Research Paper on:
Contemporary Society and Information's Changing Role

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
perceive and use information. As the world has changed, so has the commercial view of information. Once held by individuals the seeking and holding of knowledge has become institutionalised. Information  is now seen as a resource to be used and maximised. This can be seen as anything for the details in the telephone book to the make up of the  human genome. Both of these items of information have value, yet they are both in the public domain., If we then apply this to the information that is increasing held  in private hands and protected by the law we can see that a problem may exist with the way that we are treating information. We also need to remember that  to those who have spent time and money collecting information there is also the legitimate need to protect it. Information can be  seen as classed as intellectual property. Law is a complicated subject, when it concerns tangible items it can be difficult and confusing, when it concerns intangibles it is be fraught  with difficulties. Intellectual property is one of these difficulties, as even the definition can be subject to interpretation (Denham, 1994). The concept in the law is relatively new, but  its commercial importance in the business world as an asset is becoming more apparent (Melia, 1993). Intellectual property can be items such  as computer programmes and software, biotechnology brand names, trade marks and copyrights to name but a few (Melia, 1993). Although all these different aspects of intellectual property may be very  different there are common threads, including the intangible nature of there existence, and usually a creativity that has been used to create them. Under the United Kingdom law intellectual property