10 Big Myths About Copyright Explained.

[Teacher Mark 53]

An attempt to answer common myths about copyright seen on the net and cover issues related to copyright and USENET/Internet publication.

- by Brad Templeton

Note that this is an essay about copyright myths. It assumes you know at least what copyright is -- basically the legal exclusive right of the author of a creative work to control the copying of that work. If you didn't know that, check out my own brief introduction to copyright for more information. Feel free to link to this document, no need to ask me. Really, NO need to ask.

1) "If it doesn't have a copyright notice, it's not copyrighted."

This was true in the past, but today almost all major nations follow the Berne copyright convention. For example, in the USA, almost everything created privately and originally after April 1, 1989 is copyrighted and protected whether it has a notice or not. The default you should assume for other people's works is that they are copyrighted and may not be copied unless you know otherwise. There are some old works that lost protection without notice, but frankly you should not risk it unless you know for sure.

It is true that a notice strengthens the protection, by warning people, and by allowing one to get more and different damages, but it is not necessary. If it looks copyrighted, you should assume it is. This applies to pictures, too. You may not scan pictures from magazines and post them to the net, and if you come upon something unknown, you shouldn't post that either.

The correct form for a notice is:

"Copyright [dates] by [author/owner]"

You can use C in a circle © instead of "Copyright" but "©" has never been given legal force. The phrase "All Rights Reserved" used to be required in some nations but is now not legally needed most places. In some countries it may help preserve some of the "moral rights."

2) "If I don't charge for it, it's not a violation."

False. Whether you charge can affect the damages awarded in court, but that's main difference under the law. It's still a violation if you give it away -- and there can still be serious damages if you hurt the commercial value of the property. There is a USA exception for personal copying of music, which is not a violation, though courts seem to have said that doesn't include widescale anonymous personal copying as Napster. If the work has no commercial value, the violation is mostly technical and is unlikely to result in legal action. Fair use determinations (see below) do sometimes depend on the involvement of money.

3) "If it's posted to Usenet it's in the public domain."

False. Nothing modern and creative is in the public domain anymore unless the owner explicitly puts it in the public domain(*). Explicitly, as in you have a note from the author/owner saying, "I grant this to the public domain." Those exact words or words very much like them.

Some argue that posting to Usenet implicitly grants permission to everybody to copy the posting within fairly wide bounds, and others feel that Usenet is an automatic store and forward network where all the thousands of copies made are done at the command (rather than the consent) of the poster. This is a matter of some debate, but even if the former is true (and in this writer's opinion we should all pray it isn't true) it simply would suggest posters are implicitly granting permissions "for the sort of copying one might expect when one posts to Usenet" and in no case is this a placement of material into the public domain. It is important to remember that when it comes to the law, computers never make copies, only human beings make copies. Computers are given commands, not permission. Only people can be given permission. Furthermore it is very difficult for an implicit licence to supersede an explicitly stated licence that the copier was aware of.

Note that all this assumes the poster had the right to post the item in the first place. If the poster didn't, then all the copies are pirated, and no implied licence or theoretical reduction of the copyright can take place.

(*) Copyrights can expire after a long time, putting something into the public domain, and there are some fine points on this issue regarding older copyright law versions. However, none of this applies to material from the modern era, such as net postings.

Note that granting something to the public domain is a complete abandonment of all rights. You can't make something "PD for non-commercial use." If your work is PD, other people can even modify one byte and put their name on it.

4) "My posting was just fair use!"

See EFF notes on fair use and links from it for a detailed answer, but bear the following in mind:

The "fair use" exemption to (U.S.) copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's vital so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to appropriate other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. Are you reproducing an article from the New York Times because you needed to in order to criticise the quality of the New York Times, or because you couldn't find time to write your own story, or didn't want your readers to have to register at the New York Times web site? The first is probably fair use, the others probably aren't.

These rules apply to content you pull from the internet as well. If you wanted to criticise the poker strategy advice on pokerlistings.com, you could reproduce sections of that advice in your criticism as fair use. Just copying it to make your own poker site would probably be plain old copyright infringement.

This advice brought to you by Pokerlistings.com

Fair use is generally a short excerpt and almost always attributed. (One should not use much more of the work than is needed to make the commentary.) It should not harm the commercial value of the work -- in the sense of people no longer needing to buy it (which is another reason why reproduction of the entire work is a problem.) Famously, copying just 300 words from Gerald Ford's 200,000 word memoir for a magazine article was ruled as not fair use, in spite of it being very newsworthy, because it was the most important 300 words -- why he pardoned Nixon.

