Dear Rich: Nolo’s Patent, Copyright & Trademark Blog

Dear Rich: I developed an app/program that can be opened within MS Excel to help business's organize and compile data. Even though it is an add-on to Excel, do I have any copyright or patent issues to worry about if I plan to sell this app? It's unlikely you would get a letter from Microsoft (or any other software developer) unless you either lifted proprietary code without permission, or you stepped on someone's software patent --  always a tough call in the crazy and perhaps soon-to-be-extinct world of software patents. You could run into problems if you are using a developer's kit or other licensed software and your add-on violates your license (also unlikely). Finally, you could run into a few hurdles if you advertised your add-on as being endorsed by or associated with Microsoft (or other software providers). Based on the high volume of Excel add-ons (or add-ins as they are more commonly known) the Dear Rich Staff feels that none of these issues will arise for you and you're probably going to have a problem-free release.

Dear Rich: I have a two-part question. Part 1: I'm developing a website whose main feature is an online database that contains (in part) original material written by me. What kinds of notices, user terms and agreements should we have to protect the database and its contents? Part 2: The site publisher is a partnership, but one of the two partners retains copyright to the database and its contents. Should there be a license agreement between the database author-partner and the partnership itself?   This article is a good summary of the legal maneuvers used to protect databases. The most common strategies are to: