A mask work is a two or three-dimensional layout or topography of an integrated circuit (IC or "chip"), i.e. the arrangement on a chip of semiconductor devices such as transistors and passive electronic components such as resistors and interconnections. By extension, it also refers to the copyright-like intellectual property right conferring time-limited exclusivity to reproduction of a particular layout.

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dbpprop:abstract
  • A mask work is a two or three-dimensional layout or topography of an integrated circuit (IC or "chip"), i.e. the arrangement on a chip of semiconductor devices such as transistors and passive electronic components such as resistors and interconnections. By extension, it also refers to the copyright-like intellectual property right conferring time-limited exclusivity to reproduction of a particular layout. The layout is called a mask work because, in photolithographic processes, the multiple etched layers within actual ICs are each created using a mask, called the photomask, to permit or block the light at specific locations, sometimes for hundreds of chips on a wafer simultaneously. Because of the functional nature of the mask geometry, the designs cannot be effectively protected under copyright law (except perhaps as decorative art). Similarly, because individual lithographic mask works are not clearly protectable subject matter, they also cannot be effectively protected under patent law, although their combined functions and structure certainly may. The United States Code (USC) defines a mask work as "a series of related images, however fixed or encoded, having or representing the predetermined, three-dimensional pattern of metallic, insulating, or semiconductor material present or removed from the layers of a semiconductor chip product, and in which the relation of the images to one another is such that each image has the pattern of the surface of one form of the semiconductor chip product". Mask work exclusive rights were first granted in the US by the Semiconductor Chip Protection Act of 1984. In Canada these rights are protected under the Integrated Circuit Topography Act (1990, c. 37). Equivalent legislation exists in Australia and Hong Kong.
  • Topografia układu scalonego - poddające się ścisłej definicji prawno-technicznej rozwiązanie polegające na przestrzennym rozplanowaniu elementów, z których co najmniej jeden jest elementem aktywnym, oraz wszystkich lub części połączeń układu scalonego. Topografie opisane w dowolny sposób i zgłoszone do urzędu patentowego podlegają ochronie.
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  • as of February 2003
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  • November 2008
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  • A mask work is a two or three-dimensional layout or topography of an integrated circuit (IC or "chip"), i.e. the arrangement on a chip of semiconductor devices such as transistors and passive electronic components such as resistors and interconnections. By extension, it also refers to the copyright-like intellectual property right conferring time-limited exclusivity to reproduction of a particular layout.
  • Topografia układu scalonego - poddające się ścisłej definicji prawno-technicznej rozwiązanie polegające na przestrzennym rozplanowaniu elementów, z których co najmniej jeden jest elementem aktywnym, oraz wszystkich lub części połączeń układu scalonego. Topografie opisane w dowolny sposób i zgłoszone do urzędu patentowego podlegają ochronie.
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  • Mask work
  • Topografia układu scalonego
  • Topografia de Circuito Integrado
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