Misappropriation doctrine
The misappropriation doctrine is a U.S. legal theory conferring a "quasi-property right" on a person who invests "labor, skill, and money" to create an intangible asset. The right operates against another person (usually a competitor of the first person) "endeavoring to reap where it has not sown" by "misappropriating" the value of the asset (ordinarily by copying what the first person has created). The quoted language and the legal principle come from the decision of the United States Supreme Court in International News Service v. Associated Press, 248 U.S. 215 (1918), also known as INS v. AP or simply the INS case.