These are terms that I have always heard about, but never really understood.  I had the pleasure of meeting with Christopher Haigh, Patent Attorney with IPXtract (www.ipxtract.com) here in Chicago.  What a fascinating, intense, challenging job!  Chris is great at it, representing those inventors and firms who need to “get that patent” done and no longer pending! He has done some tremendous work in this area, approaching almost two decades of such! WOW!  He educated me on the differences between patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets.  This is relevant as I work with small businesses in Chicago to implement small business marketing systems. One of the steps in our process is to “package solutions” and many times that is accomplished via trademarks, copyrights, etc.  Chris, thanks again for the education!