Answers.com

copyright

 
Dictionary: cop·y·right   (kŏp'ē-rīt') pronunciation
 
n. (Abbr. c. or cop.)

The legal right granted to an author, composer, playwright, publisher, or distributor to exclusive publication, production, sale, or distribution of a literary, musical, dramatic, or artistic work.

adj.
  1. Of or relating to a copyright: copyright law; a copyright agreement.
  2. Protected by copyright: permission to publish copyright material.
tr.v., -right·ed, -right·ing, -rights.

To secure a copyright for.

copyrightable cop'y·right'a·ble adj.
copyrighter cop'y·right'er n.
Search unanswered questions...
Enter a word or phrase...
All Community Q&A Reference topics
 

The legal ownership of a "work," which can take any of the following forms: written text, program source code, graphics images, sculpture, music, sound recording, motion picture, pantomime, choreograph and architecture. Before January 1, 1978, a work had to be published to be copyrighted. After that date, any work expressed in paper or electronic form is automatically copyrighted for the life of the author plus 70 years. Registration with the Copyright Office is not required, although it is beneficial if there are disputes later on. In the U.S., a copyright symbol is not mandatory, but recommended.

For works by an anonymous author or an author who uses a fictitious name (pseudonymous) as well as works "made for hire," such as a publication written by an employee of a company, the copyright lasts 120 years from date of creation or 95 years from date of publication, whichever is shorter. For more information, visit www.copyright.gov. See Creative Commons, copyleft, trademarks, DRM and image protection.

Download Computer Desktop Encyclopedia to your iPhone/iTouch

 
Marketing Dictionary: copyright
Top

Form of protection granted by United States law to authors, artists, and musicians for their original work (including advertisements and commercials). A copyright protects the work from being copied, reprinted, sold, or used by someone else without the consent of the owner of the work. The Copyright Act of 1976, which became effective in January 1978, provides this protection for the period of the owner's lifetime plus an additional 50 years. (Previous to 1978, a copyright had been in force for 28 years and was subject to renewal for another 28 years, providing protection for a maximum of only 56 years.) Under this new law, a work is considered copyrighted immediately upon creation and need not be published or registered in order to be considered copyrighted. However, registration does offer certain advantages-for example, it establishes a public record and validity of the copyright, and if registration is made within three months after publication (or prior to an infringement), statutory damages and attorney fees will be available to the copyright owner. For this reason, it is advisable that advertisers copyright their advertisements and commercials. When the copyright expires, the work comes into the category of public domain and can then be used by anyone. It is important to note that copyrighting protects the expression of an idea but not the idea itself. Also, names, titles, systems, and methods cannot be copyrighted.

 
Accounting Dictionary: Copyright
Top

Protection given by law to authors of literary, musical, artistic, and similar works. The copyright holder enjoys the following exclusive rights: (1) to print, reprint, and copy the work; (2) to sell, assign, or distribute copies; and (3) to perform the work. A copyright is recorded at its acquisition price. The legal life of a copyright is the life of the author plus 70 years. Rarely will the economic life of a copyright exceed its legal life. For example, some textbooks become obsolete in five years. As other limited life intangible assets, copyrights are amortized over the period benefited.

 
US Supreme Court: Copyright
Top

The Constitution empowers Congress “[t]o promote the Progress of Science … by securing for limited Times to Authors … the exclusive Right to their … Writings.” Long described simply as the law of literary property, today copyright law affords to creators not only of most literary, musical and artistic works, but also of architectural works and computer software and databases, a limited monopoly on the use of the products of their minds—a powerful incentive to create.

The foundational decision was Wheaton v. Peters (1834), in which the Supreme Court, denying claimed ownership of its opinions by the Court's own Reporters of Decisions, held that copyright exists primarily to benefit the public rather than authors or assigns.

At times, the Court has struggled when asked to extend copyright protection to new technologies, for example, piano rolls (White‐Smith v. Apollo, 1908) and VCRs (Sony v. Universal City Studios, 1984). The risk of failing to provide protection in such instances, observed Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (concurring in White‐Smith), is that the result may accord copyright “less scope than its rational significance and the ground on which it is granted seem … to demand” (p. 19).

In general, the Court has displayed marked flexibility in interpreting key terms of the Copyright Clause, for example, by recognizing photographs as “Writings” (Burrow Giles Lithographic v. Sarony, 1884) and corporations as “Authors” (Bleistein v. Donaldson Lithographing, 1903), as well as by deferring to Congress in approving repeated extensions of the “limited Times” for which copyright may be granted (Eldred v. Ashcroft, 2003).

Overall, however, the dominant themes in the Court's copyright jurisprudence have been promoting the general welfare and protecting the public domain, including recognizing statutory limitations on copyright grants (Wheaton, supra), according protection for expression but not underlying ideas (Baker v. Selden, 1880), declaring that the first sale of a copy of a work precludes the copyright owner from controlling future sales of that copy (Bobbs‐Merrill v. Straus, 1908), reaffirming constitutional minima for protectible authorship (Feist Publications, Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Company, Inc., 1991), and implementing the fair use doctrine to assure reasonable use of protected matter by subsequent authors (Campbell v. Acuff‐Rose Music, 1994).

In the twenty‐first century, as technologies for creating and distributing works expand rapidly along with economic pressures on Congress to protect copyright owners, the Court's challenge, as always, will be to subject both to the overriding public purposes of copyright envisioned by the Founders.

— Craig Joyce

 

Exclusive right to reproduce, publish, or sell an original work of authorship. It protects from unauthorized copying any published or unpublished work that is fixed in a tangible medium (including a book or manuscript, musical score or recording, script or dramatic production, painting or sculpture, or blueprint or building). It does not protect matters such as an idea, process, or system. Protection in the U.S. now extends for the life of the creator plus 70 years after his or her death. Works made for hire are now protected for a maximum of 95 years from the date of publication or 120 years from the date of the creation of the work. In 1988 the U.S. joined the Bern Convention, an agreement that governs international copyright. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, adopted in the U.S. in 1998, expanded owners' control over digital forms of their creations and penalized persons who sought to evade technological shields (such as encryption) for copyrighted material. See also intellectual property; patent; trademark.

For more information on copyright, visit Britannica.com.

 
British History: copyright
Top

Copyright is the ownership of and right of control over the means of reproducing works of literature, art, drama, film, sound, and computer technology. Until the 18th cent. authors had little protection against pirate publication of their works. An important step forward was a statute of 1709 ‘to encourage learned men’ (8 Anne c. 19) by granting the author sole right of publication for fourteen years, with the possibility of a further extension of another fourteen years. Copyright now lasts 70 years after the death of an author. Under the terms of the Public Lending Rights scheme, introduced in 1983, authors can receive royalties on the use of their books in libraries in Britain and elsewhere.

 
Columbia Encyclopedia: copyright
Top
copyright, right granted by statute to the author or originator of certain literary, artistic, and musical productions whereby for a limited period of time he or she controls the use of the product. The work may be reproduced by the individual or by another licensed to do so by the individual. Royalties are paid on each performance of the work or each copy that is sold.

