Cottage Grove is a city located 8 miles (12.5 km) south of Saint Paul in Washington County in the U.S. state of Minnesota. The city lies on the north bank of the Mississippi River, north of a backwash from the confluence with the Saint Croix River. Cottage Grove and nearby suburbs form the southeast portion of Minneapolis-Saint Paul, the sixteenth largest metropolitan area in the United States, with about 3.2 million residents. The U.S. Census Bureau estimated the city's population at 33,081 in 2007. The city is a bedroom community of Saint Paul and to a lesser extent Minneapolis linked by U.S. Routes 10 and 61. Once a rural township known for the state's first creameries and wheat production, the area was served by rail lines, river shipping, and grist mills. The primary settlers were from New England and left their architectural influence, which is preserved today. Formerly containing the railway station village of Langdon, the entire township incorporated into Cottage Grove in 1963. New Englander James Sullivan Norris, an early farmer, called his homestead Cottage Grove which was adopted by the town.

What is intellectual property law?

Under intellectual property law, owners are granted certain exclusive rights to a variety of intangible assets, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights and trade secrets. Intellectual property law involves advising and assisting individuals and businesses on the development, use, and protection of intellectual property -- which includes ideas, artistic creations, engineering processes, scientific inventions, and more.

Answers to intellectual property law issues in Minnesota

A patent is a document issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) that grants a monopoly for a limited...

Some types of inventions will not qualify for a patent, no matter how interesting or important they are. For example...

In the context of a patent application, an invention is considered novel when it is different from all...

Once a patent is issued, it is up to the owner to enforce it. If friendly negotiations fail, enforcement involves...

Patent protection usually ends when the patent expires.

For all utility patents filed before June 8, 1995,...

Typically, inventor-employees who invent in the course of their employment are bound by employment agreements that...

On its own, a patent has no value. A patent becomes valuable only when a patent owner takes action to profit from...

Copyright protects works such as poetry, movies, video games, videos, DVDs, plays, paintings, sheet music, recorded...

For works published after 1977, the copyright lasts for the life of the author plus 70 years. However, if the work...

The term "trademark" is commonly used to describe many different types of devices that label, identify, and...