The United States of America has had more than 200 years of Patent and Copyright laws on its books. Is it possible that early lawmakers James Madison, George Read, Rufus King, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and Thomas Jefferson could have foreseen the importance of their hard work as it advances America’s sciences and useful arts into the twenty-first century?

Imagine how brilliant and omniscient the drafters of the U.S. Constitution and successive statutes were when they thought to write, in Article 1, Section 8, that Congress shall have the power to “promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.”

The golden eggs laid by inventors, gadgeteers, cranks, tinkerers, thinkers, imagineers, and entrepreneurs that continue to hatch American industries have been protected and nurtured by a vital—albeit imperfect—system of intellectual property laws that has stood the test of time.

Part 5 focuses on the methods of protection available to you, thanks to our forefathers—patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets. This information isn’t meant to take the place of competent legal advice, but rather to familiarize you with the terrain as you continue on your quest to commercialize your ideas.