Talk:Copyright/Archive 3

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Unrelated link

I am removing this link http://info4.juridicas.unam.mx/ijure/tcfed/133.htm?s= because it does not relate to the subject of copyright. This site is about the Mexican "Federal Law of Animal Sanity" ("Ley Federal de Sanidad Animal") Amoscare (talk) 08:09, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm all for removing unrelated links, but I just got to know: "Animal Sanity"? There's a Mexican law about crazy animals? (Maybe "Sanitation" is the better translation?)--TJRC (talk) 18:58, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

This page links to "LEY FEDERAL DE RADIO Y TELEVISION" . If you can't read Spanish don't guess what it means: Sanidad means health of animals. This web site is about all laws. It seems they renumber the pages from time to time so the original link has moved to a different page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.109.254.144 (talk) 08:17, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

I am removing the link * Against Perpetual Copyright from the external links as it is not directly related to the topic and is an opinion piece. Sbauman487 (talk) 00:36, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Earliest case-law of copyright dates from 6th century Ireland

The earliest-recorded historical case-law on copyright, and hence the concept of copyright, comes from ancient Ireland. The Cathach is the oldest extant Irish manuscript of the Psalter and the earliest example of Irish writing. It contains a Vulgate version of Psalms XXX (10) to CV (13) with an interpretative rubric or heading before each psalm. It is traditionally ascribed to St. Columba as the copy, made at night in haste by a miraculous light, of a Psalter lent to Columba by St. Finnian. A dispute arose about the ownership of the copy and King Diarmait Mac Cerbhaill gave the judgement "To every cow belongs her calf, therefore to every book belongs its copy"[1]. The arbitration failed and the Psalter of St. Columba passed into the hands of the O'Donnells after the battle of Cúl Dreimhne in A.D. 561. St. Columba went to Iona in A.D. 563. This principle became encoded in Ireland's ancient Brehon Laws.Seneschally (talk) 14:49, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Distinguish US Copyright Law

Perhaps this article could be improved or clarified by separating or distinguishing US copyright law from that of other nations, the WTO TRIPs regime, or the WIPO. The purpose of copyright is subtly different in the US than in parts of Europe. US law, enshrined in the Constitution, is very interested in striking a balance between protecting innovation and delivering "the useful arts" to the people. In Europe, copyright purpose is more geared toward protecting an artist's "moral rights" in his or her work from dilution or use by others. This is a fundamental conceptual difference that's hard to discuss under the monolithic heading of "copyright" that doesn't distinguish between the different purposes of copyright.

However, the US and the world moved closer to more uniform copyright laws after the Uruguay Round of GATT. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) signed into law in the US has made it possible to possess a copyright in a work created without registering it at all (although there are still advantages to registration). The DMCA was also the domestic (US) enabling legislation Congress enacted as part of the US obligation under the Uruguay Round talks of GATT / TRIPs. TRIPs are administered by the WTO. Bkinloch (talk) 19:47, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Copying Section Incorrect

Section http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright#What_is_a_.22copy.22.3F on What is a "copy"? incorrectly states that a "A three-dimensional counterpart of a two-dimensional drawing is usually not a “copy” of the drawing, under United States copyright law" This is contrary Rogers v Koons and other cases. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogers_v._Koons http://www.owe.com/legalities/legalities30.htm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.0.176.62 (talk) 17:32, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

This anomaly is clarified in http://www.bitlaw.com/copyright/unprotected.html "Take [...] a painting of a futuristic looking automobile. Copyright protection would prevent the outright copying of the painting. In addition, copyright law would prevent the creation of a three-dimensional model of the automobile found in the painting. However, under the specific terms of the Copyright Act, copyright law would not prevent General Motors from making a working (hence utilitarian) automobile of the design found in the painting." This is why an artist can't make a copy but a real bridge could be made. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.136.231.67 (talk) 12:11, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Write an article FOR this magazine. What does that really mean?

I responded to a newspaper ad that advertised a position as journalist. The editor asked me to write a 300 word article for the publication she sought a journalist for. I sent the article through via email on the deadline. Although I came in subsequently for another test, they told me that they found a journalist for the position.

Months later the publisher called me to offer me a job, not as a journalist, but advertising sales person. I took the job, and discovered my article in one of their magazines. They had printed it for publication without my consent, without giving me credit, and without paying for the article.

Their argument was that they asked me to write an article FOR this publication. The editor said, she did not know it was my article when it went to print, and she was unwilling to pay me for it. Have they acted illegally / unlawfully according to South Africn copyright laws? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Inktaps (talk • contribs) 12:20, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not the best place to go for legal advice. You should really ask a South African copyright attorney. · jersyko talk 13:48, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Creatrix?

"Creatrix" is not really a word, is it? Perhaps in theology, but hopefully not in the context of copyright law? I believe that "creator" applies equally to males and females. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.177.153.132 (talk) 20:29, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

"Life of the Author"

Could someone clarify what the life of the author plus 50 or 70 years means? Does it mean the date of death and 50 or 70 years or something else? Thanks.--Gramy! 17:44, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry. I didn't read the rest of the section. I get it now. If someone else was confused by this, then you should probably change it.--Gramy! 17:48, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

This is best resolved by example to avoid confusion - e.g. John wrote a book when he was 30 and it was published immediately after he wrote it. He died when he was 80. Copyright would end either 50 or 70 years AFTER he died (depending on the specific copyright term for books). I believe for books the duration is 70 years (i haven't checked this, but am pretty sure). Hence copyright on the book would end 70 years after his death and 120 years after John initially wrote it. Hope this clarifies any issues. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ToyotaPanasonic (talk • contribs) 07:01, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Is it worth someone clarifying this? Ie how long after death for prose; how long after death for poetry; how long for theatre works etc. If anyone can let me know this on the talk page, I'm happy to integrate it into the article--TimothyJacobson (talk) 18:23, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

It depends on the country, i.e. juristiction. You can find more info in copyright term and List of countries' copyright length which are linked from this article in the "copyright term" section.--LakeT (talk) 19:24, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Recieving Copyright

Can you please describe how to get the copyrights? Is it something any particular organization provides it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.34.231.233 (talk) 10:22, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

How to indicates that that is guide, and this is different per country :Sterremix (talk) 14:04, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

No organization or authorization needed - international copyright protection is automatic, it exists as soon as a work is created, and this principle applies in all the countries party to the Berne Convention. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cmd4632 (talk • contribs) 15:04, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Question

If I had created a compilation CD, would I be able to put it on Last.fm? I don't mean like uploading the tracks, just the tracklist. Would that be copyright or not? Tcatron565 (talk) 01:03, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a forum. Seek help elsewhere. Cavenba (talk • contribs) 16:31, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Transfer and Licensing

I feel like there should be a separate page for discussion of Transfer and Licensing, discussing types of contracts, exclusive vs. non-exclusive licenses, and so forth. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.3.228.75 (talk) 18:22, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

POV in "Justification" section

The "Justification" section is an interesting essay, but it's largely opinion. I share much of the opinion expressed here, but it's not appropriate for an encyclopedia article. I've stricken one paragraph that was pure editorial. The rest could still use some edit. 20:19, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Why is this edit unsigned? Looks like vandalism without a signature. I'm removing the tag until someone places one who is willing to sign it and improve it. Dr. Perfessor (talk) 02:02, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

the section is now referenced. It could do with some extension but the basics is covered.--SasiSasi (talk) 19:26, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Constitutionality of term extensions

Absent from this discussion, at least as far as US Copyright Law, is the defacto notion that copyright extension is itself unconstitutional, being in direct violation of the specific Constitutional statements regarding the inability of Congress to produce "no ex post facto bill of attainder", that is, to change the rules in play. Alterations to copyright laws can alter the copyright length of newly produced material after the law has been altered, but changing the length of copyright is tantamount to extending the length of your sentence for a crime after you've already been convicted and sentenced for that crime. That no one has yet challenged this is probably due to the need for a large war chest to fight Disney's deep pockets on the matter. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.250.219.28 (talk) 10:14, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

The reason no one's challenged this is more likely that it's a fringe theory that has no chance of succeeding. There have been some substantial challenges to the copyright term extension, on theories with more substantial foundation; See, for example, Eldred v. Ashcroft. The idea that challenges are not being brought doesn't match reality.