Copyrightable Materials

Literary matter, periodicals, maps, photographs, works of art, textile and other designs, sound recordings, musical compositions, photoplays, and radio and television programs are among the commodities that may be copyrighted. Material for copyright in the United States must be registered and deposited with the Library of Congress. The law makes special provision for the transmission of copyright material over cable television, jukeboxes, and public broadcasting stations. It also specifies circumstances under which the reproduction of copyrighted works by libraries and archives is permissible. Since 1980, computer software has been eligible for the same copyright protection as printed matter, and in 1984, a ten-year period of copyright protection was extended to semiconductor chips. The Supreme Court ruled in 1987 that neither the home use of television video recorders nor their manufacture violated the copyright laws.

The Bern and Universal Copyright Conventions

Copyrighting of foreign materials in the United States is a relatively recent development. After 1891, foreign language material was easily copyrighted in the United States; material in English, however, could not be copyrighted if it was imported, unless type was set and material printed and bound in the United States. Most of the major countries of the world, with the exception of the United States, adhered to the Bern Convention of 1887, which provided that literary material copyrighted in any signatory country automatically enjoys copyright in all the signatory countries.

The Universal Copyright Convention (UCC), which had as a main purpose the inclusion of the United States in a general system of international copyright, was signed at Geneva in 1952. It was accepted by the United States in 1954 and came into effect the following year. The U.S. copyright law was modified to conform to the convention, notably by elimination of procedural steps for the establishment of U.S. copyright in works published in other signatory countries and of the requirement that works in the English language by foreign authors be manufactured in the United States to obtain U.S. copyright protection. The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) played a leading part in the negotiations for the UCC, which was revised in 1971. In 1989 the United States became a member of the Bern Convention, which was most recently revised in 1971. Most nations subscribe to the convention, and most of those who do not are parties to the UCC or members of the World Trade Organization, whose agreements cover copyright and other intellectual property rights.

History

Protection of rights in literary property did not appear necessary in Europe prior to the invention of printing from movable type in the 15th cent. The sovereign asserted control over printing by issuing patents or privileges to individuals or by organizing publishers' guilds with monopoly rights. Through such devices, the state was able to censor heresy and sedition, while at the same time fostering literature. The only protection that the common law extended to the author was against publication of the work without permission; once publication was allowed, the work passed completely out of the author's control.

The first English copyright act (1710), while maintaining the common-law right, allowed the author to copyright a work for 14 years (with a like period of renewal); it also required deposition of copies and a notice that the work was copyrighted. That law was the model for the earliest American copyright statute, passed in 1790. Wheaton v. Peters (1834; see Henry Wheaton) established that copyright exists primarily for the public benefit rather than for the creator of the work. The current copyright statute became effective in 1978, superseding an act of 1909. The law provides copyright for the duration of the author's life plus 70 years.

Bibliography

See B. Kaplan, An Unhurried View of Copyright (1967); W. S. Strong, The Copyright Book (1986); H. G. Henn, Copyright Law (1988); J. M. Samuels, ed., Patent, Trademark, and Copyright Laws (1989); E. Samuels, The Illustrated Story of Copyright (2000).


 
Law Encyclopedia: Copyright
Top
This entry contains information applicable to United States law only.

An intangible right granted by statute to the author or originator of certain literary or artistic productions, whereby, for a limited period, the exclusive privilege is given to the person to make copies of the same for publication and sale.

A copyright is a legal device that gives the creator of a literary, artistic, musical, or other creative work the sole right to publish and sell that work. Copyright owners have the right to control the reproduction of their work, including the right to receive payment for that reproduction. An author may grant or sell those rights to others, including publishers or recording companies. Violation of a copyright is called infringement.

Copyright is distinct from other forms of author protection such as patents, which give inventors exclusive rights over use of their inventions, and trademarks, which are legally protected words or symbols that represent products or services. Whereas a patent protects the application of an idea, and a trademark protects a device that indicates the provider of particular services or goods, copyright protects the expression of an idea. And whereas the operative notion in patents is novelty, so that a patent represents some invention that is new and has never been made before, the basic concept behind copyright is originality, so that a copyright represents something that has originated from a particular author and not from another. Copyrights, patents, and trademarks are all examples of what is known in the law as intellectual property.

As the media on which artistic and intellectual works are recorded have changed with time, copyright protection has been extended from the printing of text to many other means of recording original expressions. Besides books, stories, periodicals, poems, and other printed literary works, copyright may protect computer programs; musical compositions; song lyrics; dramas; dramatico-musical compositions; pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works; architectural works; pantomimes and choreographic works; motion pictures and other audiovisual works; and sound recordings.

History of Copyright Law

U.S. copyright law grew out of English common law and statutory law. When the printing press was developed in the fifteenth century, rights for the reproduction of written works extended to printers rather than to authors. In England, a printers' guild, the Stationers' Company, claimed for itself the exclusive right — in effect, a monopoly — on written works. It was not until 1710 that Parliament passed a statute related to copyright. This law, called the Statute of Anne, established authors' rights to control the reproduction of their work after it was published. It also created a term of protection of twenty-eight years from the date of publication. After that time, an author's work entered the public domain, meaning that anyone could print or distribute it without obtaining the author's permission or paying a royalty, or fee, to the author. Other European countries developed similar laws in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Under the British system, the author retained a common-law right to ownership of his or her work until publication. After publication, copyright was established as a statutory right, protected by the Statute of Anne. U.S. copyright law retained this distinction between prepublication common-law rights and postpublication statutory rights, until 1976.

By the late eighteenth century, the protection of intellectual property as a means of advancing the public interest was considered important enough to receive mention in the U.S. Constitution. The Patent and Copyright Clause — Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 — of the U.S. Constitution empowers Congress "[t]o promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." Congress passed its first copyright statute in 1790 — and has substantially revised copyright law four times, in 1831, 1870, 1909, and 1976.

Revisions in the copyright law have been driven largely by commercially significant changes in technology. In 1802, for example, graphic prints came under copyright protection, establishing the notion that the Constitution's language regarding copyright not be interpreted to apply literally to "Writings" alone. In 1831, musical compositions were incorporated into copyright protection, and in 1870, paintings, statues, and other works of fine art were placed under copyright law.

The distinction between common-law protection for unpublished works and statutory protection of published works received increasing criticism in the twentieth century, particularly as the notion of publication changed greatly with technological innovations in communication. Congress removed this distinction in the landmark Copyright Act of 1976 (17 U.S.C.A. § 102(a)). According to this act, an author receives copyright protection as soon as a work is recorded in a concrete way — when, for example, it is written on a piece of paper, recorded on an audiotape, or stored on a computer disk. Any unauthorized copying of the work is subject to an infringement suit and criminal charges. The 1976 act also allows copyright protection of works that derive from the original, such as motion pictures, CD-ROM multimedia editions, and other adaptations.

Many features of the 1976 Copyright Act make U.S. copyright law conform more to international copyright standards, particularly with regard to the duration of copyright protection and to the formalities of copyright deposit, registration, and notice. These changes have been greatly influenced by the most important international copyright treaty, the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (828 U.N.T.S. 221, S. Treaty Doc. No. 99-27). In 1988, the United States passed the Berne Convention Implementation Act (102 Stat. 2853), which made the nation an official member of the treaty as of 1989. Section 2(a) of this act holds that provisions of the treaty are not legally binding in the United States without domestic legislation that specifically implements them.

U.S. copyright law has continued to evolve toward greater conformity with international copyright standards. In the 1990s, for example, the Berne Convention added twenty-five years to the minimum standard for copyright duration, changing it to the length of the author's life plus seventy-five years. U.S. copyright law is expected to follow suit.

Copyrightable Works

The 1976 Copyright Act provides that copyright protection "subsists … in original works of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression, now known or later developed" (17 U.S.C.A. § 102(a)). Thus, virtually any form of fixed recording is protected, no matter how new the technology.

Originality is the most important quality needed by a work in order for it to receive copyright protection. Originality is not dependent on the work's meeting any standard of aesthetic or artistic quality. Thus, a work need not be fine art to be copyrightable.

Works Not Copyrightable

Copyright protects the expression of an idea or vision, not the idea itself. In legal terminology, this concept is called the idea-expression dichotomy, and it has been an important feature of legal reasoning related to copyright. Ideas, procedures, processes, systems, methods of operation, concepts, principles, and discoveries are not within the scope of copyright protection. Other works that are not copyrightable are words and short phrases, including slogans; blank forms for recording information (such as bank checks); works containing no original authorship (such as standard calendars or simple phone listings); and works produced for the officers and employees of companies and organizations.

Some works are not copyrightable because they are not fixed in a tangible medium. These include unrecorded dance choreography, and unrecorded speeches, lectures, and other vocal performances. Although typefaces are tangible, they have traditionally been regarded as lying outside of copyright protection. A dramatic character is not copyrightable.

Holders of a Copyright

A copyright is initially owned by the author or authors of the work, except in the case of a "work for hire." A work for hire can arise in two situations: (1) where an employee creates a work within the scope of his or her employment, in which case the employer owns the copyright to the work upon its creation; (2) where two parties enter a written agreement designating the work a work for hire and the work falls within one of nine specific categories of work designated by copyright law. If the work does not fit one of the specified categories, it will not be a work for hire even if the parties have called it one. In such a case, the author or authors retain the copyright and transfer must be accomplished through a written assignment of copyright. Where there is a valid work for hire, the employer who owns the copyright has the same rights as any copyright holder, including the right to initiate an action for copyright infringement.

The ownership of a copyright, or the ownership of any of the five exclusive rights afforded by a copyright (discussed later in this article), can be transferred to another and is regarded as personal property upon the death of the copyright holder. Copyright ownership and ownership of the material object in which the copyrighted work is embodied are two entirely separate legal entities. Furthermore, transfer of an object and transfer of the copyright to that object are separate, independent transactions, neither of which, by itself, has any effect on the other. Therefore, transfer of a material object, such as an original manuscript, photograph negative, or master tape recording, does not transfer the copyright to that work. Likewise, transfer of the copyright to a work does not require transfer of the original copy of the work.

Exclusive Rights

Copyright affords an author a number of exclusive rights: (1) to reproduce, or copy, the work; (2) to prepare new works that derive from the copyrighted work; (3) to distribute the work to the public by sale or other arrangement; (4) to perform the work publicly; and (5) to display the work publicly. The first two rights, involving reproduction and derivation, are infringed whether violated in public or in private, or whether violated for profit or not. The last three rights are infringed only when violated publicly, that is, before a "substantial number of persons" outside of family and friends (17 U.S.C.A. § 101).

All the exclusive rights afforded by copyright may have significant economic value. For example, derivative works, which may include translations, dramatizations, films, recordings, and abridgments, can offer substantial rewards to the author. An author may sell, license, or transfer one or all of the exclusive rights.

Duration of Ownership

Under the Copyright Act of 1976, copyright protection of an authored work extends throughout the life of the author and to fifty years after the author's death. Thus, it is possible for authors to benefit from royalties on their works until their death, and to pass on copyright and associated royalties to their heirs. In the case of joint works, the termination date of the copyright is fifty years after the death of the last surviving author.

As for works made for hire, pseudonymous works, and anonymous works, the copyright generally expires seventy-five years after publication or one hundred years after creation, whichever occurs first. However, in the case of an anonymous or pseudonymous work, an author or interested party, such as an heir, may reveal to the Copyright Office the true identity of at least one author of the work, and be eligible for the full duration of copyright until fifty years after the author's death.

Infringement

Infringement involves any violation of the exclusive rights of the copyright owner. Infringement may be unintentional or intentional. When unintentional, it is called innocent infringement. An example of innocent infringement occurred when George Harrison, of the rock band the Beatles, created his song "My Sweet Lord." Harrison unconsciously copied the tune of another song, "He's So Fine," by the Chiffons, and was found guilty of infringement (Bright Tunes Music Corp. v. Harrisongs Music, 420 F. Supp. 177 [S.D.N.Y. 1976]). Vicarious or related infringement refers to those who profit indirectly from infringement of copyright, as in the case of a theater owner who profits from booking a band that illegally performs copyrighted works.

Since evidence of direct copying or plagiarism of an authored work is difficult to obtain, infringement of copyright is usually established through circumstantial evidence. Such evidence typically must show a substantial similarity between the original and the copy, as well as prove that the copier had access to the original. This means that where two works are similar or identical, there is nevertheless no infringement if each work was produced through the original and independent work of its creator. An infringer is not relieved of liability by crediting the source or the creator of the infringed work. Although infringement does not require that even a large portion of the work be similar, it does require that a substantial part be similar. It is irrelevant if the copied work is an improvement of the original work.

Remedies for Infringement

Because the owner loses the value of a copyright when infringement occurs, relief is often sought through filing a lawsuit in federal court. If infringement is established, the court can grant preliminary and permanent injunctions, or court orders that restrain the offending party from continuing to infringe the copyright. A court may also award monetary damages as a remedy for copyright infringement. The copyright owner can recover for actual financial losses and any additional profits that the infringer earned from the infringement.

The copyright owner may instead choose to receive statutory damages, which range from a minimum of $250 to a maximum of $10,000. The court may adjust these limits based on the innocence or willfulness of the infringer. Innocent infringers may prove their good faith and have damages reduced to as little as $100, whereas willful infringers may be punished by the court with damages as high as $50,000. Courts may also impound and even destroy illicit reproductions of copyrighted works.

Willful copyright infringement can be a federal misdemeanor punishable by as much as $10,000 or one year's imprisonment. Criminal prosecutions on this basis require that infringement be for the "purposes of commercial advantage or private financial gain" (17 U.S.C.A. § 506(a)). Criminal prosecutions for copyright infringement are generally rare. Nevertheless, piracy of music and motion picture recordings — in which criminals mass-produce such recordings without permission and without paying royalties — has become increasingly common. This fact led to the passage of the Piracy and Counterfeiting Amendments Act of 1982 (18 U.S.C.A. § 2318), which allows punishment of up to $250,000 in fines or five years in prison for pirating one thousand phono records or sixty-five films within 180 days. The fraudulent use or removal of copyright notices is also a punishable offense.

Fair Use

Fair use is a judicial doctrine that refers to a use of copyrighted material that does not infringe or violate the exclusive rights of the copyright holder. Fair use is an important and well established limitation on the exclusive right of copyright owners. Well-tested examples of fair use include the making of braille copies or audio recordings of books for use by blind people, and the making of video recordings of broadcast TV programs or films by individuals for private, noncommercial use.

Examples of fair use typically involve, according to the Copyright Act of 1976, the reproduction of authored works for the purpose of "criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching … , scholarship, or research" (17 U.S.C.A. § 107). The same act also establishes a four-part test to determine fair use that considers the following factors: (1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; (2) the nature of the copyrighted work; (3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and (4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for, or value of, the copyrighted work (17 U.S.C.A. § 107).

It is usually considered fair use of an authored work to take small quotations or excerpts from it and include them in another work, as when quotations are taken from a book and inserted into a book review. However, courts have found that such quotation is not fair use when material is taken from unpublished sources, as happened in the 1985 case Harper & Row v. Nation Enterprises, 471 U.S. 539, 105 S. Ct. 2218, 85 L. Ed. 2d 588.

The Harper case involved publication by Nation magazine of quotations from Gerald R. Ford's unpublished memoir, A Time to Heal. Harper & Row, publisher of the memoir, sued Nation, claiming that the magazine's actions had caused it to lose a lucrative contract with Time magazine to publish excerpts from the memoir. The Court ruled in favor of Harper, citing the economic value of first publication to the copyright holder as an important factor in its decision. The Court found that Nation had infringed on Ford's copyright by becoming the first publisher of his original expression, thereby inflicting economic losses on Ford. It rejected Nation's argument that it was simply reporting news. Lower courts have subsequently applied the Court's reasoning to other cases involving quotations from unpublished works. In Salinger v. Random House, 811 F.2d 90 (2d Cir. 1987), a federal appeals court blocked publication of a book that used extensive quotations from unpublished letters of the author J. D. Salinger. The court ruled that the author retained copyright ownership of the "expressive content" of the letters, even when the letters themselves were deposited in university library collections.

Parody and satire often constitute fair use of copyrighted material. In cases involving parodies of copyrighted works, courts typically assess the purpose and intent involved in taking material from the original expression, and whether or not the author of the parody has borrowed a reasonable amount of material in producing the parody. For example, in the 1994 case of Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, 501 U.S. 569, 114 S. Ct. 1164, 127 L. Ed. 2d 500— which involved a parody by the rap group 2 Live Crew of the Roy Orbison song "Pretty Woman" — the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a parody can be fair use under copyright law even if it is created for commercial purposes.

Copyright Registration, Deposit, and Notice

Registration of copyright involves recording the existence of an authored work and the identity of its author with the Copyright Office of the Library of Congress. Deposit involves placing the work in its recorded, physical form with the same office. Notice, or notification, involves placing on an authored work the ;cW or the word Copyright or the abbreviation Copr., along with the year of first publication and the name of the owner of the copyright.

Many of the major copyright acts in U.S. history required that works be registered and deposited with a U.S. district court or with the register of copyrights at the Library of Congress, in order to be legally enforceable. Over time, however, deposit, registration, and notice of copyright have increasingly become formalities. Under the Copyright Act of 1976, authors automatically receive federal copyright protection when they fix their work in a tangible medium. Even if a copyright is not registered and an authored work is not deposited, the author maintains exclusive rights to the work.

Nevertheless, registration and deposit may still have significant legal consequences. Most important, owners of copyright cannot sue for copyright infringement until they have registered the copyright (17 U.S.C.A. § § 411, 412). Deposit is not a requirement for copyright protection, but federal law requires that two copies of a published work be deposited within three months of publication. Failure to deposit a copy after it has been demanded by the Copyright Office is an offense punishable by a fine. Registration of copyright requires the deposit of at least one copy of a work and two copies of a published work. The Copyright Office has the power to vary these requirements.

Copyright notice serves a number of functions. A lack of copyright notice has traditionally informed users that a particular work is in the public domain, whereas the presence of a notice has warned users that a work is copyrighted and identifies the date and year of the work. Despite these traditions, copyright notice is optional for works distributed after October 31, 1988. Under prior law, an omission of copyright notice resulted in a loss of copyright protection.

See: copyright, international.

 
Grammar Dictionary: copyright
Top

The legal protection given to published works, forbidding anyone but the author from publishing or selling them. An author can transfer the copyright to another person or corporation, such as a publishing company.

  • The symbol for copyright is ©.

  •  
    Economics Dictionary: copyright
    Top

    A grant of an exclusive right to produce or sell a book, motion picture, work of art, musical composition, software, or similar product during a specified period of time.

     
    Word Tutor: copyright
    Top
    pronunciation

    IN BRIEF: The legal right to be the sole publisher of written materials.

    pronunciation Writers are wise to get a copyright for their magazine articles.

     
    Wikipedia: Copyright
    Top

    Copyright gives the author of an original work exclusive right for a certain time period in relation to that work, including its publication, distribution and adaptation, after which time the work is said to enter the public domain. Copyright applies to any expressible form of an idea or information that is substantive and discrete and fixed in a medium. Some jurisdictions also recognize "moral rights" of the creator of a work, such as the right to be credited for the work. Copyright is described under the umbrella term intellectual property along with patents and trademarks.

    An example of the intent of copyright, as expressed in the United States Constitution, is "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries".[1]

    Copyright has been internationally standardized, lasting between fifty to a hundred years from the author's death, or a shorter period for anonymous or corporate authorship. Some jurisdictions have required formalities to establishing copyright, but most recognize copyright in any completed work, without formal registration. Generally, copyright is enforced as a civil matter, though some jurisdictions do apply criminal sanctions.

    Contents

    History

    The concept of copyright originates with the Statute of Anne (1710) in Britain. It established the author of a work as the owner of the right to copy that work and the concept of a fixed term for that copyright. It was created as an act "for the encouragement of learning", as it had been noted at the time that publishers were reprinting the works of authors without their consent "to their very great detriment, and too often to the Ruin of them and their Families". As such, copyright was first created with the intention that authors might have some control over the printing of their work and to receive some financial recompense, so that this would encourage them to write more books and thus to aid the flow of ideas and learning. As the act itself says: "for the encouragement of learned men to compose and write useful books". [2]

    The Statute of Anne was the first real copyright act, and gave the authors rights for a fixed period, a fourteen year term for all works published the Statute, after which the copyright expired. Copyright has grown from a legal concept regulating copying rights in the publishing of books and maps to one with a significant effect on nearly every modern industry, covering such items as sound recordings, films, photographs, software, and architectural works. Subsequently the Copyright Clause of the United States Constitution (1787) authorized copyright legislation: "To promote the Progress of Science..., by securing for limited Times to Authors.... the exclusive Right to their... Writings."[3]

    Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works

    The 1886 Berne Convention first established recognition of copyrights among sovereign nations, rather than merely bilaterally. Under the Berne Convention, copyrights for creative works do not have to be asserted or declared, as they are automatically in force at creation. In these countries, there is no requirement for an author to "register" or "apply for" a copyright, or to mark his or her works with a copyright symbol or other legend. As soon as a work is "fixed", that is, written or recorded on some physical medium, its author is automatically entitled to all copyrights in the work, and to any derivative works unless and until the author explicitly disclaims them, or until the copyright expires. The Berne Convention also resulted in foreign authors being treated equivalently to domestic authors, in any country signed onto the Convention. The UK signed the Berne Convention in 1887 but did not implement large parts of it until 100 years later with the passage of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988. The USA did not sign the Berne Convention until 1989.[citation needed]

    Other international conventions

    The United States and most Latin American countries instead entered into the Buenos Aires Convention in 1910, which required a copyright notice (such as "all rights reserved") on the work, and permitted signatory nations to limit the duration of copyrights to shorter and renewable terms. The Universal Copyright Convention was drafted in 1952 as another less demanding alternative to the Berne Convention, and ratified by nations such as the Soviet Union and developing nations.[citation needed]

    Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement

    The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is a proposed plurilateral trade agreement which is claimed by its proponents to be in response "to the increase in global trade of counterfeit goods and pirated copyright protected works."[4] The scope of ACTA is broad, including counterfeit physical goods, as well as "internet distribution and information technology".[5]

    In October 2007 the United States, the European Community, Switzerland and Japan announced that they would negotiate ACTA. Furthermore the following countries have joined the negotiations: Australia, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Mexico, Jordan, Morocco, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and Canada.[6][7][8] The ACTA negotiations have been largely conducted in secrecy, with very little information being officially disclosed. However, on 22 May 2008 a discussion paper about the proposed agreement was uploaded to Wikileaks, and newspaper reports about the secret negotiations quickly followed.[8][9][10][11]

    Copyright by country

    Copyright laws have been standardized to some extent through international conventions such as the Berne Convention and Universal Copyright Convention. These multilateral treaties have been ratified by nearly all countries, and international organizations such as the European Union or World Trade Organization require their member states to comply with them.[citation needed] Although there are consistencies among nations' intellectual property laws, each jurisdiction has separate and distinct laws and regulations about copyright.[12] The World Intellectual Property Organization summarizes each of its member states' intellectual property laws on its website (see WIPO Guide to Intellectual Property Worldwide and National copyright laws in the See also section below).

    The regulations of the Berne Convention are incorporated into the World Trade Organization's TRIPS agreement (1995), thus giving the Berne Convention effectively near-global application.[citation needed] The 2002 WIPO Copyright Treaty enacted greater restrictions on the use of technology to copy works in the nations that ratified it.[citation needed]

    Justification

    The British Statute of Anne, full title “An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by Vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or Purchasers of such Copies, during the Times therein mentioned”, was the first act to directly protect the rights of authors. Since its inception, copyright is considered a property right and attempts to balance the rights of the producer with the rights of society at large.[12] According to the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), intellectual property laws, which includes industrial property and copyright, exist for primarily two reasons:

    "One is to give statutory expression to the moral and economic rights of creators in their creations and to the rights of the public in accessing those creations. The second is to promote creativity, and the dissemination and application of its results, and to encourage fair trade, which would contribute to economic and social development."[13]

    Under US copyright law, the justification appears in the constitutional provision authorizing Congress to enact copyright laws: Article I, section 8, clause 8 provides that "Congress shall have Power ... To promote the Progress of Science ... by securing for limited Times to Authors ... the exclusive Right to their ... Writings." The term "science" has been interpreted to refer to human knowledge in general. The justification for US copyright is thus seen to be that the prospect of copyright grants encourages authors to make public their writings, which will then become a part of the public domain after a limited period. The theory that copyright is a natural property right of authors has been rejected in a series of decisions of the US Supreme Court beginning with Wheaton v. Peters (1834).[14]

    Scope

    Copyright may apply to a wide range of creative, intellectual, scientific, or artistic forms, or "works". Specifics vary by jurisdiction, but these can include poems, theses, plays, other literary works, movies, dances, musical compositions, audio recordings, paintings, drawings, sculptures, photographs, software, radio and television and broadcasts.

    Copyright does not cover ideas and information themselves, only the form or manner in which they are expressed. For example, the copyright to a Mickey Mouse cartoon restricts others from making copies of the cartoon or creating derivative works based on Disney's particular anthropomorphic mouse, but it does not prohibit the creation of other works about anthropomorphic mice in general, so long as they're not copies or adaptations of Disney's mouse. In many jurisdictions, copyright law makes exceptions to these restrictions when the work is copied for the purpose of commentary or other related uses (See Fair Use, Fair Dealing). However, other laws — such as trademark and patent law — may impose additional restrictions that copyright does not.

    Obtaining and enforcing copyright

    Typically, a work must meet minimal standards of originality in order to qualify for copyright, and the copyright expires after a set period of time (some jurisdictions may allow this to be extended). Different countries impose different tests, although generally the requirements are low; in the United Kingdom there has to be some 'skill, labour and judgment' that has gone into it.[15] In Australia and the United Kingdom it has been held that a single word is insufficient to comprise a copyright work. However, single words or a short string of words can sometimes be registered as a trademark instead.

    Copyright law recognizes the right of an author based on whether the work actually is an original creation, rather than based on whether it is unique; two authors may own copyright on two substantially identical works, if it is determined that the duplication was coincidental, and neither was copied from the other.

    In all countries where the Berne Convention standards apply, copyright is automatic, and need not be obtained through official registration with any government office. Once an idea has been reduced to tangible form, for example by securing it in a fixed medium (such as a drawing, sheet music, photograph, a videotape, or a computer file), the copyright holder is entitled to enforce his or her exclusive rights. However, while registration isn't needed to exercise copyright, in jurisdictions where the laws provide for registration, it serves as prima facie evidence of a valid copyright and enables the copyright holder to seek statutory damages and attorney's fees. (In the USA, registering after an infringement only enables one to receive actual damages and lost profits.)

    The original holder of the copyright may be the employer of the author rather than the author himself, if the work is a "work for hire". For example, in English law the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 provides that if a copyrighted work is made by an employee in the course of that employment, the copyright is automatically owned by the employer as a "Work for Hire."

    Copyrights are generally enforced by the holder in a civil law court, but there are also criminal infringement statutes in some jurisdictions. While central registries are kept in some countries, which aid in proving claims of ownership, registering does not necessarily prove ownership, nor does the fact of copying (even without permission) necessarily prove that copyright was infringed. Criminal sanctions are generally aimed at serious counterfeiting activity, but are now becoming more commonplace as copyright collectives such as the RIAA are increasingly targeting the file sharing home Internet user. Thus far, however, most such cases against file sharers have been settled out of court. (See: File sharing and the law)

    "Poor man's copyright"

    Because of the cost associated with copyright registration some creators, particularly musicians, have attempted to establish evidence of ownership and creation of a work by mailing it to themselves. In the US this non-statutory practice became known as "poor man's copyright."[16] Today the US Copyright Office makes it clear that the technique is no substitute for actual copyright registration,[17] although the practice may be accepted as proof of creation in a number of national jurisdictions, such as the UK and the Netherlands. "Poor man's copyright" may also include depositing a copy of the work with a bank or attorney.[18][19]

    Exclusive rights

    Several exclusive rights typically attach to the holder of a copyright:

    • to produce copies or reproductions of the work and to sell those copies (mechanical rights; including, sometimes, electronic copies: distribution rights)
    • to import or export the work
    • to create derivative works (works that adapt the original work)
    • to perform or display the work publicly (performance rights)
    • to sell or assign these rights to others
    • to transmit or display by radio or video (broadcasting rights)

    The phrase “exclusive right,” in this context, means that only the copyright holder has a legal power to secure relief from a court against certain, statutorily defined uses by others without the copyright holder's authorization. The copyright holder is free to exercise those rights, unless doing so would violate rights of others. Copyright is sometimes called a “negative right” or "exclusionary right," as it serves to prohibit or exclude other people (e.g., readers, viewers, or listeners, and primarily publishers and would-be publishers) from doing something they would otherwise be able to do, rather than permitting people (e.g., authors) to do something they would otherwise be unable to do. In this way it is similar to the unregistered design right in English law and European law. The rights of the copyright holder also permit him/her to not use or exploit their copyright, for some or all of the term.

    There is, however, a critique that rejects this assertion as being based on a philosophical interpretation of copyright law that is not universally shared. There is also debate on whether copyright should be considered a property right or a moral right.[citation needed] Many argue that copyright does not exist merely to restrict third parties from publishing ideas and information, and that defining copyright purely as a negative right is incompatible with the public policy objective of encouraging authors to create new works and enrich the public domain.[weasel words]

    The right to adapt a work means to transform the way in which the work is expressed. Examples include developing a stage play or film script from a novel, translating a short story, and making a new arrangement of a musical work.

    Duration

    Copyright subsists for a variety of lengths in different jurisdictions. The length of the term can depend on several factors, including the type of work (e.g. musical composition, novel), whether the work has been published or not, and whether the work was created by an individual or a corporation. In most of the world, the default length of copyright is the life of the author plus either 50 or 70 years. In the United States, the term for most existing works is a fixed number of years after the date of creation or publication. In some countries (for example, the United States[20] and the United Kingdom[21]), copyrights expire at the end of the calendar year in question.

    The length and requirements for copyright duration are subject to change by legislation, and since the early 20th century there have been a number of adjustments made in various countries, which can make determining the duration of a given copyright somewhat difficult. For example, the United States used to require copyrights to be renewed after 28 years to stay in force, and formerly required a copyright notice upon first publication to gain coverage. In Italy and France, there were post-wartime extensions that could increase the term by approximately 6 years in Italy and up to about 14 in France. Many countries have extended the length of their copyright terms (sometimes retroactively). International treaties establish minimum terms for copyrights, but individual countries may enforce longer terms than those.[22]

    Limits and exceptions to copyright

    Idea-expression dichotomy

    Immanuel Kant in his 1785 essay Von der Unrechtmäßigkeit des Büchernachdrucks distinguishes the physical from the ideological, the thought involved from the book. This distinction is of critical importance to the near constant wrangling between publishers, other intermediaries, and the original, creative authors.

    First-sale doctrine and exhaustion of rights

    Copyright law does not restrict the owner of a copy from reselling legitimately obtained copies of copyrighted works, provided that those copies were originally produced by or with the permission of the copyright holder. It is therefore legal, for example, to resell a copyrighted book or CD. In the United States this is known as the first-sale doctrine, and was established by the courts to clarify the legality of reselling books in second-hand bookstores. Some countries may have parallel importation restrictions that allow the copyright holder to control the aftermarket. This may mean for example that a copy of a book that does not infringe copyright in the country where it was printed does infringe copyright in a country into which it is imported for retailing. The first-sale doctrine is known as exhaustion of rights in other countries and is a principle that also applies, though somewhat differently, to patent and trademark rights. It is important to note that the first-sale doctrine permits the transfer of the particular legitimate copy involved. It does not permit making or distributing additional copies.

    In addition, copyright, in most cases, does not prohibit one from acts such as modifying, defacing, or destroying his or her own legitimately obtained copy of a copyrighted work, so long as duplication is not involved. However, in countries that implement moral rights, a copyright holder can in some cases successfully prevent the mutilation or destruction of a work that is publicly visible.

    Fair use and fair dealing

    Copyright does not prohibit all copying or replication. In the United States, the fair use doctrine, codified by the Copyright Act of 1976 as 17 U.S.C. § 107, permits some copying and distribution without permission of the copyright holder or payment to same. The statute does not clearly define fair use, but instead gives four non-exclusive factors to consider in a fair use analysis. Those factors are:

    1. the purpose and character of the use;
    2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
    3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
    4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.[23]

    In the United Kingdom and many other Commonwealth countries, a similar notion of fair dealing was established by the courts or through legislation. The concept is sometimes not well defined; however in Canada, private copying for personal use has been expressly permitted by statute since 1999. In Australia, the fair dealing exceptions under the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth) are a limited set of circumstances under which copyrighted material can be legally copied or adapted without the copyright holder's consent. Fair dealing uses are research and study; review and critique; news reportage and the giving of professional advice (i.e. legal advice). Under current Australian law it is still a breach of copyright to copy, reproduce or adapt copyright material for personal or private use without permission from the copyright owner. Other technical exemptions from infringement may also apply, such as the temporary reproduction of a work in machine readable form for a computer.

    In the United States the AHRA (Audio Home Recording Act Codified in Section 10, 1992) prohibits action against consumers making noncommercial recordings of music, in return for royalties on both media and devices plus mandatory copy-control mechanisms on recorders.

    Section 1008. Prohibition on certain infringement actions
    No action ever may be brought under this title alleging infringement of copyright based on the manufacture, importation, or distribution of a digital audio recording device, a digital audio recording medium, an analog recording device, or an analog recording medium, or based on the noncommercial use by a consumer of such a device or medium for making digital musical recordings or analog musical recordings.

    Later acts amended US Copyright law so that for certain purposes making 10 copies or more is construed to be commercial, but there is no general rule permitting such copying. Indeed making one complete copy of a work, or in many cases using a portion of it, for commercial purposes will not be considered fair use. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act prohibits the manufacture, importation, or distribution of devices whose intended use, or only significant commercial use, is to bypass an access or copy control put in place by a copyright owner. An appellate court has held that fair use is not a defense to engaging in such distribution.

    Educational use is regarded as "fair use" in most jurisdictions, but the restrictions vary wildly from nation to nation.[24]

    Transfer and licensing

    A copyright, or aspects of it, may be assigned or transferred from one party to another. For example, a musician who records an album will often sign an agreement with a record company in which the musician agrees to transfer all copyright in the recordings in exchange for royalties and other considerations. The creator (and original copyright holder) benefits, or expects to, from production and marketing capabilities far beyond those of the author. In the digital age of music, music may be copied and distributed at minimal cost through the Internet, however the record industry attempts to provide promotion and marketing for the artist and his or her work so it can reach a much larger audience. A copyright holder need not transfer all rights completely, though many publishers will insist. Some of the rights may be transferred, or else the copyright holder may grant another party a non-exclusive license to copy and/or distribute the work in a particular region or for a specified period of time. A transfer or licence may have to meet particular formal requirements in order to be effective; see section 239 of the Australia Copyright Act 1968 (Cth). Under Australian law, it is not enough to pay for a work to be created in order to also own the copyright. The copyright itself must be expressly transferred in writing.

    Under the U.S. Copyright Act, a transfer of ownership in copyright must be memorialized in a writing signed by the transferor. For that purpose, ownership in copyright includes exclusive licenses of rights. Thus exclusive licenses, to be effective, must be granted in a written instrument signed by the grantor. No special form of transfer or grant is required. A simple document that identifies the work involved and the rights being granted is sufficient. Non-exclusive grants (often called non-exclusive licenses) need not be in writing under U.S. law. They can be oral or even implied by the behavior of the parties. Transfers of copyright ownership, including exclusive licenses, may and should be recorded in the U.S. Copyright Office. (Information on recording transfers is available on the Office's web site.) While recording is not required to make the grant effective, it offers important benefits, much like those obtained by recording a deed in a real estate transaction.

