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Copyright
Origins
According to the United Kingdom government, the Statute of
Anne was the first statute to legally address copyright during
the eighteen century. In the United States, the first copyright
law was passed in 1790.
When Do You Get a Copyright?
Upon creation (in a fixed form), a creator (author) has a
copyright in the work.
What's Required to Get a Copyright?
You do not need to apply or register to have a copyright;
you receive copyright protection when you create the work.
However, registering your work expands your protections and
sometimes can be done without disclosing the entire work.
Depositing a copy of your work with the Copyright Office
within 90 days of creation also protects your work by providing
a legal record of the creation date and allowing others to
have notice of your ownership rights.
| The following categories of works have copyright protection: |
|
literary works
musical works, including any accompanying words
dramatic works, including any accompanying music
pantomimes and choreographic works
pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works
motion pictures and other audiovisual works
sound recordings
architectural works
|
Software, sometimes the GUI, and webpages have copyright
protection.
The following do not have copyright protection:
Works that have not been fixed in a tangible form of expression,
(for example, choreographic works that have not been notated
or recorded, or improvisational speeches or performances
that have not been written or recorded)
Works without enough ?originality? (creativity) to merit
copyright protection: titles, names, short phrases, and slogans;
familiar symbols or designs; font design; ingredients or
contents; facts; blank forms, etc. As there is great tension
here between granting incentive and financial reward when
something is worthy, but not granting it to things so basic
and commonly used that everyone would be forced to pay, the
law is somewhat unclear in this area.
·Ideas or concepts. Copyright protects the expression
of the idea, but not the ideas themselves. This is easier
to understand if you remember the goals of our Founding Fathers
– to reward creations, but protect the free flow of
ideas and information. For example (*this is Plato?s explanation
of the concept long before copyright), if I ask you what
a chair is, you get a picture in your head; the picture I
get in my head is different; the picture Buffy gets in her
head is different. These are the ?ideas? of what a chair
is. However, if you draw the chair in your head or use words
to describe the chair, that the ?expression? of the idea
and that is protected by copyright.
What Do You Have When You Have a Copyright and Is There
Any Risk?
| The 1976 Copyright Act gives the owner of a copyright
the exclusive right |
|
to copy the work
to modify the work (create "derivative works")
to distribute the work
to perform the work publicly
to display the work publicly
|
Length of copyright protection can be complex, but generally
lasts 70 years after the death of the creator.
As registration of copyright is not required for protection
and some registrations can be done without full disclosure
of the work, persons that want to keep their creation secret
often opt to rely on copyright protection for their work.
If registration is desired, it is relatively simple and inexpensive.
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