Setting aside that a bill of attainder and an ex post facto law are two different things, not an "ex post facto bill of attainder," this article wouldn't be the right place for a discussion of that theory. This article is a discussion of copyright in general, and the idea you propose is limited to one specific facet (term) of on jurisdiction's (US) copyright law. If it would go anywhere, an appropriate place might be a line or two in an article like Copyright Term Extension Act; but only if there are reliable sources that discuss it. TJRC (talk) 14:57, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism

I've noticed that even now, unregistered users still mess up this topic. I would like to propose a semi-lock on this topic to protect it from future spamming. Adam Hillman (talk) 13:17, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Not sure if it's down to vandalism but there is a weird bias in this article towards publishers. It's very odd and creepy and tries to make it seem like copyrights should always go automatically to publishers, when the whole point of copyright was originaly to protect authors from publishers to maintain the flow of ideas to create more good works (as the article itself even quotes!). In fact copyright has always gone to the author first and not the publisher. I've tried to correct this. It's not at all nice that someone has done this however. --Kystal (talk) 01:20, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Actually, copyright does not always automatically go to the author. Probably it should, but if you want to be published, many journal publishers--and encyclopedia publishers--routinely require the author turn over copyright to them as a condition of publication. In a "publishe or perish" academic environment this is certainly exploitation, but its real. Mervyn Emrys (talk) 04:12, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply Mervyn. Actually thats true of course and I think in many countries if they work for the publisher they don't even have to turn over the copyright as it is considered "work for hire". :( Technically copyright still goes to the author tho, it's just the legal author is now the company in question. This applies to people employed by the publisher of course. If you are an independent author then copyright still goes directly to you! If you choose to then sell it to a publisher thats your choice. Publishers will of course need you to give them some copyright in some form otherwise they aren't allowed to print anything!--Kystal (talk) 14:11, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

wordwide view: copyright/author's rights

There are fundamental differences between the common law concept of copyright and the civil law author's rights. This article quite obviously isn't aware of this and anglocentrically treats copyright in the common law sense as if it were universal. But since the article author's rights exists, it shouldn't be too difficult to fix this. It should be noted in this article that in a large part of the world—the larger one, in fact—"copyright" takes on the different form of author's rights, which is a fundamentally different concept, although the effects are largely, but not completely, the same. "Author's rights" should be linked and at least be shortly defined. They comprise moral rights and property rights. The moral rights are personality rights. Therefore, while the property rights are transferable, the moral rights are so only in case of death—to the heirs. This also explains why author's rights come to existence together with the work, without any need to claim them.

It might also be helpful to know that the Berne Convention is founded on author's rights. On the other hand, the expression "intellectual property" is closely linked to copyright and remains somewhat alien to civil law, although it is now used there widely, too. German legalese for example prefers to speak of "Immaterialgüterrecht". Now don't make me translate that. --88.67.45.138 (talk) 08:19, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Tags

For a former featured article, this one has too many tags for neutrality, verification and references. Is somebody using these tags inappropriately? The tag for neutrality says there is a dispute, but there is no dispute noted on this talk page for that section. The article appears to have adequate, authoritative references which can easily be verified with hot links. Isn't it time the tags were removed, or for whoever put them there to make a real contribution to the article instead of merely being critical? Dr. Perfessor 03:12, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Substantial parts of the article does not cite any references at all, which is not in line with Wikipedia quality standards. Tag or not, the problem remains. Maybe instead of removing tags, the problems should be addressed. The tags are not about being critical but providing readers with guidelines as to the reliability of the information in the article, and editors with a reference on which articles need improvement (tagged articles are far likelier to become the focus of cleanup efforts than untagged articles). If you for example look at the Good Article (GA) criteria it gives you a good picture of which quality standards the article should meet, and in the moment it falls far short.--SasiSasi (talk) 13:06, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Fine, so add some references, please. Enough already with the lectures. How about some edits? Contributions? Dr. Perfessor (talk) 23:01, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

coming from you! where are your contributions apart from removing tags and waffling on talk pages. :-)--SasiSasi (talk) 23:48, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

All over Wikipedia, since September. Please see WP:BITE. Have a nice day. Mervyn Emrys (talk) 04:06, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

US centric Article

As the case with so many other Articles this piece talks of copyright law as if it exist only in United States. Whereas one can understand the economic significance of copyright law in the US since RIAA MPAA and many huge corporations rely soley on these laws for their major source of revenues, it does not warrant filling up of copyright law article substantially with US copyright legal regime. The Article goes into details US copyright law in nitty gritty when there exists another separate article on US copyright law. It only makes a passing refernce to other common law countries and to very less extent to civil law copyright system. I hope this inherent bias running across various Articles, and discussion pages (talking only of US situations) could be neutralized by doing research on other countries around the world. I do not object to giving more bytes to US if it is justified in the context of the Article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.138.120.65 (talk) 09:10, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

This is a historic problem, and a common one as well. Many contributors to the English Wikipedia are from the US and my impression is that to start with many articles were written from a US perspective for US readers. Many articles are now being "globalised" as per wikipolicy (it takes its time), see tag below.

--SasiSasi (talk) 19:35, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Globalising the article

I have started to move some of the very US specific stuff into the United States copyright law... I will do some work on this over the next days (time, oh time), any help is welcome.--SasiSasi (talk) 20:36, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

The term "Intellectual Property"

Use of the term "Intellectual Property" is right wing POV-pushing that should be avoided. The neutral way is to refer to copyrights, patents, and trademarks separately. Jwray (talk) 19:08, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Jwray, I am afraid that the train left the station long ago on this one. I remember during the 1970s opposing the use of "intellectual property" to talk about patents, and meeting consistent defeat. The American Patent Law Ass'n changed its name to the American Intellectual Property Ass'n; the Patent Section (of which I was Chief) of the US Dep't of Justice's Antiotrust Division became the Intellectual Property Section; and innumerable law committees changed their names. The term is pretentious and affected, but I think it goes to far to call it a right-wing POV-pusher. The worst it does is to imply that patents and copyrights are somehow sacred and inviolable (as in the 4-3 USSC decision on relief in the Hartford Empire case), buit more recent decisions seem no longer to take such notions seriously (see the CAFC decision in thre Zoltek case). I think we should save our energy for more substantive issues than this. PraeceptorIP (talk) 18:28, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I understand that some members of the open source community, most notably Stallman, object to the term; and that's fine. However, it's definitely established as the umbrella term for these and other types of rights. See, for example the web page What is Intellectual Property? ([2]) hosted by the United Nations agency, the World Intellectual Property Organization. To avoid using the term in deference to a minority opinion like Stallman's, in the face of near-universal acceptance of the term would be violating WP:NPOV. TJRC (talk) 18:56, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

in law “IP law” is used as an umbrella term that includes copyright, patent and trademark law. However, copyright and patents predate the establishment of the IP grouping. I dont think we have to avoid using the term but I would be in favour of looking at the intro again - i.e.:

"Copyright is a form of intellectual property which gives the creator of an original work exclusive rights 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. Some jurisdictions also recognize "moral rights" of the creator of a work, such as the right to be credited for the work."

This could be reworded to make clear that copyright law is now regarded as a form of IP law. For example:

"Copyright gives the creator of an original work exclusive rights 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. Some jurisdictions also recognize "moral rights" of the creator of a work, such as the right to be credited for the work." In law copyright is grouped under intellectual property along with patents and trademarks."

If necessary I can find a citation for the last sentence - as the statement is not covered in the article body. Maybe we could also add a section in the article on how copyright law became grouped as IP law.

This seems unobjectionable. You might revise the last sentence, however, as follows: In law copyright is grouped under the umbrella term intellectual property along with patents and trademarks. PraeceptorIP (talk) 23:28, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

sounds good to me, I made the change as there was no objection.--SasiSasi (talk) 08:16, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Poor man’s copyright

In the US this non-statutory practice became known as "poor man's copyright" and was considered a common law concept until 1978.

What happened in 1978? —Frungi (talk) 13:21, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

The 1976 Copyright Act went into effect. The line in the article is pretty much a non-sequitur, though. The mail-it-to-yourself technique was to provide evidence of authorship. It was relevant both to pre-1978 state-law copyright (sometimes called by the misnomer "common law copyright"; in some states it was indeed common-law, but in most it was statutory) as well as proving up a federal copyright. It was not a great technique even before 1978, though. I recall at last one case where a plaintiff relying on it lost because of the unreliability of evidence attempted to be made this way. TJRC (talk) 16:55, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Use of "creator" in introduction

The first paragraph states: Copyright gives the creator of an original work exclusive right for a certain time period in relation to that work...