    Copyright may also be licensed. Some jurisdictions may provide that certain classes of copyrighted works be made available under a prescribed statutory license (e.g. musical works in the United States used for radio broadcast or performance). This is also called a compulsory license, because under this scheme, anyone who wishes to copy a covered work does not need the permission of the copyright holder, but instead merely files the proper notice and pays a set fee established by statute (or by an agency decision under statutory guidance) for every copy made. Failure to follow the proper procedures would place the copier at risk of an infringement suit. Because of the difficulty of following every individual work, copyright collectives or collecting societies and performing rights organizations (such as ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC) have been formed to collect royalties for hundreds (thousands and more) works at once. Though this market solution bypasses the statutory license, the availability of the statutory fee still helps dictate the price per work collective rights organizations charge, driving it down to what avoidance of procedural hassle would justify.

    Similar legal rights

    Copyright law covers the creative or artistic expression of an idea. Patent law covers inventions. Trademark law covers distinctive terms, marks, and names that are used in relation to products or services as indicators of origin, as does (in a similar fashion), Trade dress and Design patents cover the look or appearance of a manufactured or functional article. Trade secret law covers secret or sensitive knowledge or information.

    Although copyright and trademark laws are theoretically distinct, more than one type of them may cover the same item or subject matter. For example, in the case of the Mickey Mouse cartoon, the image and name of Mickey Mouse would be the subject of trademark legislation, while the cartoon itself would be subject to copyright. Titles and character names from books or movies may also be trademarked while the works from which they are drawn may qualify for copyright.

    Another point of distinction is that a copyright (and a patent) is generally subject to a statutorily-determined term, whereas a trademark registration may remain in force indefinitely if the trademark is periodically used and renewal fees continue to be duly paid to the relevant jurisdiction's trade marks office or registry. Once the term of a copyright has expired, the formerly copyrighted work enters the public domain and may be freely used or exploited by anyone. Courts in the United States and the United Kingdom have rejected the doctrine of a common law copyright. Public domain works should not be confused with works that are publicly available. Works posted in the internet for example, are publicly available, but are not generally in the public domain. Copying such works may therefore violate the author's copyright.

    What is a "copy"?

    There are different approaches to the issue of what is a "copy" of a copyright-protected work. For example, several important rights under United States copyright law exist only for “copies” of works—material objects in which the work is embodied.[25] A three-dimensional counterpart of a two-dimensional drawing is usually not a “copy” of the drawing, under United States copyright law. Thus, the copyright in a drawing of the approach to the Triboro Bridge is not infringed when the bridge approach is built.[26]

    The copyright law of England is different, a copyright in a drawing is infringed by manufacture of the depicted object.[27] As the House of Lords held in British Leyland Motor Corp. v. Armstrong Patents Co., the manufacture of a tailpipe corresponding to a blueprint of the tailpipe infringes the copyright in the blueprint, and unless a defense applies (as it did in that case) the tailpipe “copyist” is liable for copyright infringement damages.

    Typefaces

    In the United States, the Copyright Office maintains that typeface designs are not covered by copyright, and it will not accept applications for their registration. See 37. C.F.R. § 202.1(e). In Tufenkian Import/Export Ventures, Inc. v. Einstein Moomjy, Inc., 338 F.3d 127, 132 (2nd Cir. 2003),[28] the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit recognized this rule when it held, “the public domain includes, for example, both the generic shape of the letter 'L' and all of the elaborately more specific 'L's' from the hundreds of years of font designs that have fallen into the public domain.” However, if a design is novel and "non-obvious," it may be covered by design patent.[29]

    Germany (in 1981) passed a special extension (Schriftzeichengesetz) to the design patent law (Geschmacksmustergesetz) for protecting typeface designs. This permits typefaces being registered as designs in Germany, too. So far, the United States courts have not published any opinions discussing whether a computer program creating a particular font might be intellectual property protected by the copyright laws.

    England recognized copyright in typeface at least as early as 1916.[30] The current United Kingdom copyright statute, enacted in 1989, expressly refers to copyrights in typeface designs.[31] The British law also applies to designs produced before 1989.[citation needed]

    Accessible copies

    It is legal in several countries including the United Kingdom and the United States to produce alternative versions (for example, in large print or braille) of a copyrighted work to provide improved access to a work for blind and visually impaired persons without receiving prior permission from the copyright holder.[32][33]

    "Copyrightable" as a word

    Use of "copyrightable" or "uncopyrightable" as words is rarely helpful from a standpoint of legal analysis and is often misleading or confusing. The problem is that, so long as a writing exists in tangible form, there will usually be something to which some quantum of copyright protection attaches, even if it is "thin." Thus, a book containing a list of computer-generated code words[34] might be said to be uncopyrightable for lack of originality, a sine-qua-non of copyright protection,[35] or for lack of human authorship. But the work (considered as the whole book) will likely contain an Introduction explaining what the book does, and that portion of the book will almost surely have enough of that minimal degree of creativity that suffices to attract some degree of copyright protection. The proper issue is thus not copyrightability but what kind of copyright protection (thin[36] or robust) attaches to which portions of the work. By the same token, it is not helpful to speak of functionally-dictated or scenes-a-faire aspects of a work as being uncopyrightable----it is more useful to ask whether the copyright protection of the work (for there is some) extends to its functionally-dictated or scenes-a-faire aspects.

