Copyright

Before the European Enlightenment, there was no concept of copyright. It was the product of a shift from seeing knowledge as divine revelation to seeing knowledge as created by people. In the 1500s, the issue of ownership of intellectual property was largely moot because of the licensing system, because the government granted a monopoly to printing companies, and authors had little say in the matter if they wanted to be published. With the decline of licensing arrangements (in part because of an increasing resistance to censorship), and with both an increasing literacy and a resultant increasing demand for knowledge, the issue of ownership took on greater importance. Two justifications were offered for copyright protection for authors— natural rights and utilitarianism. The natural rights justification was that people had a natural right to dispose of, and benefit from, the product of their labor, whether mental or physical. The utilitarian justification was that copyright was the best means of encouraging the development of new knowledge that benefited society. The first copyright statute in the Western world, the Statute of Anne (1710), was a compromise between the two positions as its full title indicates—“A Bill for the Encouragement of Learning and for Securing the Property of Copies of Books to the Rightful Owners Thereof” (Hesse, 2002, p. 38). The basis of United States copyright law, the federal Constitution, has a similar approach. As set forth in Article 1, Section 8, Congress has the power to “promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.”

What can be copyrighted are “original works of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression, now known or later developed, from which they can be perceived, reproduced, or otherwise communicated, either directly or with the aid of a machine or device” (1997, 17 U.S.C. §102[a]). This includes literary works, musical works, dramatic works, pantomimes and choreographic works, pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works, motion pictures and other audiovisual works, sound recordings, and architectural works, but “any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied” cannot be copyrighted (1997, 17 U.S.C. §102[b]).

While it is intended that copyright is invested in the creator of the work, this is not the case for works for hire, either within the normal scope of employment or commissioned works. In these cases, the employer is considered the author. The parties involved in the employment situation may change this by contract.

Copyright exists from the time of the creation of the work and registration is not required. To register for a copyright, a completed application form, a filing fee, and two copies of the work (one if unpublished) are filed with the copyright office. Notice in the form of some sort of recognizable abbreviation or symbol, name of the copyright holder, and the date should be placed on the work in a noticeable place. Although registration or notice are not required, there are certain advantages to registration. For example, there may be pride of ownership in claiming the creative activity, certain copyright infringement actions cannot be initiated absent registration, and no statutory damages or attorney fees can be awarded without registration. Duration of the copyright depends on such items as time when granted, whether the copyright holder is an individual or a corporation, and so on. For individuals, generally the term of the copyright is the life of the author, plus 70 years.

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