I think it should be mentioned in the introduction that often the copyright does not, in fact, belong to the creator of the work but to the creator's employer. In fact, the introduction contradicts itself by saying that copyright generally lasts for 50-100 years after the death of the creator. How can it belong to the creator, then? Esn (talk) 04:06, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Firstly, copyright by default belong to a creator. If they're employed (we're not born employed!), then local laws probably change this, might rarely change this, or might change it to favour an employer by default (this is commonplace). In UK law it depends on the conditions in which the work is carried out and there's all sorts of subtlety in contract law as to what defines a "work for hire", particularly when the creator is to some extent an independent creator rather than a salaried employee. For one thing, as a "contractor for hire" I might be happy for my client to own the copyright eventually, but certainly not if they failed to pay for it! The contract here needs to make it clear that copyright only transfers if the creator is paid as agreed - otherwise the legal position gets hazy and it depends on whether this "work for hire" status would be ruled applicable.

Secondly it belongs to the creator's estate (a legal term, which continues after death). If our wording is "Copyright gives the creator ... " (rather than "belongs to") then this is correct. It's given to the creator when they create it (they clearly aren't dead at this point, as they're still creating) and it's inherited afterwards. Local laws might affect this in detail, but it's broadly how it works. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:33, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Ok, thanks for the information. I still believe that this reality of the copyright very often not belonging to the creator but to his employer is important enough to be mentioned in the introduction. How about this: "Copyright gives the creator of an original work (or his employer) exclusive right for a certain time period..." It is also worth pointing out that though theoretically it belongs to his estate after death, in reality the majority of the most culturally-significant copyrighted works belong not to estates but to corporations/companies, often in very complex ways. For example, here are the owners the songs from just one album by Annette Hanshaw. Esn (talk) 07:41, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Legally, copyright does not give any rights to an employer. Copyright gives rights to creators; but it's employment or contract law that may then transfer them to an employer immediately. The difference is subtle but important - for one thing this ensures that any "right to copyright" remains clearly related to the act of creation, not to mere financial involvement. For instance a studio's landlord has no claim to copyright (and clearly doesn't), but a copyright law that was rewritten in terms of "copyright is granted to who paid for it" would open up an opportunity for landlords and banks to challenge the ownership, on the grounds of their purely financial involvement or support.

Secondly there's also the notion of "moral rights" (more prevalent in the USA than the UK). Unlike copyright these are strongly attached to the creator and remain with them, unless specifically transferred afterwards.

Overall, we should certainly clarify the "work for hire" aspects, but I don't think this needs to go into the lead, and it's confusing to try and put a simplified statement of it into the lead. Leads are introductions, not one-para precis of everything in the whole article. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:06, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

A bit of a quibble, but at least in the U.S., it's not true that "Legally, copyright does not give any rights to an employer." In the U.S., when an employee creates a work within the scope of his employment, the employer is the author of the work, and ownership of the copyright vests directly in the employer. The employee never has any rights in the work, and never transfers them to the employer; the rights belong to the employer ab initio. This may be different in other jurisdictions, of course.

My suggestion for this article would be to use the more precise term "author" to refer to the entity deemed by law to be the author of the work, and in whom/which rights initially vest; and use "creator," "creating individual," or some such, where there's a need to distinguish the actual human being who created the work from whoever the legal author may be. "Author" is the word used in the U.S. and U.K copyright acts, as well as in the Berne Convention and WIPO Copyright Treaty. There's really no good reason to vary from the generally internationally accepted terminology. TJRC (talk) 14:48, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

How about we use "owner"? This is the term used in the introduction to the intellectual property article, the "parent article" of this one. Esn (talk) 02:13, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

POV in "copyrightability"

The section on the word "copyrightability" was not written with NPOV. Courts often consider whether a particular subject matter is "copyrightable" and thus many courts and lawyers consider this to be a useful concept. I have tried to maintain some of the author's point that, in literary works, some form of arrangement, coordination, or selection protection still exists, but this idea of always having a thin layer of protection does not extend to other "uncopyrightable" things such as fonts, recipes, fashion design, etc. Michaelfeldman (talk) 07:28, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

The large "fair use" paragraph at the top of the article - not necessary

I don't think the following paragraph is necessary in the overview of Copyright, so I've removed it:-

"The development of the Internet, digital media, and computer network technologies, such as peer-to-peer file sharing, have prompted reinterpretation of these exceptions, introduced new difficulties in enforcing copyright, and inspired additional challenges to copyright law's philosophic basis. Simultaneously, businesses with great economic dependence upon copyright have advocated the extension and expansion of their copyrights, and sought additional legal and technological enforcement."

EssentialParadox (talk) 22:37, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Consensus is generally attempted before such an action, but thanks for keeping us informed anyway.

I prefer it with the inclusion of "digital fair use" in the intro. It's a topic of current major interest, and especially so around on-line systems such as Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons. As such, I think this topic deserves a para of intro coverage. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:04, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Well, he did propose it and then waited an entire week, making the change only when no one objected in a pretty reasonable time. I see no consensus issues here.

My own preference is to keep it out. I think shorter ledes are better, as a rule, and shoveling a lot into the lede from the body tends toward WP:UNDUE problems. But that's just a personal preference; I'm mostly apathetic about it. TJRC (talk) 20:27, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

My mistake - I'd missed it first time, caught the later edit to it on my watchlist tonight. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:03, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Free encyclopedic public domain source (CRS report)

I'm adding Congress's CRS reports to their relevant talk pages, since they're so thorough and you can just copy-and-cite the content ... here's yours:

• http://wikileaks.org/wiki/CRS:_Copyright_Cases_in_the_Courts:_Napster%2C_MP3_Digital_Music%2C_and_DVD_Motion_Picture_Encryption_Technology%2C_February_16%2C_2001
• http://wikileaks.org/wiki/CRS:_Copyright_Issues_in_Online_Music_Delivery%2C_June_4%2C_2002
• http://wikileaks.org/wiki/CRS:_Digital_Rights_and_Fair_Use_in_Copyright_Law%2C_March_24%2C_2003
• http://wikileaks.org/wiki/CRS:_Copyright_Law%27s_Small_Business_Exception:_Public_Performance_Exemptions_for_Certain_Establishments%2C_December_10%2C_2003
• http://wikileaks.org/wiki/CRS:_%22Fair_Use%22_on_the_Internet:_Copyright%27s_Reproduction_and_Public_Display_Rights%2C_January_16%2C_2004

PS : if you can think of a better talk page for this, please copy it there

• PPS there are a lot of other reports with the word "copyright" in the title here: http://wikileaks.org/wiki/CRS_reports_by_date
• PPPS : see my contribs page for a list of pages I've added CRS reports to Agradman ^talk/_contribs 08:18, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

International copyright law

I would love to see a table comparing the copyright laws in different countries. Possible columns would whether a three strikes law is in force. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.209.108.248 (talk) 12:16, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

copyright

whom shall i consider the copyright-holder (the publisher or the writer ) if there is no mention at all of "copyright" in a printed & published book ( in India , in Oct 2009 ) ? Cdpnkr (talk) 09:58, 2 December 2009 (UTC) Dipankar Chowdhury , Kolkata , India 12.02.2009 cdpnkr@yahoo.co.in

Formalities

I've removed the following from the lead:

Some jurisdictions have required formalities to establish copyright, but most recognize copyright in any completed work, without formal registration.

