Questions & Answers

Copyright (or author’s right) is a legal term used to describe the rights that creators have over their literary and artistic works. Works covered by copyright range from books, music, paintings, sculpture, and films, to computer programs, databases, advertisements, maps, and technical drawings.

Every business uses material in which copyright exists. Your logo, website and marketing material for example will all have copyright associated with them, as will many other documents produced within your business.

Exhaustive lists of works covered by copyright are usually not to be found in legislation. Nonetheless, broadly speaking, works commonly protected by copyright throughout the world include:

• literary works such as novels, poems, plays, reference works, newspaper articles;
• computer programs, databases;
• films, musical compositions, and choreography;
• artistic works such as paintings, drawings, photographs, and sculpture;
• architecture; and
• advertisements, maps, and technical drawings.

Copyright protection extends only to expressions, and not to ideas, procedures, methods of operation or mathematical concepts as such. Copyright may or may not be available for a number of objects such as titles, slogans, or logos, depending on whether they contain sufficient authorship.

As soon as you have created the work in which copyright subsists you should use the symbol © along with your name and the year in which the work was created. This applies regardless of whether the copyright has been registered.

Typically, the copyright in any literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work (other than a photograph) is for the life of the author plus fifty years. The fifty-year period is counted from the year following the death of the author.

Yes. You can license/assign your copyright in a work to another person provided the arrangement has been reduced to writing. No license/assignment is valid unless a written instrument supports it.

No. It is not mandatory to register a copyright in a work in Pakistan. Though registration of copyright is legally sufficient evidence that copyright exists in the work and that the person named in the certificate as the owner is the owner of such copyright, however there is no difference in the protection granted to a copyright in a work of a registered or an unregistered copyright.

Ordinarily the author is the first owner of the copyright.

There are different authors for different kinds of work. In the case of a literary or dramatic work the person who creates the work is the author. In the case of a musical composition, the author is the composer. For film and sound recording the producer is the author while in the case of a photograph, the photographer is the author. In the case of a computer-generated work, the person who causes the work to be created is the author.

Yes, with respect to Pakistani works that have been published or performed in public. A person can make an application to the Board for grant of a compulsory license of such works on the following conditions. If the copyright owner: - Has refused to republish. allow republication, or allow the public performance of the work, and by reason of such refusal the work is withheld from the public; or - Has refused to allow communication to the public by broadcast; or - Is dead, unknown, or cannot be found and republication of the work is necessary in the public interest.

Yes. Any final order of the Registrar of Copyrights can be appealed to the Copyright Board.

A trademark is a sign capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one enterprise from those of other enterprises. Trademarks are protected by intellectual property rights.

No, Pakistani trademark law allows filing of a trademark application in Pakistan on an “intent-to-use‟ basis.

In principle, a trademark registration will confer an exclusive right to the use of the registered trademark. This implies that the trademark can be exclusively used by its owner, or licensed to another party for use in return for payment. Registration provides legal certainty and reinforces the position of the right holder, for example, in case of litigation.

The procedure for the registration of a trademark is described under the section “The Registration Process”

No. Pakistan does not have a system of multi-class applications. Therefore, one application can be filed only for the registration of one class of goods or services.

Yes. You can do so in one application as Pakistan recognizes the system of a series application.

Registration as a trade mark is not compulsory to use your brand in the marketplace, but is strongly advisable. What would you do if a competitor copied your brand and as a result took business from you? What would you do if your brand and products were targeted by counterfeiters? A registration provides a deterrent, as the details of your ownership appear on a public searchable record. Should there be an issue in the future they provide you with a strong right upon which to base any legal action.

Company names, domain names and trademarks are all separate and perform different functions, but a trade mark is the strongest of name rights as registration provides an exclusive monopoly right that you can use to prevent the use of the same or a confusingly similar name, whether as a brand, company name or domain name. Trade marks truly are the king of name rights. Company names and domain names provide no real rights to stop others from using a name.

A trademark in Pakistan is valid for 10 years and can be renewed thereafter indefinitely for periods of 10 years.

Yes. The appeal against the decision of the Registrar of Trade Marks will be to the High Court.

The simple answer to this is yes. Research your brand. Use your industry knowledge. Have register searches undertaken. If you do this early enough in the brand development process, you have sufficient time to change your plans without incurring too much cost, and you could save yourself the embarrassment, and cost, of having to withdraw a product following launch.

Needless to say, there are restrictions as it would not be just for someone to obtain an exclusive monopoly unfairly. For this reason, if your trade mark is descriptive of your product or service, or is a generic term, you cannot simply register it. Similarly, if your trade mark is potentially deceptive, it cannot be registered.

In a legal sense, an industrial design constitutes the ornamental or aesthetic aspect of an article.An industrial design may consist of three-dimensional features, such as the shape of an article, or two-dimensional features, such as patterns, lines or color.Industrial designs are applied to a wide variety of products of industry and handicraft: from technical and medical instruments to watches, jewelry and other luxury items; from house wares and electrical appliances to vehicles and architectural structures; from textile designs to leisure goods.An industrial design is primarily of an aesthetic or visual nature, and does not relate to the technical features of an article.

In principle, the owner of a registered industrial design or of a design patent has the right to prevent third parties from making, selling or importing articles bearing or embodying a design which is a copy, or substantially a copy, of the protected design, when such acts are undertaken for commercial purposes.

Industrial designs are applied to a wide variety of products of industry and handicraft items: from packages and containers to furnishing and household goods, from lighting equipment to jewelry, and from electronic devices to textiles. Industrial designs may also be relevant to graphic symbols, graphical user interfaces (GUI), and logos.

Needless to say, there are restrictions as it would not be fair to obtain a monopoly in some circumstances. Excluded are designs that are not new or don’t really differ from existing designs, material that is offensive or contains certain protected flags and international. emblems, designs dictated solely by the product function, or features that have to have a specific design to fit an existing product (such as spare parts).

The duration of the registration of a design is initially ten years from the date of registration, but in cases where a priority claim has been allowed the duration is ten years from the priority date. This initial period of registration may be extended by two terms of ten years each if an extension application is timely filed.

No, it is not necessary for an article to have been made by an industrial process before filing.

Yes, registered designs are open for public inspection once they have been published in the Official Gazette.

Whilst the design drawings themselves will be subject to copyright, producing articles to design drawings is not an infringement of copyright (there are special rules relating to “artistic works”). There may be unregistered rights which exist in the design, but it is necessary to demonstrate copying and overall the rights are generally more limited than with registered designs.

No. Falsely representing that the design applied to the good you are selling is registered is an offense punishable with a grand fine. Moreover, it is an offense to stamp, engrave, or impress the word “Registered” or any similar word on any design applied to an article when it is not registered. Indicating that the design is registered when such registration has expired is also an offense that is punishable with a big fine.

You can file an application by attaching a representation of the design and filing the prescribed fee. The Registrar of Designs will inform you if the design is registered or not.

No pre-registration opposition procedure is presently available in Pakistan in the case of designs