Note that most inclusion of text in followups and replies is for commentary, and it doesn't damage the commercial value of the original posting (if it has any) and as such it is almost surely fair use. Fair use isn't an exact doctrine, though. The court decides if the right to comment overrides the copyright on an individual basis in each case. There have been cases that go beyond the bounds of what I say above, but in general they don't apply to the typical net misclaim of fair use.

The "fair use" concept varies from country to country, and has different names (such as "fair dealing" in Canada) and other limitations outside the USA.

Facts and ideas can't be copyrighted, but their expression and structure can. You can always write the facts in your own wordsthough

See the DMCA alert for recent changes in the law.

5) "If you don't defend your copyright you lose it." -- "Somebody has that name copyrighted!"

False. Copyright is effectively never lost these days, unless explicitly given away. You also can't "copyright a name" or anything short like that, such as almost all titles. You may be thinking of trade marks, which apply to names, and can be weakened or lost if not defended.

You generally trademark terms by using them to refer to your brand of a generic type of product or service. Like a "Delta" airline. Delta Airlines "owns" that word applied to air travel, even though it is also an ordinary word. Delta Hotels owns it when applied to hotels. (This case is fairly unusual as both are travel companies. Usually the industries are more distinct.) Neither owns the word on its own, only in context, and owning a mark doesn't mean complete control -- see a more detailed treatise on this law for details.

You can't use somebody else's trademark in a way that would steal the value of the mark, or in a way that might make people confuse you with the real owner of the mark, or which might allow you to profit from the mark's good name. For example, if I were giving advice on music videos, I would be very wary of trying to label my works with a name like "mtv." :-) You can use marks to critcise or parody the holder, as long as it's clear you aren't the holder.

6) "If I make up my own stories, but base them on another work, my new work belongs to me."

False. U.S. Copyright law is quite explicit that the making of what are called "derivative works" -- works based or derived from another copyrighted work -- is the exclusive province of the owner of the original work. This is true even though the making of these new works is a highly creative process. If you write a story using settings or characters from somebody else's work, you need that author's permission.

Yes, that means almost all "fan fiction" is arguably a copyright violation. If you want to publish a story about Jim Kirk and Mr. Spock, you need Paramount's permission, plain and simple. Now, as it turns out, many, but not all holders of popular copyrights turn a blind eye to "fan fiction" or even subtly encourage it because it helps them. Make no mistake, however, that it is entirely up to them whether to do that.

There is a major exception -- criticism and

parody. The fair use provision says that if you want to make fun of something like Star Trek, you don't need their permission to include Mr. Spock. This is not a loophole; you can't just take a non-parody and claim it is one on a technicality. The way "fair use" works is you get sued for copyright infringement, and you admit you did copy, but that your copying was a fair use. A subjective judgment on, among other things, your goals, is then made.

However, it's also worth noting that a court has never ruled on this issue, because fan fiction cases always get settled quickly when the defendant is a fan of limited means sued by a powerful publishing company. Some argue that completely non-commercial fan fiction might be declared a fair use if courts get to decide. You can read more

7) "They can't get me, defendants in court have powerful rights!"

Copyright law is mostly civil law. If you violate copyright you would usually get sued, not be charged with a crime. "Innocent until proven guilty" is a principle of criminal law, as is "proof beyond a reasonable doubt." Sorry, but in copyright suits, these don't apply the same way or at all. It's mostly which side and set of evidence the judge or jury accepts or believes more, though the rules vary based on the type of infringement. In civil cases you can even be made to testify against your own interests.

8) "Oh, so copyright violation isn't a crime or anything?"

Actually, in the 90s in the USA commercial copyright violation involving more than 10 copies and value over $2500 was made a felony. So watch out. (At least you get the protections of criminal law.) On the other hand, don't think you're going to get people thrown in jail for posting your E-mail. The courts have much better things to do. This is a fairly new, untested statute. In one case an operator of a pirate BBS that didn't charge was acquited because he didn't charge, but congress amended the law to cover that.

9) "It doesn't hurt anybody -- in fact it's free advertising."

It's up to the owner to decide if they want the free ads or not. If they want them, they will be sure to contact you. Don't rationalize whether it hurts the owner or not, ask them. Usually that's not too hard to do. Time past, ClariNet published the very funny Dave Barry column to a large and appreciative Usenet audience for a fee, but some person didn't ask, and forwarded it to a mailing list, got caught, and the newspaper chain that employs Dave Barry pulled the column from the net, pissing off everybody who enjoyed it. Even if you can't think of how the author or owner gets hurt, think about the fact that piracy on the net hurts everybody who wants a chance to use this wonderful new technology to do more than read other people's flamewars.

