Colantuoni, Lucio; Novazio, Cristiano --- "Intellectual Property Rights in Sports: A Comparative Overview of the USA, UK, and Italy" [2011] ELECD 824; in Nafziger, A.R. James; Ross, F. Stephen (eds), "Handbook on International Sports Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: Handbook on International Sports Law

Editor(s): Nafziger, A.R. James; Ross, F. Stephen

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847206336

Section: Chapter 15

Section Title: Intellectual Property Rights in Sports: A Comparative Overview of the USA, UK, and Italy

Author(s): Colantuoni, Lucio; Novazio, Cristiano

Number of pages: 31

Extract:

15 Intellectual property rights in sports: a comparative
overview of the USA, UK, and Italy
Lucio Colantuoni and Cristiano Novazio



1. INTRODUCTION
1.1. Background

Traditionally, `intellectual property' connotes a legal system of protection of immaterial
goods that have significant economic importance: it refers to the result of human
creativity and imagination such as, for example, artistic and literary works, industrial
inventions, and trademarks. Intellectual property rights (IPR) influence three dimensions
of a community: socio-cultural, economical, and environmental. Copyright and image
rights particularly affect the cultural/artistic process, to the point that they can influence
the freedom of expression. Patents and trademarks become such an integrated part of the
product and of the industrial/commercial processes that they regulate significant and
economically relevant aspects (production, use and circulation).
Intellectual property can be divided into two categories: industrial property, which
includes inventions (patents), trademarks, industrial designs, and geographic indications
of source; and copyright, which includes literary and artistic works such as novels, poems
and plays, films, musical works, artistic works such as drawings, paintings, photographs
and sculptures, and architectural designs. The copyright may subsist in creative and
artistic works (e.g. books, movies, music, paintings, photographs, and software) and give
the copyright holder the exclusive right to control reproduction or adaptation of such
works for a certain period of time. A patent may be granted for a new, useful, and
non-obvious invention, and gives the patent holder a right to prevent others from
practicing the invention without a license ...