Copyright & Trademark Policies

Copyright & Trademark Policies

At The Principal Exchange, we respect the intellectual property rights of others, and we ask that all of our users do the same. We have established the following intellectual property infringement policy in accordance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”) and other applicable laws. In any instance where we receive a valid infringement Notice from a copyright or trademark owner that meets all of the requirements listed below, we will comply with the law and remove the content from our site. As a service provider hosting the content produced by our members, TPE is not qualified to make legal judgment calls or resource comparisons, so we often have to rely on formal Notices to take action.

If we find that a member of our community has violated this policy repeatedly or egregiously, we will close that userโ€™s account, and we may take further action.

This policy provides instructions on how to submit a formal Notice. If you have any other questions or concerns about our service or policies, please email us and a member of our team will be in contact. Keep in mind that TPE does not offer legal advice or guidance, so if you have questions about your resources, copyright or trademark law, or fair use exceptions, we encourage you to discuss them with an attorney. ย 

DEFINING AND DISTINGUISHING THE TERMS

Here are some definitions and examples to explain the difference in the terms.

Intellectual Property (IP):

  • What it is: Ideas or creations of the mind, like inventions, art, designs, or symbols.
  • Protection: Legal rights to safeguard these creations from being copied or used without permission.
  • Examples: Patents for inventions, copyrights for books or music, trademarks for logos.

Copyright:

  • What it covers: Protects original works like books, music, art, or movies.
  • Rights: Gives the creator exclusive rights to use, reproduce, or distribute their work.
  • Duration: Usually lasts the creator’s lifetime plus a set number of years.

Trademark:

  • Purpose: Identifies and protects brands or logos to distinguish them from others.
  • Scope: Includes names, symbols, or designs used in commerce to represent a product or company.
  • Protection: Guards against unauthorized use by others in similar products or services.

NOTICE AND TAKEDOWN PROCESS

We work hard to respond as quickly as we can to complete any notices of alleged copyright or trademark infringement. Our Designated Agent will receive infringement claims. You can find our email address at the end of this Policy.

If you believe that your work has been used in a way that infringes on copyright or trademarks in material found on our site, please submit a notice to our Designated Agent. To comply with the requirements of the law, your notice needs to include all of the following information:

  1. Identification of your intellectual property that you claim has been infringed upon on our website (if your notice pertains to the use of your trademark, please include your federal trademark registration number);
  2. Identification of the material that you claim has infringed on your intellectual property, including:
    1. an explanation of how the material identified is using your intellectual property in a way that constitutes infringement, AND
    2. a description of where the material youโ€™ve identified is located on the TPE website, with sufficient detail to allow us to find the material (A URL of the resource page is best);
  3. Your contact information, including your full name, mailing address, telephone number, and email address;
  4. A statement by you stating that you believe that the disputed use of the work is not authorized by the intellectual property owner, its agents, or the law;
  5. Statement by you stating that, under penalty of perjury, the information provided in your notice is accurate and that you are the intellectual property owner or are authorized to act on behalf of the owner;
  6. Electronic or physical signature of the person authorized to act on behalf of the copyright holder.

Remember, under Section 512(f) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, any person who knowingly misrepresents that content or activity is infringing may be subject to liability for damages, including attorney’s fees.

The more information you can include, the faster we will be able to help you and process your notice.

What happens after you submit your Notice?

Trademark Notice โ€” If your Notice of Trademark Infringement contains all of the required information, we will review and consider your request and take what action we believe in good faith to be appropriate. To make it easier for us to process your request and ensure that all of the infringment content is removed, make sure your notice is as specific as possible in terms of where your mark appears on our site. For example, by identifying each place, it appears in a resource, in the name of a store, or title of a resource.

Copyright Notices โ€” Weโ€™ll review your Notice of Copyright Infringement to make sure it contains all of the required information. The more specific your explanation is about which parts of a resource you believe are infringing, the easier it will be for us to process your request and ensure that the infringing content is removed. When we do take action on a notice, we reach out to the member who posted the content, forward them your notice, and remove the material from our site.

The user who posted the content has a legal right to submit a counter-notice (described below) if they believe that the content was misidentified as infringing or was removed by mistake. If we receive a complete, valid counter-notice, weโ€™ll forward it to you. Then, itโ€™s up to you to take further legal action to protect the work. The law gives you 10 days to let us know youโ€™ve done so. Otherwise, we have to allow the individual to repost the content.
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Copyright Counter-Notice Process

If you receive a Notice of Copyright Infringement from us about one or more of your resources and you wish to dispute the claim that your work is violating the copyright of the notifier, you can submit a Counter-Notice to our Designated Agent. A reply to the email we send you is appropriate. Your Counter-Notice needs to contain all of the following information:

  1. Identification of your material(s) that has been removed, including a description of where the material appeared on the The Principal Exchange website before it was removed or disabled (a URL is most helpful);
  2. A statement by you stating that, under penalty of perjury, you have a good faith belief that the material was removed as a result of a mistake or misidentification of the material in question;
  3. Your contact information (full legal name, mailing address, telephone number, and email address);
  4. Statement by you stating:
    1. you consent to the jurisdiction of the Federal Court for the judicial district in which your address is located or, if your address is outside of the USA, for the judicial district in which The Principal Exchange is located, and
    2. that you will accept the service of process from the person who provided notification of the alleged infringement;
  5. Your physical or electrontic signature.

After You Submit Your Counter-Notice

If your notice includes all of the requested information, we will forward it to the person who sent the original notice. Then they will have 10 days to let us know if theyโ€™ve initiated further action to legally protect their work. If so, we have to respect that, and your material will remain blocked and removed from our site. If we donโ€™t receive anything from them, we willl put your resource back up on our site at the end of the 10 day period.

DESIGNATED AGENT & CONTACT INFORMATION

You can submit a Notice or Counter-Notice to our Designated Agent by email

Email Address:

tpe@theprincipalexchange.com (The subject of the email should state: Attention Copyright)

Last Updated: December 11, 2023