Table of Contents
Legal Resources for Marketers
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- Guide to Do-it-Yourself Legal Help - Lawyers are vital, but expensive. Self-help options abound for everyday legal matters, By Daniel Kehrer, Work.com Editor
- United States Code Collection (USC) - Search offical U.S. Codes. The CAN-SPAM act from 2003 for example was codified at 15 U.S.C. §§ 7701-7713 and 18 U.S.C. § 1037 (leading digits are title, digits after U.S.C. are the section). Provided by the Legal Information Institute (LII) at the Cornell Law School website.
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If you are interested in the legal requirements for filing taxes as an affiliate from the United States, or if you are an US advertiser and want to learn about your reporting requirements of your affiliates commission to the IRS, check out my affiliate tax resources here.
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Blogs about Internet Laws and Regulations
Word of Mouth - Buzzmarketing Laws
Email Marketing Regulations and Laws
Labor Laws
- elaws Advisors are interactive e-Tools provided by the DOL as employment laws assistance for workers and small businesses. There are currently over 20 different eLaw Advisor Tools available such as the following:
- eLaws FirstStep Employment Law Advisor by the U.S. Department of Labor
- eLaws FLSA Overtime Calculator Advisor - The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) requires that covered, nonexempt employees in the United States be paid at least the federal minimum wage for each hour worked and receive overtime pay at one and one-half times the employee's regular rate of pay for all hours worked over 40 in a workweek.
- eLaws Health Benefits Advisor for Employers to get an overview of existing federal laws that could affect health benefit coverage provided by group health plans
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Interlectual and Creative Content Ownership Protection Laws
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Most people cannot distinguish between trademarks, copyright and patents and one in exchange for the other, treating them as they were the same. This is understandable and there is also a reason, why there is only one goverment office responsible for handling all three in the United States, the USPTO, the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
All three serve the purpose of protecting a persons (or legal entity) interlectual or creative content ownership from being stolen and replicated and cutting the creator out of his well deserved cut of financial profits from the commercial exploits of that content or other (mainly financial) gains from using what was conceived by somebody else. However, each of the three protect a differnt kind of property or content with a different origin of how it was conceived.
- Copyright protects creative content, such as pieces of visual, accustic and written art; something that was created by using mostly the right half of the human brain, the hemisphere of our brains that controls the visual, artistic functions and also the emmotions like love, hate, lust and pleasure.
Content that can be protected with copyright laws include paintings, artistic photographs, motion pictures, music, written novels and the design of a logo, such as the distinct Coca Cola logo.
In the example of the Coca Cola logo does copyright only protect the unique shape and colors of the logo, but not the name Coca Cola itself.
- Patents protect a method or process that was conceived by intelligence, analytics and often by extensive research; something that was created by using mostly the left half of the human brain, the hemisphere of our brains that controls the verbal, logical and analytical functions.
Patents cannot (should not) be used to protect a process that is commonly known, is the logical consequence of optimization or consists of a combination of elements with a relatively low number of available combinations to begin with.
Manufacturing processes can be patented, allows and artifical fabrics can be patented. A cooking receipe cannot be patented, due to it's limitation of possible, logical combinations of ingrediences and preparation steps from start to finish.
- Trademark protects a NAME that was artificially created or used for something like a product or service.
The name can only be protected in a specific context and not simply for every use. Tradmark protection serves the purpose to avoid confusion and misinterpretation of one thing to another.
It provides businesses with the ability to distinguish themselves from their competition in the same niche. Brand is often used instead of the word trademarks, but while brand names are often protected trademarks, are not all trademarks automatically a brand and vice versa. A trademark is most of the time registered with the goal that it becomes a brand that is recognized by other people (especially prospects) and associated with properties and characteristics that are good and positive in the minds of potential customers or influencers.
Trademark law becomes important, if the trademark is an established brand to prevent others to use somebody elses brand recognition to promote the same orsimilar product and service or to affect the associated properties and characteristic of a brand in a negative way that is not intended by the owner of the brand/trademark.
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Trademark Laws
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Copyright Law and DMCA
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- 10 Big Myths about copyright explained by Brad Templeton - addressing common myths about copyright seen on the net and cover issues related to copyright and USENET/Internet publication.
