I’m variously amazed, amused, bemused by the amount of misinformation about IP issues in circulation, and the attitude of hapless bewilderment adopted by many otherwise competent professionals in relation to them. While copyright law, trademark law, and patent law certainly have their complexities, the basic principles thereof, including the “fair use” exception to the copyright law, hardly qualify as arcane. Don’t let the laziness or ineptitude of others discourage you from learning about this. It ain’t rocket science. Even trademark law and patent law, much less familiar to the lay public, function according to elementary rules and reasoning that aren’t hard to grasp. […]