Sophia is a small unincorporated area in central Randolph County in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is located along U.S. Highway 311, just northwest of the route's intersection of with I-73/I-74/US 220 and southeast of Archdale, North Carolina. It is the location of WGHP-TV's (Fox 8) television transmitter tower. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Sophia citizens protested the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) on its plan to route I-74 through the center of town, essentially removing the community from existence. After a hearing with locals, the NCDOT decided to shift the planned corridor about 1 mile to the north.

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 North Carolina

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...