Comparison of the UK Copyright Law and Patent Law Research Paper

Comparison of the UK Copyright Law and Patent Law - Research Paper Example The effect of a grant of a patent is to exclude others from reproducing, selling and making the patented object whilst the effect of copyright protection is to give its owner the exclusive right to do anything to his copyrighted work.1. In the United Kingdom jurisdiction, the applicable law for patenting is the Patent Law of 1977 (as amended) and for copyrighting the Copyright, Designs and Patents Acts of 1988 (as amended by the Copyright and Related Rights and Regulations).2 Albeit that the laws have different methods of extending legal protection to their subjects, these differences boil down to the same purpose – to minimise monopolies. The copyright law began with the practice of giving exclusive rights to printers to print and distribute books. However, in 1709, the Statute of Anne began giving these rights instead to the authors although limited to fourteen years and renewable once.3 In 1886, the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works established the fundamental structure that countries should follow in drafting their respective copyright laws.4 Eventually, the European Union was organised and one of its objectives was to harmonise the laws of member countries. Thus, the laws of the UK periodically undergo amendments to make them in accord with the EU laws. The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988 for example, has been constantly amended and in 2003 The Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003 was issued. 5 The patents law, on the other hand, was believed to have originated in Italy through the Statute of Monopolies in 1474. In England, the patents system was begun by the issuance of letters patent granted to inventors to grant them the monopoly of the production of certain goods.