컴퓨터프로그램의 특허권적 보호와 저작권적 보호

Abstract

Since the advent of information technology era, computer program became one of the main issues in intellectual property law area. Some type of innovation such as computer program related technology can be protected either by patent law or by copyright law. This causes many legal issues concerning the legal relation between the patent right and the copyright of the technology. One example is the conflict of rights. Current patent law and copyright law, however, have not addressed this issue so far. This paper addresses the legal issues concerning the dual protection of computer program by patent law and copyright law and suggests legal schemes to handle these problems. One of the scheme is to make it clear that a patent right can conflict with a copyright by adding corresponding provisions into the patent law and copyright law. The current scope of the materials that can be reviewed at the trials of the patent tribunal in order to confirm the scope of patent right and to grant a non-exclusive license, should be also modified to accomodate the conflict of the rights. One of the fundamental solutions, however, would be the change of the interpretation of the nature of an intellectual property right, i.e. to an exclusive right opposed to the current major interpretation of it as a monopolistic right.