I am not aware of any jurisdiction that still requires formalities to establish copyright. It can go back if someone can point to a jurisdiction that does not recognize automatic copyright upon creation. Hartboy (talk) 21:36, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not going to lose sleep over this, but the U.S. required formalities of various types (copyright notice, registration, renewal, "all rights reserved"; and I don't know if you want to count the old requirement to print the work in the U.S. or Canada as a "formality") for many years, and still does for enforcement of domestic works. There are a lot of people who still think a copyright notice is a requirement, enough so that it's probably worth an inclusion. I think it's worth keeping something. TJRC (talk) 22:21, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

All true, but that's not what the statement says. The US now does not require formalities to enable copyright. Certainly the article can mention that the US requires registration for domestic authors to enforce their copyright in court, though I don't think that belongs in the lead of an article on the general subject of copyright. I also don't think the fact that a lot of people believe something erroneous is a good reason to keep erroneous information in an encyclopedia article :)

My suggestion is that the article can discuss the role of formalities in copyright, but I don't think it's significant enough for inclusion in the lead of the article. Hartboy (talk) 01:12, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Ah, I missed you were referring to the lead. I agree with you 100%. TJRC (talk) 01:45, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Copyvio

Removed this section from the article:

In 1557 the British Crown thought to stem the flow of seditious and heretical books, chartered he Stationers' Company and limited the right to print to the members of that guilt. Thirty years later the Star Chamber was chartered to curtail the "greate enormities and abuses" of "dyvers contentyous and disorderlye persons professinge the arte or mystere of pryntinge or selling of books". The right to print was restricted to two universities and to he 21 existing shops in the city of London with their 53 printing presses. French repression on printing, particularly the burning at the stake of he printer Etienne Dolet in 1546, and British control on type founding in 1637 caused printers to flee to the Netherlands. Confrontation with authority made printers radical and rebellious, with 800 authors, printers and book dealers being incarcerated in he Bastille before it was stormed in 1789. ref:de Sola Pool, Ithiel (1983). Technologies of freedom. Harvard University Press. p. 15. ISBN 9780674872332.

A check of the source cited reveals that the text is copied almost verbatim with very little paraphrasing done. Hartboy (talk) 00:38, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

should be better now - the quote is a quote. I tried to merge the two sources more and cut the repetition in the section.--SasiSasi (talk) 11:54, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

How ironic. Tisane ^talk/_stalk 00:21, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Public domain

Here is the entire section called "Public domain" after my revision of the first sentence for clarity.

Works are in the public domain if their kind is outside the scope of intellectual property rights or if the intellectual property rights have expired,[63], or have been forfeited, or have never been claimed.[64] Examples include the English language, the formulae of Newtonian physics, as well as the works of Shakespeare and the patents over powered flight.[65]

The four examples should fit the four listed classes of public domain works and in the same sequence: outside the scope of i.p.r. and i.p.r. expired, forfeited, unclaimed. The first example fits: the English language is outside the scope of i.p.r. The other examples don't fit. --P64 (talk) 18:52, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Hansel and Gretel

a fairy tale of Germanic origin, recorded by the Brothers Grimm

The image of Arthur Rackham's illustration is a great one but the article should include a clear statement of what it exemplifies. What is the implication of folkloric status of Hansel & Gretel for any copyright by the Brothers Grimm or by Arthur Rackham. Evidently the expiration of any rights is not the point, but it may be valuable to make that point too, perhaps in the public domain suggestion. --P64 (talk) 19:11, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

link on Piracy

I think that the link for piracy should lead to the article on copyright infringement rather that maritime piracy —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.198.13.18 (talk) 03:06, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

Scope of copyright

Which works should be covered, what exclusive rights should be granted, and under which situations those exclusive rights should not apply: this is a major question, with multiple views, and it's somewhat obscured by the article's layout.

I'd taken the subject heading "limits and exceptions" in an overly common sense way, meaning boundaries. LakeT explained in a recent edit summary that "limitations and exceptions of copyright" has a specific meaning: permitted uses of copyrighted works.

Grouping these topics provides better context for a general audience. A neutral reader can more easily understand the viewpoints. I'd like to find a way to do it that's technically accurate, too.

Am I correct that scope of copyright is the term that means which works should be covered, what exclusive rights should be granted, and under which situations those exclusive rights should not apply? --Pnm (talk) 23:53, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Hi there,

I am not sure about scope, but there is a difference between works that are not covered by copyright law at all, and certain uses that are permitted because copyright law establishes an exception to the exclusive rights of a copyright owner.

To be honest I don’t think we should use the word scope at all, as it is confusing, and because in copyright law it has no legal meaning.

Types of work covered by copyright and exclusive rights granted:

Explains which works are covered by copyright law (ie. some works are not covered by copyright law at all). Copyright owners only have exclusive rights over works that can be copyrighted as established by copyright law, and only for a certain time as specified in law (copyright term). Works which are not covered by copyright, such as for example many lists, or works for which copyright has expired, are in the public domain and nobody (creator etc) can claim copyright in them under copyright law.

Exceptions to copyright:

There are some cases were copyright law establishes exceptions to the exclusive rights of copyright owners over a work. That is the work is under copyright, but there are exceptions which permit certain uses as per copyright law. The copyright owner retains full copyright over the work, and the work remains protected under copyright law. Any use of the work which is not permitted via an exception in copyright law requires permission or a license from the copyright owner, as per usual.

There are some people who describe exceptions as part of the public domain (see public domain article), but this definition is not accepted in copyright law. No lawyer or copyright law describes exceptions as public domain, because the work is not in the public domain, it is protected by copyright law but some uses are permitted under an exception.

In terms of structure, I believe the exclusive rights it grants over what type of works should be at the beginning of the article, or at least before the article launches into a longish history section, because readers might benefit from a basic definition and understanding of copyright before reading other related information. Though the section that was there could do we some work and we could establish a short and concise intro section explaining the scope of copyright.

The "Types of work subject to copyright" section could also do with a brief list of works that are not covered, as illustrative example.

The exceptions section needs updating and expansion as it does not cover exceptions very well, such as exceptions for backup of software, exceptions for libraries and educational institutions, for news reporting, quotation review and criticism. Many jurisdictions, as well as the Berne Convention and InfoSoc Directive, have a long list of specific exceptions in copyright law, rather than a general fair use exception that covers many uses under specific circumstances as in the US. For a global article the exceptions section is probably too US focused.

Really looking at it the entire structure no longer works, we talk about copyright term and copyright infringement before we define what copyright actually is.

Can I maybe propose the following structure on the basis of what we have, its kind of a major restructure of the article, but I think the structure would be more appropriate for an article that is suppose to cover copyright form a global perspective:

Exclusive rights granted by copyright

Types of work subject to copyright / Public domain (merge)

Idea–expression divide

Related rights and neighboring rights

First-sale doctrine and exhaustion of rights

Copyright by country

Obtaining copyright

Copyright term

Copyright enforcement

Copyright infringement

Licensing, transfer and assignment

Compulsory licensing

Future rights under pre-existing agreements

Limitations and exceptions

Fair use and fair dealing

Orphan works

History

Early European printers' monopoly

Early British copyright law

Common law copyright

Early French copyright law

Early US copyright law

International copyright law

Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works

European copyright law

Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)

Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement

Justification

Copyright as property right

Copyright and traditional knowledge

Copyright and competition law

Something like that, and I would cut the history sections down to a summary, move the detail into the country specific copyright articles?--SasiSasi (talk) 18:34, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

A couple quick thoughts.

1. I agree with SasiSasi that the exclusive rights granted should be explained at the beginning of the article. However, I think a short explanation may be sufficient, so I suggest explaining them more clearly in the lead.
2. The history section seems a little long to me, too, but it is a very enjoyable read. I think a good goal would be to make history of copyright law as engaging as the history section in this article, and yes, shortening the summary here.
3. Since the article is for a general audience, section headings shouldn't be made legally meaningful at the expense of understandability. They shouldn't be legally incorrect, for sure. However, good headings are legally and generally meaningful.
4. As an incremental improvement, I rewrote the intro sentence to avoid giving the impression that "scope of copyright" has specific legal meaning.--Pnm (talk) 23:29, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for not responding for so long. Yes sounds good, we can update the intro with two/three sentences about what works are covered by copyright. Re history section, we can move it as it is into the history of copyright law article, and add a concise summary to this article. And after that we can look at the structure again if necessary.--SasiSasi (talk) 11:59, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Changes discussed in "scope" section - intro, history and structure

Have added a description of what copyright is, i.e. exclusive rights, uses and works covered, exceptions, licensing and assignment, international standardisation and differences depending on jurisdiction. May need some tweaking. I have only added what is referenced in the body article, so it should not require citation. But if it gets too controversial we can add them.

Also took out the text under "scope" as it was unref and most of the issues raised are covered in exclusive rights section. I think it was meant as a summary, but is not necessary. The philosophy of copyright is main linked in the justification section.

re structure, I will move the exclusive rights section before infringement, it kind of makes more sense to read about the exclusive rights before reading about enforcement.

