Category: Information Literacy

This week, on November 22nd from 5-8pm in c r a v e Pub, the Medicine Hat College Library Services, along with the Medicine Hat Entrepreneurial Development Center, and Enactus are co-hosting an informal learning session where Medicine Hat entrepreneurs, inventors, educators, and experts discuss and share what they have learned about protecting ideas through trade secrets, patents, copyright, trademarks, and other intellectual property protection tactics.

As a student at MHC, here are the top 3 reasons why you should attend:

1. You are an intellectual property owner. If you’ve ever written a paper, email, text, etc., you own intellectual property, so it’s worth learning about your rights.
2. If you’re planning to work in business or a creative industry learn about intellectual property now while funding is available. “The Government of Canada is investing $85.3 million over five years to help Canadian businesses, creators, entrepreneurs and innovators understand, protect and access intellectual property (IP) through a comprehensive IP Strategy” (Government of Canada, n.d., IP Strategy section).
3. Medicine Hat has many creative and inventive people that you can learn from. Take advantage of this weeks event to network with both speakers and attendees. Who knows, the time spent  learning about and discussing intellectual property might inspire you to create something great!

Here’s what a few of our speakers had to say about IP:

Why did you start working with the IP topic you will be speaking about?

When I started working with Alberta Innovates, many of the companies I worked with were developing new products that provided them with the opportunity to grow their business. I began to look for trusted IP professionals who could assist these companies with their efforts to protect the opportunity, and by extension learned from them along the way.

One piece of advice you would give to someone thinking about working on a similar project?

My best piece of advice is this – do you really want to write a book? Do you have the space/time to write a book?  I took on a book project at the beginning of my doctoral studies. It was a decision made out of ambition, and I paid a price for that ambition and, on occasion, so did my family.  I wanted to be a scholar, I wanted to be an academic, and I wanted to be a leader (even though I am not sure I can define what I mean by any of those labels).  The book came out in July 2018, and I am thrilled, but also humbled – it wasn’t easy; I haven’t always been the best-version of myself throughout the process.  I have wondered, was the ambition worth it if, at the end of the day, I am only more certain that all is vanity, and that there is nothing new under the sun?  After all, it’s a book about assessment.  I think it’s important and I am proud of it, but my ambition has diminished me on more than one occasion. So I guess, do you know what you are signing up for, especially if you are working with someone? And if you are working with someone, make sure you talk about process.  Having those conversations up-front will help out in the end. (I guess that is two pieces of advice).

I hope you’re convinced that you should attend Entrepreneurs, Inventors, Creatives & Intellectual Property this Thursday. Register at Eventbrite.ca and join us for lively discussion and tasty refreshments in  c r a v e Pub between 5 and 8pm.

Government of Canada. (n.d.). Intellectual property strategy. Retrieved from https://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/108.nsf/eng/home#accordion-item-2