Intellectual Property

Illuminati Trust, LLC is a diversified company that specializes in all forms of intellectual property and its intrinsic value, marketability and potential disposition.

There are only three ways to protect intellectual property in the United States: through the use patents, trademarks or copyrights. A patent applies to a specific product design; a trademark to a name, phrase or symbol; and a copyright to a written document. All three methods have limitations--there's no one perfect way to protect an idea.

Copyright Protection

A copyright will protect the following categories of works:

  • Literary works
  • Musical works, including any accompanying words
  • Dramatic works, including any accompanying music
  • Pantomimes and choreographic works
  • Pictorial, graphic and sculptural works
  • Motion pictures and other audiovisual works
  • Sound recordings
  • Architectural works
  • Computer programs (sometimes the graphical user interface) and websites
  • Copyright protection gives the copyright holder the exclusive right to copy the work, modify it (that is, create "derivative works"), and distribute, perform and display the work publicly.
Ideas or concepts do not have copyright protection. Copyright protects the expression of the idea, but not the ideas themselves. For example, if I ask you what a chair is, you get a picture in your head; the picture I get in my head is different from the picture you get in your head and probably also different from the picture Buffy gets in her head. These are the "ideas" of what a chair is. However, if you were to draw the chair you envisioned in your head or use words to describe that chair, it's an "expression" of the idea--and that's what's protected by copyright.

Generally, the only protection for ideas and concepts is through trade secret law and/or confidentiality agreements, which provide a contractual remedy for misuse or disclosure of the idea.

Patents
  • Patents protect processes, methods and inventions that are "novel," "non-obvious" and "useful." If granted, a patent gives you a 20-year monopoly on selling, using, making or importing an invention into the United States. The requirements for a patent are complex, but here they are in a nutshell:
  • Your work must be novel. This means it must not be known or used by others in this country, or patented or described in a printed publication here or abroad, or in public use or for sale in this country more than one year prior to the application for patent.
  • Your work must be non-obvious. This means it must not be obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the pertinent art as it existed when the invention was made.
  • Your work must be useful. This means that it must have current, significant, beneficial use as process, machine, manufacture, composition of matter or improvements to one of these. According to the Patent Office: "The word 'process' is defined by law as a process, act or method, and primarily includes industrial or technical processes. The term 'machine' used in the statute needs no explanation. The term 'manufacture' refers to articles that are made, and includes all manufactured articles. The term 'composition of matter' relates to chemical compositions and may include mixtures of ingredients as well as new chemical compounds. These classes of subject matter taken together include practically everything which is made by man and the processes for making the products."
  • Patent protection requires full public disclosure of the work in detail and therefore precludes maintaining any trade secret protection in the same work.
Trademarks

A trademark is like a brand name. It is any word(s) or symbol(s) that represent a product to identify and distinguish it from other products in the marketplace. A trademark word example would be "Rollerblades." A trademark symbol would be the peacock used by NBC.

A trademark can be registered in three ways:
  • By filing a "use" application after the mark has been used.
  • By filing an "intent to use" application if the mark has not yet been used.
  • In certain circumstances in which a foreign application exists, you can rely on that.
  • The (TM) mark may be used immediately next to your mark. The ® registration symbol may only be used when the mark is registered with the PTO. It is unlawful to use this symbol with your mark before receiving an issued registration from the PTO.
What qualities make for a strong trademark? The cardinal rule is that a mark must be distinctive. The more distinctive it is, the easier your trademark will be to enforce. This is why so many trademarked products have unique spellings.

Trademark rights last indefinitely if the company continues to use the mark to identify its goods or services. When the mark is no longer being used, the registration is terminated. The initial term of federal trademark registration is 10 years, with 10-year renewal terms.

Trade Secrets

There is a great deal of confusion regarding trade secrets. Many people think that a trade secret is some type of protection provided by the government that allows them to seek recourse in court should someone infringe upon their idea. However, unlike copyrights, trademarks and patents, a trade secret is not registered with any government office to provide a verifiable public record of any claims to the secret. You can, however, declare one to a patent lawyer in a notarized and signed disclosure. In this manner the trade secret belongs to you forever--or until someone leaks it.

Trade secrets refer to items such as recipes that are unique and provide a business with a competitive advantage, but which cannot be safeguarded under current forms of idea protection such as copyright, trademark or patent. The best form of protection for these items is to keep them a secret. One of the most famous and best-kept trade secrets is the formula for Coca-Cola.

The best way to secure the information for a trade secret is to restrict access to the secret and have individuals and companies sign nondisclosure agreements with you should you enter into a relationship with them which will require them to know some aspects of the secret. If someone independently develops or reverse-engineers your trade secret, there's nothing you can do. If someone does leak it, you can sue for theft. Suing, however, cannot stop the person from using the leaked information. So although you may get money from the suit, you lose the larger potential profits you could have made from the idea. Still, if your luck holds and your trade secret remains secret, royalty income from it can last significantly longer than the patent period.