10) "They e-mailed me a copy, so I can post it."

To have a copy is not to have the copyright. All the E-mail you write is copyrighted. However, E-mail is not, unless previously agreed, secret. So you can certainly report on what E-mail you are sent, and reveal what it says. You can even quote parts of it to demonstrate. Frankly, somebody who sues over an ordinary message would almost surely get no damages, because the message has no commercial value, but if you want to stay strictly in the law, you should ask first. On the other hand, don't go nuts if somebody posts E-mail you sent them. If it was an ordinary non-secret personal letter of minimal commercial value with no copyright notice (like 99.9% of all E-mail), you probably won't get any damages if you sue them. Note as well that, the law aside, keeping private correspondence private is a courtesy one should usually honour.

11)"So I can't ever reproduce anything?"

Myth #11 (I didn't want to change the now-famous title of this article) is actually one sometimes generated in response to this list of 10 myths. No, copyright isn't an iron-clad lock on what can be published. Indeed, by many arguments, by providing reward to authors, it encourages them to not just allow, but fund the publication and distribution of works so that they reach far more people than they would if they were free or unprotected -- and unpromoted. However, it must be remembered that copyright has two main purposes, namely the protection of the author's right to obtain commercial benefit from valuable work, and more recently the protection of the author's general right to control how a work is used.

While copyright law makes it technically illegal to reproduce almost any new creative work (other than under fair use) without permission, if the work is unregistered and has no real commercial value, it gets very little protection. The author in this case can sue for an injunction against the publication, actual damages from a violation, and possibly court costs. Actual damages means actual money potentially lost by the author due to publication, plus any money gained by the defendant. But if a work has no commercial value, such as a typical E-mail message or conversational USENET posting, the actual damages will be zero. Only the most vindictive (and rich) author would sue when no damages are possible, and the courts don't look kindly on vindictive plaintiffs, unless the defendants are even more vindictive.

The author's right to control what is done with a work, however, has some validity, even if it has no commercial value. If you feel you need to violate a copyright "because you can get away with it because the work has no value" you should ask yourself why you're doing it. In general, respecting the rights of creators to control their creations is a principle many advocate adhering to.

In addition, while quite often people make incorrect claims of "fair use" it is a still valid and important concept necessary to allow the criticism of copyrighted works and their creators through examples. It's also been extended to allow things like home recording of TV shows and moving music from CDs you own to your MP3 player. But please read more about it before you do it.

In Summary

* These days, almost all things are copyrighted the moment they are written, and no copyright notice is required.

* Copyright is still violated whether you charged money or not, only damages are affected by that.

* Postings to the net are not granted to the public domain, and don't grant you any permission to do further copying except perhaps the sort of copying the poster might have expected in the ordinary flow of the net.

* Fair use is a complex doctrine meant to allow certain valuable social purposes. Ask yourself why you are republishing what you are posting and why you couldn't have just rewritten it in your own words.

* Copyright is not lost because you don't defend it; that's a concept from trademark law. The ownership of names is also from trademark law, so don't say somebody has a name copyrighted.

* Fan fiction and other work derived from copyrighted works is a copyright violation.

* Copyright law is mostly civil law where the special rights of criminal defendants you hear so much about don't apply. Watch out, however, as new laws are moving copyright violation into the criminal realm.

* Don't rationalize that you are helping the copyright holder; often it's not that hard to ask permission.

* Posting E-mail is technically a violation, but revealing facts from E-mail you got isn't, and for almost all typical E-mail, nobody could wring any damages from you for posting it. The law doesn't do much to protect works with no commercial value.

DMCA Alert!

Copyright law was recently amended by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act which changed net copyright in many ways. In particular, it put all sorts of legal strength behind copy-protection systems, making programs illegal and reducing the reality of fair use rights.

The DMCA also changed the liability outlook for ISPs in major ways, many of them quite troublesome.

Linking

Might it be a violation just to link to a web page? That's not a myth, it's undecided, but I have written some discussion of linking rights issues.

Permission is granted to freely print, unmodified, up to 100 copies of the most up to date version of this document from http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html, or to copy it in off-the-net electronic form. On the net/WWW, however, you must link here rather than put up your own page. If you had not seen a notice like this on the document, you would have to assume you did not have permission to copy it. This document is still protected by you-know-what even though it has no copyright notice. Please don't send mail asking me if you can link here -- you can do so, without asking or telling me. The only people I prefer not link here are those who mail me asking for permission to link.

It should be noted that the author, as publisher of an electronic newspaper on the net, has at times made his living by publishing copyrighted material in electronic form and has the associated biases. However, DO NOT E-MAIL HIM FOR LEGAL ADVICE; for that use other resources or consult a lawyer. By the way, did I mention: do not e-mail me for legal advice? Also note that while many of these principles are universal in Berne copyright signatory nations, some are derived from U.S. law, and in some cases Canadian law. This document is provided to clear up some common misconceptions about intellectual property law that are often seen on the net. It is not intended to be a complete treatise on all the nuances of the subject. Consider the U.S. Library of Congress copyright site. Australians try this. This site has Canadian Copyright Info. I should also mention sorry, but please do not e-mail me your copyright questions.

This article was originally composed in 1994. The latest revision was in October 2008.

Edited December 7, 2008 by Joe Six-Pack

[Ban Hammer 13,656]

just don't tell wom about this.

[Teacher Mark 53]

Quotations about Hypocrisy

One should examine oneself for a very long time before thinking of condemning others. ~Moliere

Every man alone is sincere. At the entrance of a second person, hypocrisy begins. We parry and fend the approach of our fellow-man by compliments, by gossip, by amusements, by affairs. We cover up our thought from him under a hundred folds. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Friendship," Essays, 1841

He does not believe who does not live according to his belief. ~Thomas Fuller

Whatever you condemn, you have done yourself. ~Georg Groddeck, The Book of the It, 1950

Many of us believe that wrongs aren't wrong if it's done by nice people like ourselves. ~Author Unknown

Your religion is what you do when the sermon is over. ~Quoted in P.S. I Love You, compiled by H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all. ~William Shakespeare, Henry VI

As no roads are so rough as those that have just been mended, so no sinners are so intolerant as those that have just turned saints. ~Charles Caleb Colton

All reformers, however strict their social conscience, live in houses just as big as they can pay for. ~Logan Pearsall Smith

The essence of immorality is the tendency to make an exception of myself. ~Jane Addams

That which we call sin in others is experiment for us. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Experience," Essays, 1844

All of us are experts at practicing virtue at a distance. ~Theodore M. Hesburgh

Go put your creed into your deed. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

The most melancholy thing about human nature, is, that a man may guide others into the path of salvation, without walking in it himself; that he may be a pilot, and yet a castaway. ~Augustus William Hare and Julius Charles Hare, Guesses at Truth, by Two Brothers, 1827

Politeness, n. The most acceptable hypocrisy. ~Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, 1911

Hypocrite: the man who murdered both his parents... pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan. ~Abraham Lincoln

'Tis curious that we only believe as deeply as we live. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

I don't never have any trouble in regulating my own conduct, but to keep other folks' straight is what bothers me. ~Josh Billings

If it were not for the intellectual snobs who pay, the arts would perish with their starving practitioners - let us thank heaven for hypocrisy. ~Aldous Huxley

Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo. ~H.G. Wells

Affectation is a greater enemy to the face than smallpox. ~English Proverb

The injury we do and the one we suffer are not weighed in the same scales. ~Aesop, Fables

The hypocrite's crime is that he bears false witness against himself. What makes it so plausible to assume that hypocrisy is the vice of vices is that integrity can indeed exist under the cover of all other vices except this one. Only crime and the criminal, it is true, confront us with the perplexity of radical evil; but only the hypocrite is really rotten to the core. ~Hannah Arendt, On Revolution, 1963

Because hypocrisy stinks in the nostrils one is likely to rate it as a more powerful agent for destruction than it is. ~Rebecca West, The Strange Necessity, 1928

Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits. ~Mark Twain, Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar for 1894

In the last analysis we must be judged by what we do and not by what we believe. We are as we behave - with a very small margin of credit for our unmanifested vision of how we might behave if we could take the trouble. ~Geoffrey L. Rudd, The British Vegetarian, September/October 1962

It is a good divine that follows his own instructions. ~William Shakespeare

The world is full of fools and faint hearts; and yet everyone has courage enough to bear the misfortunes, and wisdom enough to manage the affairs, of his neighbor. ~Benjamin Franklin

Most everyone seems willing to be a fool himself, but he can't bear to have anyone else one. ~Josh Billings

They are not all saints who use holy water. ~English Proverb

The true hypocrite is the one who ceases to perceive his deception, the one who lies with sincerity. ~André Gide

God has given you one face, and you make yourself another. ~William Shakespeare

How seldom we weigh our neighbors in the same balance as ourselves. ~Thomas à Kempis

We are not hypocrites in our sleep. ~William Hazlitt

Children lack morality, but they also lack fake morality. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

When you say that you agree with a thing in principle you mean that you have not the slightest intention of carrying it out in practice. ~Otto von Bismarck

