[Link: 24hrco.com]

Here's another written by a lawyer in 07

If you are not going to patent your ideas, which could be impossible, impracticable and costly, what can you do? The law of trade secrets may offer a useful alternative. In order for the confidential or proprietary information that you have and/or wish to include in your proposal to qualify as a trade secret, there are two criteria to be met. First, don't worry, the information does not have to be anything unusual or "eye poppingly" original. Instead, it is the kind of information that you have accumulated, discovered, developed or generated in the course of operating your business, that is not generally known and gives you a competitive edge. Second, you must take reasonable steps to preserve the secrecy of the information.