I will also start cutting down the history section as discussed. It is getting too long for this article. I will cut and paste the large chunks of early history into the History of copyright law article, so nothing will be lost.--SasiSasi (talk) 20:51, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

I have copied the early history sections into the History of copyright law article, will start on cutting them down so that the history section of this article is more proportionate in size.--SasiSasi (talk) 21:36, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

time, oh, time... will cut down the history section in the next couple of days.--SasiSasi (talk) 21:02, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

404 Error!

The external link to a page on the WIPO site in the middle of this article leads to a 404 page not found error. It need updating!

Mod MMG (User Page) Reply on my talkpage. Do NOT click this link 01:35, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

If the old link was to the original of this, the closest equivalent now seems to be this. TJRC (talk) 22:44, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Copyright Assignment in Open source

Probably in the section Copyright#Licensing.2C_transfer.2C_and_assignment there should be a subsection about the issue of more or less compulsory copyright transfer disclaimers that is common for many developers of large open source projects, like the GNU ones, ubuntu/canonical, samba, openoffice, or mysql. It is something a bit controversial and eventually it should be shortly listed here. If nobody objects I will add it. ALoopingIcon (talk) 06:24, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Just a few references for the interested readers. I will use them as a basis for the subsection:

• [3] a long article on the subject of
• [4] the position of Samba_(software)
• [5] the position of openoffice.
• [6] the official GNU agreement
• [7] the GNOME position.
• [8] Not All Copyright Assignment is Created Equal
• [9] an interview of Mark Shuttleworth where he argues that all copyright assignment systems are equal (it should be added in order to report a neutral view on the issue)

ALoopingIcon (talk) 07:01, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it belongs here. It's not really about copyright, and not useful in a encyclopedic article about copyright. If there's enough to it, it might be worth a separate article and an inclusion in "See also." TJRC (talk) 02:57, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

criticism?

a pretty fundamental part.--84.208.113.245 (talk) 11:50, 13 November 2010 (UTC)--84.208.113.245 (talk) 11:50, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Collective management of copyright section

The new section has been added by Olegwiki without sources. Will replace it with referenced material, and do some other work on the licensing section. Also creating new articles on copyright licensing.--SasiSasi (talk) 13:38, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Created collective rights management section with link to main article.

re the following para I have removed, its unref, but also, it might be worthwhile having a dedicated private copying levy section with link to main article. It should probably be under exceptions, as it is commonly established in relation to private copying exceptions.--SasiSasi (talk) 15:54, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

If one buys a CD, and makes a copy on a MP3 player to listen to it when outdoors, should the author be compensated once more for this copy? According to age-old copyright principles the answer is affirmative: any copy represents a "multiplication" in the sense of copyright law. Private copying levy managed by copyright collectives was first introduced in the USA in response to lobbying from the recording industry with the advent of the cassette recorders. Legislators were persuaded at the time that cassette recorders would decimate sales of records as friend after friend would then make copies of only one purchased album. This of course never happened and levies today are assessed on compact discs a form of media that didn't exist when levys were first conceived with the bulk of unrecorded compact discs actually being used in the computing industry.

Why do people check out this article?

Methinks it's because they want to know copyright law, not necessarily to read about copyright history. I want to know if a book that I want to scan and make a kindle book from is out of copyright protection. I give up on finding the info here. I love wikepedia, though. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.227.5.140 (talk) 20:40, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

We have the answer over at United_States_copyright_law#Duration_of_copyright, and or List_of_countries'_copyright_length but perhaps it could be made simpler to find; IIRC, there's a user page with a nice 'cheat sheet' for figuring out when copyrights expire...--Elvey (talk) 23:07, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

well, good for you, I am looking at it a set starting point for the history of copyright law, which is nicely summarized here and expanded in its own article elsewhere as it should be in an encyclopedia. People tend to approach information for different reasons, imagine. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.181.199.242 (talk) 18:02, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Originality - Can I get some more opinions?

Traditional culture or folklore may also be "repackaged" in digital formats, or restoration and colorization. Contemporary and tradition based expressions and works of traditional culture are generally protected under existing copyright law, a form of intellectual property law, as they are sufficiently original to be regarded as "new" upon publication.

This is in the article; I think it's largely untrue. I believe that digitization, restoration and colorization are not sufficiently transformative as to generate a new work with a new copyright term. Colorization (and digitization, of course) is typically done by computer; none of these involve creativity or originality, which are essential. It's in a section, "Copyright and traditional knowledge" that seems to contain several dubious claims and tangential sentences, essentially at odds with the Article I, Section 8 Clause 8 of the Constitution's basis for copyright. I'm tempted to shorten the section substantially and/or use the FA version of this article as a guide. Thoughts?--Elvey (talk) 03:44, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

the section is properly referenced. I think you are mainly saying that you think the above statement is not true. If you can point to other sources which say different from the above statement we could add them, or discuss how to rewrite the section.

Re the constitution, I think you mean the US constitution. This article is about copyright globally, see for example the licensing section. Wikipedia has an article on United States copyright law.

I am not sure what you mean with FA version?--SasiSasi (talk) 13:42, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

By FA, I mean WP:FA. FYI, I had looked at what I could of the reference; the cited page I couldn't pull up, but what I had found didn't reassure me 'till today. IIRC, we had an a recently restored old photograph on a related page that was used as an example of a work that was not copyright-eligible; can't find it now. Thanks for the input! I don't think 'repackaged' stuff is generally protected - in the US or elsewhere. I'll leave it alone pending further input. I note that the section has been pulled verbatim from Traditional_knowledge#Public_domain; see my last 2 edits. (Do we have a policy on duplicate content like that?) I also note that the source says:

"Expressions of this 'pre-existing traditional culture' are generally not protected by current copyright laws", 

and the article says (NOT in quotes):

"expressions of this pre-existing traditional culture is generally not protected by current intellectual property laws" 

which is arguably plagiarism from Wend B. Wendland's chapter in the cited work. Also, the citations are wrong and identify mere editors as authors, while ignoring the actual authors, such as Wendland. --Elvey (talk) 22:57, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

It was FA in 2004....

I think you are saying that the section could do with some work and needs quotation marks

re "I don't think 'repackaged' stuff is generally protected - in the US or elsewhere" - that is completely irrelevant until you can find a reliable source. It might be that you have detailed knowledge of the copyright law in more than 150 countries, but you still need a source before you can add something to an article.--SasiSasi (talk) 12:57, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

OK, I did some more research and got some WP:RS hits, WRT US law:

According to the USG Copyright Office:

When a PD work is colorized, the copyright status of the underlying work is unaffected. The black and white film version will remain in the public domain. When an underlying work is in the public domain, another party is free to use that work to make a different color version. Per NPRM here (finalized here).

Per Hearn v. Meyer, 664 F. Supp 832 (S.D.N.Y. 1987), a work that is a restoration of an original public domain work is not subject to copyright protection.

The Supreme Court of the United States has explicitly rejected difficulty of labor or expense as a consideration in copyrightability in Feist v. Rural.

See Threshold of originality. Thus digitization of a PD work does not result in a copyrightable work under US law.

I'm going to start by addressing the W:Content_forking problem first.--Elvey (talk) 04:01, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

This is original research and its about US law. Why don’t you work on the US copyright law article. The legal definition of originality is significantly different from country to country - as the Threshold of originality you link to indicates. Also, just because under US law restoration of a public domain work does not qualify it as a new copyright protected work does not mean that all derivative works based on a public domain work are not copyright protected.

I think you are getting the wrong end of the stick in any case. The section you take issue with states that a) "Traditional culture or folklore may also be "repackaged" in digital formats, or restoration and colorization." and that b) "Contemporary and tradition based expressions and works of traditional culture are generally protected under existing copyright law, a form of intellectual property law, as they are sufficiently original to be regarded as "new" upon publication." Ie the first sentence says that traditional culture and folklore may be "repackages in digital formats or restoration and colorization. the second sentence says that contemporary derivative works are generally protected under existing copyright law, as they are sufficiently original to be regarded as new.

