Subject: Re: Copyrights with web pages Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1998 16:18:24 GMT From: oldnasty@mindspring.com (Grinch) Organization: Happy Skeptics of America Newsgroups: misc.education References: 1 PeaceB2U wrote: >I find the copyrights concerning internet materials to be rather >confusing. It seems that most people feel that anything posted on the >internet is public domain and thus you will see the same material >appearing on several different sites. I've been trying to find out >exactly what kind of rules apply to a web site and I'm hoping someone >out there can help. >1.Can I legally put a link to another site on my own web pages without >their permission? Yes. But there have been a few cases where commercial web sites have tried to restrict links to their pages on commercial law grounds. Of course, most web sites want as many links leading to them as they can possibly get. >2. Am I allowed to write a brief review of another person's site and >include this review as well as a link on my pages? Yes. >3. If I have written original material that has been posted on my pages, >do I need to copyright them? Your original material is copyright to you automatically, see below. >4. How do I copyright and register a web site? What form would I use? Not necessary. >Any help would be greatly appreciated. Complex legal matters like copyright law should never be considered by lay persons without first paying a big fee to a lawyer. Having given this warning (necessary to protect my status as a member of the NY Bar), I can clarify a few basic points regarding copyrights: 1) If you create an original text, image, or other work of "intellectual property", you have copyright ownership of it. No, registration, c-in-a-circle mark, claim of ownership, or other notice is necessary. It's yours. (Those marks and notices only make it more difficult for a copyright violator to use the "I didn't know" defense.) 2) Nothing *ever* goes into the public domain unless the owner specifically says, "I put this in the public domain", or the copyright expires. You can post your creation to usenet, put it on a web page, scrawl it as graffiti on the outsides of trucks and trains, or whatever you like -- you retain copyright ownership of it. 3) You have no legal right to reproduce anything that is copyrighted by someone else, with a few "fair use" exceptions -- you can copy limited excerpts for purposes of commentary, criticism, news reporting, satire, and a few similar other reasons. 4) Copyright is not lost if an item is in fact copied over countless times without authorization, and the copyright owner does nothing to stop it. (Trademarks can be lost that way, but that's a different story). The copyright owner can assert his rights at any time. That's a very simplified statement of US copyright law that gets the basic ideas across. As with all law, *enforcing* it is another issue, which typically comes down to economics. If you want to enforce your copyright to material on your web page, you must exercise vigilance to hunt down violators (although commercial services that will do that for you, for a fee) and pay lawyers to send threatening letters, get injuctions and file lawsuits. It's very unlikely that you'll cover your expenses by collecting damages, because you're not likely to be able to prove you've suffered any economic loss from the copyright violation of a web page. So if you don't want something copied, don't put it on your web page. This doesn't mean that copyrights for material on the Internet are unenforcable, just that those enforcing them probably will have to pay their lawyer out of pocket to do so. Commercial enterprises will do so. Clip some material from the Disney Web site and add them to your own. Then see how long it takes for Jimminy Cricket's lawyers to come hopping around. ;-) For any who are interested: The 10 Most Common Myths About Copyrights http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The Copyright FAQ (detailed) http://www.aimnet.com/~carroll/copyright/faq-home.html