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Many of you may have heard about news about the trademark-copyright issues in naming the brands. However, have you ever wondered how Trademark is different from copyright? Today, ACU PAY will explain the differences and the legal way for naming your goods brands.
Copyright is the only right that the law certifies that a creator of a work can reproduce, adapt, or advertise and has the right to allow or disallow others to use it. It will protect nine types of creative works: literature, drama, art, music, audio-visual materials, movies, sound recordings, broadcasting, or other works in the literature, science or art department.
Trademark is a type of intellectual property that refers to a mark symbol or badge used on goods or services to indicate that the goods or services used with the trademark are different, such as logos.
When talking about intellectual property, most people are confused by the use of the words “trademark” and “copyright, both of which protect different parts of creative work. “Trademark” is meant to distinguish goods and services available on the market. On the other hand, “Copyright” protects almost all creative works except for product names, service names, advertisements, or unique slogans.
For example, we designed a logo. The logo image we designed is protected by copyright as a work of art created by creativity but does not protect the product name, advertising, or slogan in the logo. Nevertheless, if we register the logo as a trademark, all logos, whether in pictures or letters, will be protected as trademarks.
If someone else uses our logo without permission, he may be guilty of both piracy and trademark infringement.
As we all know, brand names are not considered copyrighted works, but only protected from trademark registration. If our brand name is the same or resembles others who already registered the name, it can be considered that we violated the trademark, whether copying the logo, spelling or even pronouncing similar brand names can be sued.
In the case of the same brand name, even if a trademark is registered, other products can be registered under the same name if they have not yet applied for trademark registration.
The trademark registration is “in which country it is filed, protected in that country” for example, if it is filed in Thailand, only protected in Thailand. If it is filed in the United States, only protected in the United States.
For example, a Thai Amazon coffee brand named similar to the American Amazon e-commerce brand can be named because it belongs to different product and service categories.