So nobody is saying that restorations or colorizations are copyright protected as new works.

you still have not found a source that confirms that contemporary derivative works based on public domain works are not copyright protected in the US or in other countries. I suggest that in your quest to research this topic you start looking into Disney and his derivative works of public domain works.--SasiSasi (talk) 23:51, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Elvey - you take issue with two sentences, which has not been resolved yet. This does not justify the removal of an entire section.--SasiSasi (talk) 23:57, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Re alleged content forking – Wikipedia: Content forking - "A content fork is the creation of multiple separate articles all treating the same subject. Content forks that are created unintentionally result in redundant or conflicting articles and are to be avoided. As an article grows, editors often create Summary style spin-offs or new, linked article for related material. This is acceptable, and often encouraged, as a way of making articles clearer and easier to manage." I don’t think that the "Copyright and traditional knowledge" falls under "multiple separate articles all treating the same subject" I think it is a summary style spin off, like many of the sections in the copyright article. Please also see: "Related articles - Articles on distinct but related topics may well contain a significant amount of information in common with one another. This does not make either of the two articles a content fork. As an example, clearly Joséphine de Beauharnais will contain a significant amount of information also in Napoleon I of France; this does not make it a fork."

As I said, "...the section has been pulled verbatim from Traditional_knowledge#Public_domain; see my last 2 edits." Those edits show that it's a verbatim copy (except for a couple typo corrections.) It's not a summary. You have restored plagarized content to the article, after I pointed it out to you. That behavior is entirely unacceptable. I will seek assistance. --Elvey (talk) 09:42, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Third opinion As I understand it the third opinion request is about the acceptability of the text "Expressions of this 'pre-existing traditional culture' are generally not protected by current copyright laws" ie from [10]

This is not acceptable as per the simple explanation given at Wikipedia:Copy-paste. It's a copyright violation (so ironic in this article). It should be a simple matter of policy not actually requiring a third opinion see Wikipedia:Copyright violations - in the future I can recommend the talk page of Wikipedia:WikiProject Copyright Cleanup for any help needed with copyright problems.

As such I will remove it myself. diff The information can be re-added if "written in your own words". see Wikipedia:WikiProject Copyright Cleanup/How to clean copyright infringements for more help.

I have also deleted the infringing material from the other page. As to a second point - if material has been used on this page from another page then it should have been mentioned in an edit summary (giving source) or on the talk page, or both.

Are there any further issues, such as further copyright problems?Sf5xeplus (talk) 13:55, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the input and improvement. I think the plagiarism and copyvio problems are addressed. (I need to double-check though!) There is still the W:Content_forking problem I'd like a third opinion on. I tried to fix the W:Content_forking problem with this edit, but got reverted. It's appropriate to replace one copy of duplicate content with a link to the other copy, IMO. This diff shows the content to be a W:Content_forking violation, but SasiSasi is nonetheless reverting and arguing it isn't because it's a summary (the diff clearly shows it isn't, IMO) or because it's a section, not a whole article that's been forked (irrelevent, IMO). Do you think my or SasiSasi's views on these 2 points result in a better product and/or respect the rules? --Elvey (talk) 00:27, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Mmmh a little bit of duplication is ok and inevitable, but that was quite a lot. However I don't really like to see un-abstracted links to another article - ie if you must delete one section it would be a lot better if a brief summary was left behind explaining "what I'm going to find after the link" - as per Principle of least confusion. eg even if it just says something as simple as "folkore and traditional knowledge are usually not copyrightable" .. or whatever is correct, and obvious the {{main| ... }} link above.

Also I'm not sure the link would be the other way round.. (I'd even suggest to consider to ignore the rules and leave the sections as is if they remain short - eg 1 or 2 paragraphs of duplication is probably better than the disruption of being redirected into the middle of an article.

Really I can't properly respond to this second part though. Would you like to put it back for a second third opinion.Sf5xeplus (talk) 00:47, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

I'll head back there if needed, but I think you've provided the help I needed. I think I just found the edit that first introduced the plagiarized content: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Copyright&diff=352522778&oldid=352413582 . I'm not surprised by the name of the editor!--Elvey (talk) 08:09, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

We've got a huge problem in this and other related articles on Wikipedia with an editor trying to push the viewpoint that traditional cultural knowledge somehow is not covered by laws that would make them public domain. This POV has a whole article to itself that is basically a WP:SOAPBOX and is badly sourced upon a single publication with that viewpoint and also then tries to advance that viewpoint by distorting what other sources have to say (by using WP:SYNTHESIS to come up with their own original conclusions). This content needs to be removed from this article, and Public domain, and the articles pushing that view solely need to be either completely rewritten or removed. DreamGuy (talk) 17:36, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Why did you remove this, DreamGuy?: *The Uneasy Case for Copyright: A Study of Copyright in Books, Photocopies, and Computer Programs by (SCOTUS Justice) Stephen Breyer. You have a valid point. While tribal knowledge certainly isn't protected by copyright, in current fact, there is an claim that is held by some indian tribal leaders and presented in at least one publication that it somehow should be still property of the tribes. Hence, I don't think it's a viewpoint that should be excised entirely from wikipedia. (Similarly, we have articles on monotheism, polytheism, and irreligion, including the FSM.) But, I think the current coverage I've seen is more than adequate. --Elvey (talk) 02:01, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

lead

I suggest this or something that incorporates this:

Copyright enforces both economic and moral rights in an original work. These exclusive rights are granted by the author's jurisdiction and held by the author and/or copyright owner. The copyright owner enjoys a limited term monopoly over the production and reproduction of an original work. Copyright also enforces exceptions and limitations which curtails the rights of a copyright owner. These limitations are akin to user rights as copyright strives to balance public and private interests by encouraging a robust public domain and its resultant creativity.

I don't think this is inconsistent legally. Let me know if you quibble. LazyMapleSunday (talk) 07:24, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

I am going to up this to the lead, please comment here if you want to discuss my edit. LazyMapleSunday (talk) 18:11, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

You will need a source for that. Copyright and Moral rights (copyright law) are different. Re exceptions - they are mentioned in the lead. Copyright law does not "enforce" them, it just provides for them. with regards to them being akin to user rights, you will need a source for that.

The summary is suppose to summarise what is in the article and is referenced. It is suppose to be neutral. You are introducing quite a lot of concepts, which are open to interpretation and not supported by the article.--SasiSasi (talk) 18:33, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

your revert is better than what existed before i edited at least. i feel as though moral rights should be mentioned at the outset as they are created and contemplated by copyright legislation. I know copyright is different than moral rights. Copyright subsumes moral rights. they exist concurrently. In Canada for instance s.14.2(1) of the Copyright Act provides that "Moral rights in respect of a work subsist for the same term as the copyright in the work." i had also changed the 'enforce' to 'protect' before you had reverted - copyright not only provides the right but also an enforcement mechanism.

i have a source for 'akin to user rights' in a leading Supreme Court of Canada copyright decision. "the exceptions to copyright infringement, perhaps more properly understood as users’ rights, are set out in ss. 29 and 30 of the Act." paragraph 12 - http://www.canlii.org/en/ca/scc/doc/2004/2004scc13/2004scc13.html. Regardless, the idea of 'user rights' is a logical conclusion based on copyright's striving for a balance between incentive for creation and public interest. copyright's limitation is called "fair use" after all.

I understand that the lead is meant to introduce the article - i tried to keep to the concepts already contained in the lead using it as a template (save for moral rights of course which i feel should be mentioned at the outset as copyright law protects two types of creator rights, economic and moral.) LazyMapleSunday (talk) 19:18, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

the lead as it now stands ends with this line "Some jurisdictions also recognize moral rights of creators, such as the right to be credited for the work." - i will settle for this - however IMO i think it is conceptually useful to describe the two prongs of copyright protection (economic and moral) at the outset. LazyMapleSunday (talk) 19:28, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Moral rights are discussed twice and linked to two more times in the article! Referencing the term in the lead without defining the term, given that the definition is entirely different from what a reader would guess it means is inappropriate. Defining it in the lead seems undue weight in an article that's on Copyright; the other 4 mentions are plenty. Moral rights are related to but NOT part of copyright.--Elvey (talk) 00:33, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

In most jurisdictions (and this is not a US-specific article) moral rights are most definitely part of copyright. Even in the US, certain moral rights are indeed part of copyright; in particular, see § 106A of the 1976 Copyright Act as amended ([11]), "Rights of certain authors to attribution and integrity". TJRC (talk) 01:08, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I obviously agree with TJRC, in Canada the Copyright Act creates moral rights. They do not exist outside of the Copyright scheme. I believe the U.S. regime is similar in this respect. Therefore I think it is conceptually a good idea to introduce the broad topic of Copyright by mentioning that copyright legislation protects both economic rights and moral rights associated with copyrightable work. Take for instance what the Supreme Court of Canada states regarding "the content of the respondent's rights under the copyright act" "The Act provides the respondent with both economic and "moral" rights to his work. The distinction between the two types of rights and their respective statutory remedies is crucial." (Theberge v. Galerie D'Art, para.11) This is the law as it stands in Canada. I think this is consistent with what I have said and also what TJRC has said. LazyMapleSunday (talk) 03:08, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, this quote is from the link TJRC provided: "Ownership of the [moral] rights conferred by subsection (a) with respect to a work of visual art is distinct from ownership of any copy of that work, or of a copyright." The main point of the entire last paragraph is to make clear that moral rights are fully separate from copyright rights! This is made very, very clear and explicit - certainly clearer than inferences based on the title of a bill. --Elvey (talk) 23:42, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Again, you are looking at this way too US-centrically. This is not an article about US copyright. It is an article about copyright. TJRC (talk) 19:12, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Elvey, I assume that you are quoting from the "Transfer and Waiver" subsection. Firstly, what you are using to back up your position only applies to visual arts. Secondly, IMO the purpose of the subsection is to ensure that a transfer of economic rights does not include transfer of moral rights. You say that because the act distinguishes moral rights and exclusive [economic] rights, this means moral rights are an island of their own, created and then orphaned by the Copyright Act??