Hypocrite reader - my fellow - my brother! ~St Jerome

Almost all of us long for peace and freedom; but very few of us have much enthusiasm for the thoughts, feelings, and actions that make for peace and freedom. ~Aldous Huxley

When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty. ~George Bernard Shaw

The devil loves nothing better than the intolerance of reformers. ~James Russell Lowell

It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them. ~Alfred Adler

Live truth instead of professing it. ~Elbert Hubbard

Those whose conduct gives room for talk are always the first to attack their neighbors. ~Jean Baptiste Molière, Tartuffe

Most of us are aware of and pretend to detest the barefaced instances of that hypocrisy by which men deceive others, but few of us are upon our guard or see that more fatal hypocrisy by which we deceive and over-reach our own hearts. ~Laurence Sterne, 1760

Many a man's reputation would not know his character if they met on the street. ~Elbert Hubbard

Saying is one thing, doing another. We must consider the sermon and the preacher distinctly and apart. ~Montaigne, Essays, 1588

We are irritated by rascals, intolerant of fools, and prepared to love the rest. But where are they? ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

A man generally has two reasons for doing a thing. One that sounds good, and a real one. ~J. Pierpoint Morgan

History is the chronicle of divorces between creed and deed. ~Louis Fischer

Throughout our lives, we see in the mirror the same innocent trusting face we have seen there since childhood. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

If there existed no external means for dimming their consciences, one-half of the men would at once shoot themselves, because to live contrary to one's reason is a most intolerable state, and all men of our time are in such a state. ~Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You

People are very inclined to set moral standards for others. ~Elizabeth Drew, The New Yorker, 16 February 1987

A man who should act, for one day, on the supposition that all the people about him were influenced by the religion which they professed would find himself ruined by night. ~Thomas Macaulay

We have two kinds of morality side by side: one which we preach but do not practice and another which we practice but seldom preach. ~Bertrand Russell

Few love to hear the sins they love to act. ~William Shakespeare

He rightly reads scripture who turns words into deeds. ~Saint Bernard of Clairvaux

People will disapprove of you if you're unhappy, or if you're happy in The Wrong Way. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966

Be what you would seem to be - or, if you'd like it put more simply - never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise. ~Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Loud indignation against vice often stands for virtue in the eyes of bigots. ~J. Petit-Senn

The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be. ~Socrates

Consider how hard it is to change yourself and you'll understand what little chance you have in trying to change others. ~Jacob M. Braude

Hypocrisy is an homage that vice renders to virtue. ~François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld, Maximes, 1678

What you do speaks so loud that I cannot hear what you say. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

A great deal of what passes for current Christianity consists in denouncing other people's vices and faults. ~Henry H. Williams

I desire so to conduct the affairs of this administration that if at the end... I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside of me. ~Abraham Lincoln

The best way to succeed in life is to act on the advice we give to others. ~Author Unknown

How many observe Christ's birthday! How few his precepts!

O! 'tis easier to keep holidays than commandments.

~Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanack, 1757

Just remember, there's a right way and a wrong way to do everything and the wrong way is to keep trying to make everybody else do it the right way. ~M*A*S*H, Colonel Potter

http://www.quotegarden.com/hypocrisy.html

Edited December 7, 2008 by Joe Six-Pack

[kaydee457 13]

I give up....What's the impetus of this thread? Point please......

[Ban Hammer 13,656]

I give up....What's the impetus of this thread? Point please......

op was very bored......

[Teacher Mark 53]

I give up....What's the impetus of this thread? Point please......

You show me your points I'll show you mine.

[Ban Hammer 13,656]

I give up....What's the impetus of this thread? Point please......

You show me your points I'll show you mine.

you two get a room

[Niels Bohr 72]

So, does this mean that once you post something on Message Boards such as VJ and the mod deletes it mean it is illegal for them to infringe on your rights?

[NickD 203]

So, does this mean that once you post something on Message Boards such as VJ and the mod deletes it mean it is illegal for them to infringe on your rights?

Use to cost ten bucks to get a copyright, doesn't do anything, but shows it's registered with the patent office and really not any protection from them in a court of law. Weird tradenames like Phartphucher can be copyrighted, but it's a game of your attorneys against theirs in a court of law and with appeals can go on for years.

Love those warnings on DVD's where the FBI has nothing better to do than to fine you $250,000.00 and five years in prison for making a copy of a movie that isn't even worth watching. Occurred to me, that is the same fine for using marriage to bring a person into this company.

Anyway, if you want to come up with a weird named tradename, have to do a lot of research, some other idiot may have thought of it already, no limits on copyrights, and can really make attorneys that much fatter, they love that kind of thing.