Some example of Intellectual Property that Illuminati Trust, LLC owns, controls of trades in include:
  • Domain Names
  • Vanity Toll Free Numbers
  • Music Catalogs Both Domestic and International
  • Various Patents Covering A Multitude of Industries
  • Exclusive Licensing Rights




Patents & Trademarks

Illuminati Trust, LLC is an expert in Patents and Trademarks and their potential commercialization and presently controls over 400 Worldwide Patents.

A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. A service mark is a word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of a service rather than goods. The term "trademark" is often used to refer to both trademarks and service marks.

Must all marks be registered? No, but federal registration has several advantages, including a notice to the public of the registrant's claim of ownership of the mark, a legal presumption of ownership nationwide, and the exclusive right to use the mark on or in connection with the goods or services set forth in the registration.

A patent is a limited duration property right relating to an invention, granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office in exchange for public disclosure of the invention.

A copyright protects works of authorship, such as writings, music, and works of art that have been tangibly expressed.

Illuminati Trust, LLC deals with all of the above mentioned designations and focuses on the trading, monetizing and disposition of assets of this type.




Internet Monetization

Illuminati Trust, LLC is one of the foremost Internet Monetization companies in the world, representing the full scope of all forms and techniques for monetizing Intellectual Property.

Website monetization is the process of converting existing traffic being sent to a particular website into revenue. The most popular ways of monetizing a website are by implementing Pay per click (PPC) and Cost per impression(CPI/CPM) advertising. Various ad networks facilitate a webmaster in placing advertisements on pages of the website to benefit from the traffic the site is experiencing.

Pay per click (also called Cost per click) is a marketing strategy put in place by search engines and various Advertising networks, where an advert, usually targeted by keywords or general topic, is placed on a relevant website. The advertiser then pays for every click that is made on the advert.

  • Cost per impression (also called Cost per mille) is a marketing strategy put in place by various Advertising networks, where an advert is placed on a relevant website, usually targeted to the content sector of that site. The advertiser then pays for every time the advert is displayed to a user.
  • Banner advertising consists of placing a graphical banner advertisement on a webpage. The role of this banner is to catch the eye of incoming traffic to the page, enticing readers to click the advertisement. This form of monetization is implemented by both affiliate programs and advertising networks. Banners originally just referred to advertisements of 468 x 60 pixels, but the term is now widely used to refer to all sizes of display advertising on the internet
  • Affiliate programs are another popular way of monetizing existing website traffic. By joining a business' affiliate program, any searches for products within that business' catalog may earn affiliates a commission on each sale that was originally referred through their website.
  • Websites also generate valuable user data that can be monetized through various methods. Data generated by websites about their users can range from being demographics to in-market data (i.e. in-market for a car). This data can be sold through behavioral data exchanges and used by advertisers to target their online media campaigns. Websites can also generate revenue from their newsletter and on-site registrations programs by helping to bring in offline data associated with users during this process.
Membership or Continuity Programs Paid membership programs are another way to monetize existing traffic. Often people join to get access to content and expertise, or for community, such as discussion or bulletin boards. The term "continuity" is used because the goal is to develop income continuity. Instead of making a one-time sale of a product or service, the membership site brings new, repeated income every month.

Besides news, other kinds of membership site include: health, fitness, marketing, copy writing, social media expertise, paper products, dating, paper crafting, scrap booking, coaching, writing and many other applications.




Liquidity Events

Illuminati Trust, LLC is one of the foremost Technology companies focused on exit strategy liquidity events.

A liquidity event is the purchase or sale of a corporation or an initial public offering. A liquidity event is a typical exit strategy of a company, since the liquidity event typically converts the ownership equity held by a company's founders and investors into cash.

A liquidity event is not to be confused with the liquidation of a company, in which the company's business is discontinued.

Illuminati Trust, LLC also works with initial investors in a company to cash out some or all of their ownership shares and is considered an exit strategy for an illiquid investment. Liquidity events are typically used in conjunction with venture capital/angel investors or private equity firms, which will aim to reach one within a reasonable amount of time after initially making an investment.

Illuminati Trust, LLC believes the most valuable asset in the world loses much of its luster if you can't sell it. As a result, liquidity events are always being considered when an investor or group holds illiquid equity in a company.

Illuminati Trust, LLC has established time periods after which they need to find some way to achieve liquidity for all of its investments, if for no other reason than to achieve and measure an internal rate of return for the investment.

In 2012 alone, Illuminati Trust, LLC was fortunate to have eight (8) liquidity events, all of which were derived from internal assets that Illuminati Trust, LLC had acquired between one and five years prior.