    See also

    National copyright laws

    US Legislation

    EU Legislation

    Treaties and International Agreements

    Sui generis

    Further reading

    References

    1. ^ Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 aka Copyright Clause of the United States Constitution
    2. ^ Statute of Anne
    3. ^ United States Constitution, Article I, Section 8, clause 8. The full text of the clause without ellipsis is: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."
    4. ^ http://www.med.govt.nz/templates/ContentTopicSummary____34357.aspx
    5. ^ "What is ACTA?". Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). http://www.eff.org/issues/acta. Retrieved on 1 december 2008. 
    6. ^ "What is ACTA?". Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). http://www.eff.org/issues/acta. Retrieved on 1 december 2008. 
    7. ^ Geiger, Andrea (2008-04-30). "A View From Europe: The high price of counterfeiting, and getting real about enforcement". The Hill. http://thehill.com/business--lobby/a-view-from-europe-the-high-price-of-counterfeiting-and-getting-real-about-enforcement-2008-04-30.html. Retrieved on 2008-05-27. 
    8. ^ a b Pilieci, Vito (2008-05-26). "Copyright deal could toughen rules governing info on iPods, computers". Vancouver Sun. http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/story.html?id=ae997868-220b-4dae-bf4f-47f6fc96ce5e&p=1. Retrieved on 2008-05-27. 
    9. ^ "Proposed US ACTA multi-lateral intellectual property trade agreement (2007)". Wikileaks. 22 May 2008. http://wikileaks.org/w/index.php?title=Proposed_US_ACTA_multi-lateral_intellectual_property_trade_agreement_%282007%29&oldid=29522. 
    10. ^ Jason Mick (23 May 2008). "Wikileaks Airs U.S. Plans to Kill Pirate Bay, Monitor ISPs With Multinational ACTA Proposal". DailyTech. http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=11870. 
    11. ^ Weeks, Carly (2008-05-26). "Anti-piracy strategy will help government to spy, critic says". The Globe and Mail. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20080526.COPYRIGHT26//TPStory/National. Retrieved on 2008-05-27. 
    12. ^ a b Broussard, Sharee L. (September 2007). The copyleft movement: creative commons licensing. Communication Research Trends. 
    13. ^ WIPO. Understanding Industrial Property. World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO Publication No. 895(E)). 
    14. ^ 34 U.S. (8 Pet.) 591 (1834).
    15. ^ Express Newspaper Plc v News (UK) Plc, F.S.R. 36 (1991)
    16. ^ Hull, Geoffrey (2004). The Recording Industry. Routledge. pp. 41-42. ISBN 0415968038, 9780415968034. http://books.google.com/books?id=-jUx2SStMnAC&dq=poor+man%27s+copyright&source=gbs_summary_s&cad=0. 
    17. ^ Copyright in General: I’ve heard about a "poor man’s copyright." What is it?, U.S Copyright Office
    18. ^ Auteursrecht - FAQ
    19. ^ Copyright Registers', United Kingdom Intellectual Property Office
    20. ^ 17 U.S.C. § 305
    21. ^ The Duration of Copyright and Rights in Performances Regulations 1995, part II, Amendments of the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
    22. ^ Nimmer, David (2003). Copyright: Sacred Text, Technology, and the DMCA. Kluwer Law International. p. 63. ISBN 978-9041188762. OCLC 50606064. http://books.google.com/books?id=RYfRCNxgPO4C. 
    23. ^ 17 U.S.C. § 107
    24. ^ International comparison of Educational "fair use" legislation
    25. ^ See 17 U.S.C. § 101 (defining "copy").
    26. ^ See Muller v. Triboro Bridge Authority, 43 F. Supp. 298 (S.D.N.Y. 1942).
    27. ^ See LB (Plastics) Ltd. v. Swish Products Ltd., [1979] R.P.C. 551, [1979] F.S.R. 145 (H.L.). Excerpted version available at Swish.
    28. ^ Tufenkian Import/Export Ventures, Inc. v. Einstein Moomjy, Inc., 338 F.3d 127, 132 (2nd Cir. 2003) (via FindLaw)
    29. ^ See, for example, U.S. Des. Patent No. 289,773, May 12, 1987, Typeface design, Charles A. Bigelow and Kris A. Holmes, inventors.
    30. ^ "Stephenson, Blake and Co. v. Grant, Legros & Co., 115 L.T.R. 666, 61 Sol. J. 55 (1916), reprinted in E.J. MacGillivray, Copyright Cases 1911-1916 326-329 (1969), aff'd 116 L.T.R. 268 (1917), noted in 13 Eng. and Empire Digest 68, 68-69. The court recognized that the typeface design was subject to copyright under the then-current Copyright Act of 1911, An Act to Amend and Consolidate the Law Relating to Copyright, 1911, 1 & 2 Geo. 5, ch. 46 (Eng.). However, the plaintiff's victory was hollow. The court held that the copyright protected only the design in its entirety, with all the letters in their particular order. The defendant's embodiment of them into a font of his own, as opposed to a reproduction of the design with the letters in the same order, was held not to infringe. MacGillivray , supra at 327-28." Terrence J. Carroll, Protection For Typeface Designs: A Copyright Proposal, 10 Santa Clara Computer & High Tech. L.J. 139, 169, n.181.
    31. ^ Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, ch. 48, § 54 (England)
    32. ^ 17 U.S.C. § 121
    33. ^ Copyright (Visually Impaired Persons) Act 2002 (England): http://www.rnib.org.uk/xpedio/groups/public/documents/publicwebsite/public_cvipsact2002.hcsp
    34. ^ Cf. Reiss v. National Quotation Bureau, Inc., 276 F. 717 (S.D.N.Y. 1921).
    35. ^ Feist Publications, Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Co., 499 U.S. 340(1991).
    36. ^ See Feist, 499 U.S. at 349.

    External links

    Wikisource
    Wikisource has original text related to this article:


     
    Misspellings: copyright
    Top

    Common misspelling(s) of copyright

    • copywrite

     
    Translations: Copyright
    Top

    Dansk (Danish)
    n. - ophavsret
    v. tr. - beskytte ved copyright
    adj. - beskyttet ved copyright

    Nederlands (Dutch)
    auteursrecht

    Français (French)
    n. - copyright, droit d'auteur
    v. tr. - réserver les droits de (un livre), obtenir les droits exclusifs sur
    adj. - protégé par des droits d'auteur, dont le droit de reproduction est réservé

    Deutsch (German)
    n. - Copyright, Urheberrecht
    v. - urheberrechtlich schützen
    adj. - urheberrechtlich geschützt

    Ελληνική (Greek)
    n. - πνευματική ιδιοκτησία, συγγραφικά/πνευματικά δικαιώματα

    Italiano (Italian)
    copyright

    Português (Portuguese)
    n. - direitos (m pl) autorais

    Русский (Russian)
    авторское право

    Español (Spanish)
    n. - derechos de autor, propiedad literaria
    v. tr. - registrar la propiedad literaria
    adj. - de propiedad literaria, de derechos de autor

    Svenska (Swedish)
    n. - copyright

    中文(简体)(Chinese (Simplified))
    版权, 著作权, 为取得版权, 版权的, 有版权保护的

    中文(繁體)(Chinese (Traditional))
    n. - 版權, 著作權
    v. tr. - 為取得版權
    adj. - 版權的, 有版權保護的

    한국어 (Korean)
    n. - 저작권, 판권
    v. tr. - 저작권으로 보호하다
    adj. - 판권으로 보호된

    日本語 (Japanese)
    n. - 著作権, 版権
    adj. - 著作権のある
    v. - 著作権で保護する, 版権を取る

    العربيه (Arabic)
    ‏(الاسم) حقوق الطبع و النشر‏

    עברית (Hebrew)
    n. - ‮זכות יוצרים‬
    v. tr. - ‮הבטיח זכות יוצרים‬
    adj. - ‮מוגן ע"י זכות יוצרים‬


     
    Shopping: copyright
    Top
    patent trademark copyright
     
     

     

    Copyrights:

    Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Computer Desktop Encyclopedia. THIS COPYRIGHTED DEFINITION IS FOR PERSONAL USE ONLY.
    All other reproduction is strictly prohibited without permission from the publisher.
    © 1981-2009 Computer Language Company Inc.  All rights reserved.  Read more
    Marketing Dictionary. Dictionary of Marketing Terms. Copyright © 2000 by Barron's Educational Series, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Accounting Dictionary. Dictionary of Accounting Terms. Copyright © 2005 by Barron's Educational Series, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
    US Supreme Court. The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States. Copyright © 1992, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
    British History. A Dictionary of British History. Copyright © 2001, 2004 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/  Read more
    Law Encyclopedia. West's Encyclopedia of American Law. Copyright © 1998 by The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Grammar Dictionary. The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Edited by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joseph F. Kett, and James Trefil. Copyright © 2002 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Economics Dictionary. The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Edited by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joseph F. Kett, and James Trefil. Copyright © 2002 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Word Tutor. Copyright © 2004-present by eSpindle Learning, a 501(c) nonprofit organization. All rights reserved.
    eSpindle provides personalized spelling and vocabulary tutoring online; free trial Read more
    Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Copyright" Read more
    Answers Corporation Misspellings. © 1999-2009 by Answers Corporation. All rights reserved.  Read more
    Translations. Copyright © 2007, WizCom Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved.  Read more

     

    Mentioned in

    Related topics