dailylicious!

This good news for RIM might be a drop in the bucket considering the string of issues that it is currently facing. Even though RIM has been calling its messaging system the BlackBerry Messenger for a while, only recently it began to widely adopt the abbreviation BBM, which apparently had been trademarked by BBM Canada, a broadcast measurement company, for about six decades. The judge sided with RIM citing difference in industries to allow the BlackBerry company continued use of the name BBM.

Indonesians in general are clueless when it comes to intellectual property. Fact of the matter is the majority simply don’t care what it is or what it encompasses. There are in fact several different understandings of intellectual property and they apply to different things. Trademarks, copyrights, and patents are often lumped under what Indonesians call hak cipta, or creation rights. Some simply call them patents.

In the age of knowledge, understanding what constitutes intellectual property is important as often things have been developed or created elsewhere before and those creators or innovators deserve to be recognized for their initial work. We Indonesians tend to dismiss this when dealing with works of art or product development. Blatant disregard is also widespread thanks to ignorance of the subject.

This little primer on the different things covered by intellectual property is therefore worth reading even if only to understand why songs, names, or other forms of art can’t be patented and why the word kopitiam should not have been trademarked in the country.