- Copyright Office Basics - the US Copyright Law explained at Copyright.gov
- Fair Use - section 107 of the copyright law - Explained at Copyright.gov
- Copyright Guide by DirectLegal.com, a company that offers copyright registration services with the U.S. Copyright Office. The guide explains the process of the registration, the benefits of it and the penalties and problems that could be the result of not registering it. It explains special cases like Derivative Work, Changed Work, Work for Hire, Joint Work, Fair use, Public Domain and others.
Copyright law, trademark law and libel law explained and tips for internet marketers. Free 1 hour SEMPO Webinar recorded on 12/14/2006. Format: WebEx (requires player or browser plugin)
- List of designated agents for OSPs at the U.S. Copyright office
Copyright and protect Your Web Content, Written Work, Photos, Logo, Artwork or Music with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) today!
"Who Owns Your Website? Can You Prove It?" Click Here for copyright and trademark services! Provided by - DirectLegal.com
DirectLegal provides fast, professional & cost-effective copyright & trademark services for artists, writers, designers, musicians, songwriters, and bands! 
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Digital Millenium Copyright Act of 1998 - DMCA
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Patents
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- USPTO Website, the homepage of the United States Patent and Trademark Office
- USPTO Database Search - Patent Full-Text and Image Database search provided directly by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
- Google Patents Search is a free patent search powered by Google over a database with over seven million patents. It does currently only cover U.S. patents.
- EPO.org the European Patent Office homepage on the World Wide Web.
- ESP@CeBet.com - the free European Network of Patent Databases, providing access to over 60 million pattents; European and world wide patents.
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Domaining, Trademark Laws and Typosquatting
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More Resources to Domain Name Disputes & Cybersquatting Laws
Interlectual Property and the Internet a Power Point presentation for BlogWorld Expo conference in 11/2007 by Attorney Brett Trout, who is a lawyer that specializes in Internet Law
Trademarks and Domaining article written by Domainers Magazine staff writers that was published by Domainers Magazine, issue 11-12/2007 on pages 41 and 42
- Domain Ownership Disputes Column by David W. Nance (dwnancellc.com), for the magazine Modern Domainer, issues #1, #2 and #3. Part 1 and Part 2 of the column are available on the internet. Part 3 was not published on the site, but you can download the whole magazine issue in PDF format here. Issue 1 and 2 are also available for download: Link to 1st issue and to 2nd issue.
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See also: My Domainers Glossary, including explainations of commonly used abbreviations, terms and phrases by domainers in the domain name industry.
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Founding a Business
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Consumer Protection and Business Regulations Agencies and Organizations
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You should leverage the benefits of being a member of an organisation or association that is active in your industry. Organizations and Association, Forums, Communities, Networking Sites relared to Internet Marketing and Affiliate Directories .
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Business and Consumer Protection Resources
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- The Grandma Standard by Mark Meckler at the iLegal Column of DMConfidential. Covering Legal and Regulatory Issues in the Online Advertising Industry.
- The Legal Minefield by Mark Meckler at iLegal. Covering Legal and Regulatory Issues in the Online Advertising Industry
- FTC Business and Consumer information related to E-Commerce & the Internet available for Download as Text, PDF or MP3
- eConsumer.gov a joint effort to gather and share cross-border/international e-commerce complaints by multiple governments. It also provides general information about consumer protection.
- Franchise and Business Opportunities - FTC Information and Guides
- FTC Site to Spyware and Spyware Consumer Alert provides information to how to determine that spyware is on your computer and how to lower the risk of infection.
- OnGuardOnline.gov provides practical tips from the federal government and the technology industry to help you be on guard against Internet fraud, secure your computer, and protect your personal information. Main topics: Email Spam Scams, Social Networking, Online Shopping, P2P File-Sharing, VoIP, Cross-Border, Investing Online.
- FCC Registry - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Consumer Registry for consumers to receive updates on FCC issues.
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Additional Useful Resources
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Advertiser Kit to learn more about sponsorship opportunities at Cumbrowski.com. Press? Download my 
