Copyright
The US Copyright Office defines Copyright as "a form of protection grounded in the U.S. Constitution and granted by law for original works of authorship fixed in a tangible medium of expression. Copyright covers both published and unpublished works."[1]
History of Copyright
Background of Copyright Protection[2]
Copyright came about with the invention of the printing press and with wider literacy. As a legal concept, its origins in Britain were from a reaction to printers' monopolies at the beginning of the 18th century. The English Parliament was concerned about the unregulated copying of books and passed the Licensing of the Press Act 1662, which established a register of licensed books and required a copy to be deposited with the Stationers' Company, essentially continuing the licensing of material that had long been in effect.
Copyright laws allow products of creative human activities, such as literary and artistic production, to be preferentially exploited and thus incentivized. Different cultural attitudes, social organizations, economic models and legal frameworks are seen to account for why copyright emerged in Europe and not, for example, in Asia. In the Middle Ages in Europe, there was generally a lack of any concept of literary property due to the general relations of production, the specific organization of literary production and the role of culture in society. The latter refers to the tendency of oral societies, such as that of Europe in the medieval period, to view knowledge as the product and expression of the collective, rather than to see it as individual property. However, with copyright laws, intellectual production comes to be seen as a product of an individual, with attendant rights. The most significant point is that patent and copyright laws support the expansion of the range of creative human activities that can be commodified. This parallels the ways in which capitalism led to the commodification of many aspects of social life that earlier had no monetary or economic value per se.
Copyright has grown from a legal concept regulating copying rights in the publishing of books and maps to one with a significant effect on nearly every modern industry, covering such items as sound recordings, films, photographs, software, and architectural works.
What Copyright Protection Covers
Understanding Copyright Protection[3]
There are three basic requirements that a work must meet to be protected by copyright. The work must be:
- Original: To be original, a work must merely be independently created. In other words, it cannot be copied from something else. There is no requirement that the work be novel (as in patent law), unique, imaginative or inventive.
- Creative: To satisfy the creativity requirement a work need only demonstrate a very small amount of creativity. Very few creations fail to satisfy this requirement.
- Fixed: To meet the fixation requirement, a work must be fixed in a tangible medium of expression. Protection attaches automatically to an eligible work the moment the work is fixed. A work is considered to be fixed as long as itβs sufficiently permanent or stable to permit it to be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated for a period of more than transitory duration.
See Also
References
- β Definition: What does Copyright Mean? copyright.gov
- β History of Copyright Protection Wikipedia
- β What work can be protected by Copyright? Copyright Alliance