Metaverse & Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)
Metaverses, or interactive virtual environments, such as various VR and AR technologies, social media applications and game worlds, offer companies new possibilities to develop technological innovations. They offer brands new ways to utilise and license products and services. On the other hand, virtual environments produce new channels and tools for illegal copying and IPR violation, as the recent NFT boom has proved.
Even in virtual environments, IPRs – especially copyrights, trademarks, design rights and patents – are tools intended to allow you to decide who may use your creative work or product development and how they may use it.
At the same time, IPRs enable you to defend your brand and provide an efficient tool to take poor-quality illegal copies off the market to prevent them from undermining your brand.
A trademark is often understood as the registration of a name or logo, and design protection is interpreted as the registration of physical design objects. Nevertheless, both forms of protection offer much wider possibilities to protect different kinds of products and environments, even digital ones, such as user interfaces, short animations, and sounds.
Software, however, is primarily protected by copyright. On its own, software cannot be patented, and an invention requires sufficient technological impact. Nonetheless, as a rule of thumb, software can be patented if it implements a patentable method. Patents related to virtual environments are on the increase.Open link in a new tab
Challenges of virtuality
Protecting IPRs related to virtual environments comes with distinctive features and challenges. The legislation related to IPRs is national – unlike the virtual environments themselves – and is only now adapting to the needs of a digitalising world. This is why the few classes in the trademark classification system relevant to digital products and services, such as classes 9 and 35, are congested and competed. On the other hand, designs that only exist in digital form have had weaker protection than designs of physical objects, although the issue will soon be addressed at the EU level.
As we examine the patenting of the technology that makes virtual worlds possible, patenting professionals already know the field. This refers especially to the front end – in other words, the various devices that provide access to virtual worlds. However, when it comes to software and applications, different countries and regions have their own interpretations of what ‘technological impact’ consists of and whether a certain product is patentable.
The global and distributed nature of metaverses makes controlling and protecting IPRs challenging for all forms of protection.
Agreements are key to protecting IPRs in virtual environments. Content creators must pay attention to the platform’s user agreements to make sure they own the rights to the content they upload or create on the platforms. Secondly, the companies developing platforms must ensure their user agreements do not conflict with national legislation.
For these reasons, it is vital that companies consider their IPR strategy carefully and aim for a global approach to protect and control their IPRs in this new field of technology.
The Finnish Patent and Registration Office (PRH), Business Finland and Nokia are holding an event called Metaverse In Action – IPR and Standardization on 20 May, where you can hear more about the subject.
Jani Joenniemi
SME Network Advisor, PRH & EUIPO
Tel: +358 50 4714016
jani.joenniemi@ext.euipo.europa.eu
www.euipo.europa.eu