Intellectual Property Systems in Software

Abstract

Support for research and development in information technology is considered today as critical by most governments in the industrially advanced countries. Traditionally the way of stimulating research has been to ensure to the investor the appropriability of the returns generated. Such appropriability is typically implemented by means of the Intellectual Property Rigths. Nevertheless the protection of such rights is heterogeneous worldwide. Today two different legal systems for the protection of software coexist: the system of patents and the system of author's copyrights. This paper explains these two main systems of ‘intellectual property’ to provide legal protection to a software, including the licenses to transfer rights on software. The end of the paper presents the most recent trends of the EU government to replace the current European software protection system, including a discussion onf the software patents and the legal initiatives on the subject. In addition, legal issues linked with new ways in software comercialization are presented.