What is the difference between a patent and copyright? Can an invention be protected by both?
Patent and copyright protection are complementary. In very general terms, patents protect new technical ideas and principles, while copyright protects the form of expression used. For example, a new sort of paper might be protected by a patent, while the printed content of a newspaper would be protected by copyright. In computer terms, the actual code (whether machine-readable or in a form which is intelligible to human readers) would be subject to copyright protection, while underlying technological ideas may be eligible for patent protection. Patent law gives the holder of a patent for a computer-implemented invention the right to prevent third parties from using software incorporating any new technology he has invented (as defined by the patent claims). On the other hand, a computer program will be accorded copyright protection where the form of expression is original in the sense of being the authors own intellectual creation. Third parties would not be able to produce substantiall
