Property law is considered absolute. However, it is not the only legal category characterized in this way. The rights to the results of intellectual activity are also considered absolute. These two categories of legal opportunities have significant differences among themselves. Let's consider them in more detail.
Intellectual Property Law
The result of physical labor are usually things. Intellectual activity is considered as the mental (creative, mental, spiritual) work of people in the fields of technology, science, art, literature, and artistic design. Every person who performs certain labor operations acts meaningfully and consciously. For example, this can be said about the typesetter in a printing house printing textbooks. Meanwhile, in the legal sense, intellectual activity is not considered material production. It does not end with the production of prints as things. Intellectual activity is primarily considered spiritual. Its outcome, in particular, can be the creation of an ideal conceptual system within a certain discipline. The same typesetter, for all the importance of his work, only embodies the ideal results of intellectual activity. The legal opportunity to work is enshrined in the Constitution. In this case, the work can be very different. The main condition for its implementation is the rule of law. Regardless of the sphere in which a person works - industrial or intellectual - the results of his activity, as well as it itself should not infringe on the rights and freedoms, interests of others. Work, therefore, should benefit people.
Objects of intellectual activity
They are products called, depending on their nature, works of art, literature, scientific achievement, industrial design , etc. Specific conditions of use and protection apply to each result of intellectual activity. Legislation, among other things, provides a system of protection for their authors. Meanwhile, the development of intellectual activity led to the identification and generalization of a number of common features inherent in all its products.
Ideal nature
It is inherent only in products of intellectual activity. The results of physical labor do not have an ideal nature. Scientific and technological achievements act as defined systems of specific categories or concepts. Art and literary works are presented in the form of a special system of combined images. Of course, all these categories are expressed in digital, alphabetic and other signs, symbols, sound, visual means. Quite often they exist on completely material carriers. It can be paper, stone, film, canvas, etc. Nevertheless, by themselves, they do not cease to be ideal. Like any intangible object, products of intellectual activity do not have a natural form, they are not subject to depreciation, wear and tear. They are inherent only in obsolescence.
The impact of legal categories
Law is not capable of directly affecting the mental processes taking place in the human brain. They remain outside the scope of regulatory coverage. Meanwhile, not having the ability to directly influence the thought processes that result in the creation of products of intellectual activity, legal discipline can positively influence them. This is achieved through the development of regulatory forms, within the framework of which scientific, technical and other types of intellectual activity are organized, as well as their consolidation in definitive provisions on the conditions for the protection of its works.
Means of individualization
The laws enforce the rights to the results of intellectual activity. Together with them, individualization means are also protected . They also act as products of human mental labor. There are means of individualization of services, legal entities, works, products. These include, in particular, brand names, trademarks, the name of the place of origin of products, etc. They are used by subjects of civil turnover to personify themselves and their services, products, works. The main value of means of individualization, in contrast to scientific, technical, artistic, literary and other works, is, in fact, not in themselves, but in the ability to use them to create a healthy competitive environment through the differentiation of both individual entrepreneurs and products, which they release, the work they perform, or the services they provide. In addition, the exclusive right to an individualization tool is legally assigned not to the developer (designer, for example), but to the subject who registered it in his name.
Value
The ideal nature of the products of intellectual activity does not indicate the insignificance or isolation of mental labor from the production of things and other values necessary for people. Scientific and technological achievements, for example, contribute to the development of the most rational options for using natural resources in the interests of mankind. Design, art, literature are of great importance for the process of forming the spiritual world of people. In modern market conditions, the wide and timely use of products of mental work contributes to increasing the effectiveness of entrepreneurial activity, competitiveness and quality of services and products. Legally secured opportunities to dispose, own, use utility models, inventions, industrial designs, trademarks and other forms of designations are the most important component of intangible assets of any business entity. Together with other values, they can be invested in entrepreneurship and other areas of society. The property right to the results of mental work may also be a contribution to the capital of a business partnership or other association.
Regulatory support
The key role in the formation of conditions for the protection and use of products of mental work belongs to civil law. Despite the fact that it does not have the ability to directly influence the processes of such labor, it can have a positive organizing effect on relations related to the protection and practical use of its results. Exclusive rights, acting as a legal institution, perform the following functions:
- Establishment of a special regime for the use of products of mental work.
- Recognition of authorship for the result of intellectual activity.
- Moral and material encouragement.
- Protecting the interests of authors, employers and other entities that acquire exclusive rights.
Important point
Recognition of authorship may or may not depend on the registration of the product of the activity. The former is characteristic, for example, of works of literature, art, scientific achievements, etc. The latter is characteristic of industrial designs, utility models, and inventions. The exclusive right establishes a special regime for using the result of intellectual work. It determines who has the legal ability to put it into practice and who does not. They provide the empowerment of authors of scientific achievements, literary and other works, designers, inventors, as well as their employers and other entities with individual property and non-property rights, establish forms and methods for their protection.
Conclusion
The general regulatory provisions present not only in the Civil Code, but also in other legislative acts, enshrined the features of the formation of legal entities for which research, development, theater, literary and other intellectual activity is the main one. Legal acts also determine the procedure for creating their separate property, the rules for reorganization and liquidation. In some cases, to ensure a clearer separation of exclusive and proprietary legal possibilities, the law directly emphasizes that authorship of a work, for example, is not connected with the ownership of the object in which it is expressed.