Wisconsin Business Law and Litigation
A blog dedicated to Wisconsin business law and business litigation matters, authored by Chris Moander of the Moander Law Firm.

How do we determine race, ethnicity, or national origin? To some, that’s an easy question, for others, not so easy (especially businesses). The 7th Circuit, which covers Wisconsin, dissected this issue in a recent case, Abdullahi v. Prada. The lesson the court imparts is that, when a discrimination claim is filed, the case is not centered on which boxes are checked in the EEOC forms.

As background for businesses, when a discrimination complaint is filed, the person(s) filing the complaint must use a form that has boxes marked for various categories, including race, national origin/ethnicity/nationality, color, etc. The ruling in Abdullahi appears to view these boxes are rough estimates as to the basis of discrimination, not firm categories. This puts businesses in a tighter spot when sued for discrimination, particularly regarding ethnicity, national origin, and race. Again, this case is particularly important for Wisconsin businesses because Wisconsin is in the Federal Court’s 7th Circuit.

H/T: Ohio Employer’s Law Blog and Workplace Prof Blog

Forgive me for lapsing into legalese in my last post. I believe I should clarify some things.

Copyrights are an actual property right. If you own the copyright, you control that content for the allowed period of time and can generally use it how you see fit. Businesses struggle with the idea of intellectual property (particularly non-patent areas) because intellectual property rights are applied to what we call “non-exclusive property,” versus “exclusive property.” For example, consider a plot of land. If you own it, you can exclude others from entering or otherwise using the property. You have exclusive rights to the land. Nobody can use or take part of the land without depriving you of your right to use that part of the land - the property is exclusive. Intellectual property is not like that. The copying of your work does not deprive you of your property (the work itself) - two or more entities are using the work at the same time, hence the work is not exclusive. Rather, copying deprives you of your right to economically benefit from distribution of the work.

From another perspective, you and your business have invested time and money into generating even basic materials (such as marketing materials), much less major products (books or digital media). Costs sunk into these works are almost always substantial. It’s important to protect this work as your own, much like you would want to protect physical items you create or goodwill you generate - copyrights help protect your livelihood.

I briefly mentioned the need to invest money in legal advice when determining a suitable business name. It is well worth the cost to have an attorney confirm whether your chosen name is either not protected (nobody else has it) or able to be protected (geographical names and descriptive terms are not protected). You seriously curb the risk of being sued for copyright infringement and ensure the protection of your chosen company name - both are preventative in nature. Additionally, lawyer review can also help evaluate the marketing efficacy of the chosen name - is it unique enough to be remembered easily and get attention drawn to your company?