No one is going to dispute that moral rights and exclusive rights are different. They serve different purposes. For instance, in both Canada (s.14.1(2)1) and the United States (§ 106A(e)(1)) moral rights cannot be transferred. Moral rights cannot be sold however they may be waived or inherited (14.2(2)-Canada). Moral rights are meant to guarantee and safeguard the integrity of a creator's work and their reputation. Moral rights aren't part of the money-making, incentive rationale of copyright [the purpose of the exclusive rights].

My whole point, which is [to borrow your phrase] 'very, very clear and explicit' is that moral rights are different than economic, exclusive rights. Since BOTH rights are provided by the copyright scheme AND they do not exist outside of the copyright scheme BOTH rights should be mentioned when introducing the general concepts of Copyright.

You can't just exclude moral rights from a broad copyright discussion because your conception of copyright is limited to the exclusive rights provided by §106 of the U.S. Act and/or s.3 of the Canadian Act. Your reading of Copyright is narrow. The rights provided by Copyright Law are broader than the listed exclusive rights (found in §106 and s.3).

Lastly, I think the article, in its lead, should incorporate the quote I cited above: "The Act provides the respondent with both economic and "moral" rights to his work." This passage is not as you say an "inference based on the title of a bill" this is current, leading, Canadian Copyright jurisprudence. You can't just brush it aside as an inference! I think to define copyright as a set of exclusive rights is an incomplete definition of copyright, moral rights ought to be mentioned. LazyMapleSunday (talk) 09:25, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think it's a good idea to discuss any particular country's copyright act in the lede; except the Statute of Anne, for historical reasons. TJRC (talk) 20:11, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree. A general introduction should capture all aspects. LazyMapleSunday (talk) 03:48, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Verification1

This is a very important topic.

Under the section 'Obtaining copyright', a reference is given directing browsers to a medical terminolgy book (available on Google Books). vbt: Copyright law is different from country to country, and a copyright notice is required in about 20 countries for a work to be protected under copyright.[32] Before 1989, all published works in the US had to contain a copyright notice, the © symbol followed by the publication date and copyright owner's name, to be protected by copyright. This is no longer the case and use of a copyright notice is now optional in the US, though they are still used.

ref:Fries, Richard C. (2006). Reliable design of medical devices. CRC Press. p. 196. ISBN 0824723759, 9780824723750.

I feel that this is too important of a claim to let slip into some page in some book about where one could possibly verfiy this.Rajpaj (talk) 14:05, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Could you clarify what your actual problem with this section is? Does the medical book not seem reliable enough for you? VernoWhitney (talk) 16:05, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

It's not the book itself, but where in the book does it state this? Rajpaj (talk) 02:18, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Judging from the citation, page 196. You can check it for yourself via Google Books. VernoWhitney (talk) 11:58, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Although the book does state that, its topic is not copyright but medical devices, so it cannot be considered authoritative on the subject of copyright. Authoritative reference material, preferably scientific work on copyright, needs to be found and the three(!) references to that book should be removed ASAP. --PointedEars (talk) 16:47, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Is that not a question of whether the source is reliable as per wiki policy - Reliable sources? PointedEars,I dont agree that the source is unreliable. Also, you are free to find alternative sources.--SasiSasi (talk) 12:24, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

"The reliability of a source depends on context. Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made and is the best such source for that context." A book on medical devices is a reliable source for a statement on medical devices. It is not a reliable source for a statement on copyright law. Especially in this case, where it is wrong; the source has apparently misunderstood the portion of the UCC that specifies an acceptable form of copyright notice if such notice is required, and interpreted it as a statement that copyright notice is required. TJRC (talk) 21:08, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Non of what you say is supported by the reliable source policy. You can provide another source. I think the original concern was over the 20 countries require copyright notice claim. It would be good to find other sources for this, for example listing the countries, and it would also be good to find how many countries still require registration. The WIPO website may have info on that, as it is meant to provide detailed info on copyright law in countries around the world (dunno if only for WIPO members).--SasiSasi (talk) 23:03, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

On the contrary, what I said was supported by the part of the reliable source policy I quoted. I don't know what you mean by "you can provide another source." It's a pretty unlikely claim, so it will be unsurprising that there is not a reliable source to support it. TJRC (talk) 23:30, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Copyright

This article constitutes a copyright concern on Wikipedia as it incorporates text taken verbatim or with minimal change from its sources, including print sources.

For example, in this edit in February 2010, content was copied into this article from Contemporary Intellectual Property: Law and Policy by MacQueen, Waelde and Laurie. While only snippets of this book are available, I can see the following text:

In most European countries, the origins of copyright law lie in the efforts of governments to regulate and control the output of printers once the technology of printing had been invented and become established in the 15th and 16th centuries. Whereas before printing a writing, once created, could only be physically multiplied by the highly laborious and error-prone process of manual copying out....

The content placed in the article reads:

The origins of copyright law in most European countries lies in efforts by governments to regulate and control the output of printers. The technology of printing was invented and widely established in the 15th and 16th centuries. Before the printing press a writing, once created, could only be physically multiplied by the highly laborious and error-prone process of manual copying out.

I know the copying continues, because the text I was searching for in the book that landed me at this snippet was "In England the printers, known as stationers, formed a collective organisation." In Google book search, I can see that the following appears in that book: "In England, the printers (then termed 'stationers') formed a collective organisation, known as the Stationers' Company, which in the 1 6th century was given the power to require the entry in its register of all lawfully printed books."

As placed in our article, it says, "In England the printers, known as stationers formed a collective organisation, known as the Stationers’' Company. In the 16th century the Stationers' Company was given the power to require all lawfully printed books to be entered into its register."

The contributor is currently blocked by another administrator for copying content into Statute of Annefrom another book, which I cannot see.

All content added by this contributor to this article may need to be removed, unless we are able to determine that the material is public domain, in which case it must be handled in accordance with Wikipedia:Plagiarism. I'm sure that there is quite a bit of content in here that is not suspect, but it will take some time to work out what content is safe, as the contributor in question has edited this article 225 times. If anybody wishes to help with this, the temporary space now linked to the article's front would be an ideal point. It seems that this version could be used as base for forward movement. Alternatively, we could simply look at each of his edits and remove content he added unless we have good reason to believe it is free of copyright concerns.

Sorry for the mess. :/ --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:00, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it is plagiarism (as are many articles on wikipedia), but is it a copyright problem? In any real legal sense? I doubt it. A few phrases are De minimis. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 21:20, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

It's a copyright problem in a real Wikipedia policy sense, which is what matters. Content on Wikipedia based on non-free sources must be written from scratch except in the case of brief, explicitly marked quotations. And we have no idea how many phrases there are, unless we have access to all of his sources. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 00:19, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

The greatest problem is when wikipedia entries are sourced from other encyclopedias; that practice is damaging their business. Wikipedia should not allow it, even if the content is rephrased. In comparison to that, copy-pasting phrases from scholarly books is much less of a problem. Except of course that style and content are less likely to be optimal for an encyclopedia. Few wikipedia editors have a command of the subject matter that allows them to write an article without looking at other texts. And when they do, the expert's contribution gets marred by all these {{citation needed}} templates. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 11:02, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

If you would like to suggest a relaxing of standards in copy-pasting phrases from scholarly books, please take it up at WT:C and/or WP:VPP. Currently, however, policy does not permit copy-pasting from any non-free source except in accordance with WP:NFC. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:06, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

On enwp there is a reasonably relaxed attitude towards fair use of copyrighted images. I see no reason for a different standard with respect to text fragments. But no thanks, I won't attempt to change policy pages. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 19:32, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, we're not quite as laid back as all that. :) There's a reason that there's 53 pages in archive [WT:NFC]. Not to mention all the ink spilled at the administrators noticeboards.

