line phrases for each shirt. I will also......

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Dear Rich: I am a freelance filmmaker in Chicago and I do volunteer freelance film making for churches. Once a year we have a parish mission at our church and our guest speaker is usually a priest from a different......

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Dear Rich: I'm trying to find my roller derby name. Being a sci-fi geek, I'm leaning towards the name of a character in a sci-fi novel that would fit me perfectly. Seeing that Frito-Lay has been suing a skater for......

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