But there are important similarities in the approach towards non-free images and non-free text: they must be clearly marked as non-free, and there must be some indication that their use is justifiable. If anything, we're a bit more relaxed about non-free text when it is marked as a quotation, although even then policy forbids using them extensively and requires that they be used transformatively. We don't expect anybody to explain how their use is transformative, and as long as too much isn't taken from one source people don't seem to run around challenging that like they do with non-free images. But the general feeling about unmarked fragmented duplication of text (I say, based on a lot of observation over the last four years) is that it runs into problems under policy nutshell point 2: "It is used for a purpose that cannot be fulfilled by free material (text or images, existing or to be created)". It is hard to argue that we cannot fulfill the purpose here with free text that could be created given that most of us have the ability to create free text. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 11:14, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

I am a University of Toronto Master of Information student. I am supposed to be editing a Wikipedia article for school and I was hoping to work on copyright. I am new to Wikipedia and I am not sure how best to proceed in light of the investigation into copyright issues that is taking place. I am therefore wondering if anyone is interested in working on an alternative version of the "Copyright" article while waiting to find out what is going to happen to the original? I have posted to the new "temporary" talk page which can be found via the link on the "article" part of the copyright page (in the section about writing a new article without copyright-infringing material) if any fellow students or Wikipedians are interested.Marshallc8 (talk) 20:18, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Copyright/Temp is the place to work on that alternative article to replace the tainted one. SchuminWeb (Talk) 23:13, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

It would appear that this is the last untainted revision: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Copyright&direction=prev&oldid=221049083 SchuminWeb (Talk) 23:17, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for posting that link. May I ask how you can be sure that the version you linked to is not tainted? Would it be appropriate to begin working on that version of the article? Or is it best to wait and see what is decided about the latest version?Marshallc8 (talk) 01:38, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Can we revert this article to a known good version while the full investigation goes on? Is there a known good version? Protonk (talk) 07:34, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, absolutely. I generally don't do that without talk page agreement when it sets the article back so much. But I've reverted to [12], which is the last version prior to editing by User:SasiSasi. Of course, there may be a lot of good content added by others subsequent to that date. But if it's helpful to have a launching point, this one seems to be it. (Thanks, SchuminWeb! The link I had provided earlier actually missed some substantial contributions by SasiSasi earlier in his career.) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:16, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! I don't work much in copyright problems (actually came here because of this thread) so I didn't want to dive in and mess something up. Protonk (talk) 18:33, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Piracy

Hello fellow editors! I am new to the editing process and would appreciate any feedback that you could offer about my proposed changes/additions. I noted at the top of the talk page that a list of priorities have been established for added content to this article. I would like to attempt a new section on the issue of 'piracy.' The article Copyright infringement offers a brief overview, but I agree with the proposed additions to related piracy information in the central copyright article. I have researched information that outlines some of the debate surrounding the concept of piracy as well as its effects financially for companies holding large copyrights (US focus). I have uncovered basic information discussing copyright legislation in China and other parts of the world as well, as per the suggestions on this page. I plan to proceed with my additions very shortly so any suggestions for related content in this section would be valuable as I begin. CJMinf1001 (talk) 00:27, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I have added the section noted above with some basic information regarding what constitutes 'piracy' and some statistics on how these activities have influenced key industries. There is more relevant content that can be added here (specific stats on China and other areas of the world) but I feel this is a good starting point.

My one concern is that even though I have qualified the statistics by pointing out the inherent difficulties of calculating money that is 'lost' before it is gained, I can still see how the numbers may be misleading/bias based on the companies that have compiled the data. These are the only concrete stats that I could locate in relation to the actual effect that piracy has, however, so I feel they are worth adding. I would welcome feedback and suggestions. CJMinf1001 (talk) 03:38, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Creative Commons section

Hi. I have added a sub-section called "Creative Commons" to the article, as I suggested in another section of this talk page (see "Potential Additional Section").

I decided that it made sense to position it as a sub-section within the "Exclusive Rights Granted by Copyright" section. Since Creative Commons aims to help copyright holders define which of these exclusive rights they wish to retain while allowing them to waive others, I felt this was an appropriate place for it. However, I can see that there are other sections within which Creative Commons information might fit equally well. For instance, perhaps it would work better as a sub-section of "Licensing, Transfer, and assignment"?

If anyone else would like to weigh in on this issue, please do so. Also, since this is my first time editing a Wikipedia article, I would welcome feedback and/or suggestions related to any and all aspects of this edit. Thank you!Marshallc8 (talk) 19:58, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Potential additional section

Hi. I am considering beginning a section about the "Technology, Education and Copyright Harmonization" Act (TEACH) within this article. This act, in effect in the United States, provides educators with the right to use other's works within classroom and education settings. I am wondering if others agree that this information should be included. Also, if it is to be included, should I create a new section for it--perhaps beneath the "Fair use and fair dealing" section?

I also believe that it might be appropriate to briefly include information about how the creative commons helps individuals--free of charge--define and make public the terms of use of material to which they hold the copyright. Do others feel that this should be included? If so, would it be appropriate to place this information under the general section "Obtaining and enforcing copyright"? Or should I create a new sub-section within this section? Or would it be more appropriate somewhere else?

I am new to Wikipedia and I would appreciate any feedback that anyone can provide before I make any changes. Thank you!:)Marshallc8 (talk) 05:01, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I, a fellow University of Toronto student here! I think your suggestions would be a good addition, especially about TEACH. For the latter, a new section makes sense to me, perhaps one titled `Limitations on Copyright` right under the `Fair use and fair dealing section. Jamila iSchool (talk) 17:51, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi Jamila. Thanks for the suggestion! I have already added a section about the Creative Commons. Perhaps I will begin to work on the TEACH section soon...in the mean time, if you would like to work on it as well I would be happy to collaborate. There is no pressure if you aren't inclined to do so, but just in case you are interested I wanted to make it clear that I would be happy to have help.Marshallc8 (talk) 01:58, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi again! I would love to collaborate, if you do not feel it is too late? I will look into writing a brief paragraph on the history of TEACH and post it tomorrow morning, if perhaps you want do one about the content/implications of it? Or vice versa? I will be online around 9am tomorrow. Thanks for the proposal. Jamila iSchool (talk) 11:05, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry for the delayed response. I'm pretty bogged down with work right now...but I like the idea of working together. Perhaps it is a bit late to complete a joint endeavor for assignment 2, but it might be useful for the final one, as well as just improving the article. If you want to go ahead with a history paragraph (or other info about TEACH) I will add to it a bit later. Or if you have something else in mind I'm sure that would work too! Marshallc8 (talk) 23:51, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

No worries! Same on my end. Let's try then for the next one. Jamila iSchool (talk) 13:06, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Copyright and traditional knowledge

Hi there,

I am proposing a couple of edits to this section. As I am new to Wikipedia I’m unsure of the reference at the top of this section to Main article. Does this mean that this edit should apply to the main article as well? Should I be also posting edits on the other page?

In terms of my edits, I'm adding additional terms that are often used interchangeably with traditional knowledge such as indigenous knowledge, traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), people’s science or rural people’s knowledge.

More importantly, I see that there is a need to provide some insights into the reasons why there are different approaches to protecting traditional knowledge. I will be doing these edits in the next couple of hours. I would appreciate another eye on these edits and any feedback. Thanks.Nas Khan (talk) 14:03, 25 October 2011 (UTC

Hi Nas! I jusr wanted to leave a quick note about your addition to the article. I think it is a good addition, and adds a lot to the article. In the main, it points to some of the complexity involved in copyright law, which may lead readers to explore or at least be aware of the issues at stake in the use of copyright and intellectual property laws in protecting indigenious/traditional knowledge. Jamila iSchool (talk) 11:03, 28 October 2011 (UTC)