Ive  done  some  research and there is  lot  to learn but what I learned today is not  to reprint a complete article but that some content with credit and a link to the source maybe OK.

This Blog help expain the myths of the laws

10 Big Myths about copyright explained by Brad templeton

http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html

Centus.org has the exact laws

http://www.cetus.org/?404=Y

One of  my favorite sorces  for  info is    Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Below you may follow this link and get all of your questions answered

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright#Limits_and_exceptions_to_copyright

Here is part of what Winipedia has to say as of 08/12/2008 at 8.15 pm

Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by governments, giving the creator of an original work of authorship exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time, after which the work enters the public domain. Generally, it is ";the right to copy";, but also gives the copyright holder the right to be credited for the work, to determine who may adapt the work to other forms, who may perform the work, who may financially benefit from it, and other, related rights. It is an intellectual property form (like the patent, the trademark, and the trade secret) applicable to any expressible form of an idea or information that is substantive and discrete.

Copyright initially was conceived as a way for governments in Europe to restrict printing; the contemporary intent of copyright is to promote the creation of new works by giving authors control of and profit from them.

Copy rights have been internationally standardized, lasting between fifty to a hundred years from the creator's death, or a finite period for anonymous or corporate creations; some jurisdictions have required formalities to establishing copyright, most recognize copyright in any completed work, without formal registration. Generally, copyright is enforced as a civil matter, though some jurisdictions do apply criminal sanctions.

Most jurisdictions recognize copyright limitations, allowing ";fair"; exceptions to the creator's exclusivity of copyright, and giving users certain rights. The development of the Internet, digital media, computer network technologies, such as peer-to-peer filesharing, 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 copy rights, and sought additional legal and technological enforcement.

Limits and exceptions to copyright

Main article: Limitations and exceptions to copyright

[edit] Idea-expression dichotomy and the merger doctrine

Main article: Idea-expression divide

Immanuel Kant in his 1785 essay Von der Unrechtmäßigkeit des Büchernachdrucks distinguishes the physical from the ideational, the thought involved from the book. This distinction is of critical importance to the near constant wrangling between publishers, other intermediaries, and the original, creative authors.

[edit] The first-sale doctrine and exhaustion of rights

Main articles: First-sale doctrine and Exhaustion of rights

Copyright law does not restrict the owner of a copy from reselling legitimately obtained copies of copyrighted works, provided that those copies were originally produced by or with the permission of the copyright holder. It is therefore legal, for example, to resell a copyrighted book or CD. In the United States this is known as the first-sale doctrine, and was established by the courts to clarify the legality of reselling books in second-hand bookstores. Some countries may have parallel importation restrictions that allow the copyright holder to control the aftermarket. This may mean for example that a copy of a book that does not infringe copyright in the country where it was printed does infringe copyright in a country into which it is imported for retailing. The first-sale doctrine is known as exhaustion of rights in other countries and is a principle which also applies, though somewhat differently, to patent and trademark rights. It is important to note that the first-sale doctrine permits the transfer of the particular legitimate copy involved. It does not permit making or distributing additional copies.

In addition, copyright, in most cases, does not prohibit one from acts such as modifying, defacing, or destroying his or her own legitimately obtained copy of a copyrighted work, so long as duplication is not involved. However, in countries that implement moral rights, a copyright holder can in some cases successfully prevent the mutilation or destruction of a work that is publicly visible.

[edit] Fair use and fair dealing

Main articles: Fair use and Fair dealing

Copyright does not prohibit all copying or replication. In the United States, the fair use doctrine, codified by the Copyright Act of 1976 as 17 U.S.C. § 107, permits some copying and distribution without permission of the copyright holder or payment to same. The statute does not clearly define fair use, but instead gives four non-exclusive factors to consider in a fair use analysis. Those factors are:

1. the purpose and character of the use;
2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.^[10]

In the United Kingdom and many other Commonwealth countries, a similar notion of fair dealing was established by the courts or through legislation. The concept is sometimes not well defined; however in Canada, private copying for personal use has been expressly permitted by statute since 1999. In Australia, the fair dealing exceptions under the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth) are a limited set of circumstances under which copyrighted material can be legally copied or adapted without the copyright holder's consent. Fair dealing uses are research and study; review and critique; news reportage and the giving of professional advice (ie legal advice). Under current Australian law it is still a breach of copyright to copy, reproduce or adapt copyright material for personal or private use without permission from the copyright owner. Other technical exemptions from infringement may also apply, such as the temporary reproduction of a work in machine readable form for a computer.

In the United States the AHRA (Audio Home Recording Act Codified in Section 10, 1992) prohibits action against consumers making noncommercial recordings of music, in return for royalties on both media and devices plus mandatory copy-control mechanisms on recorders.

Section 1008. Prohibition on certain infringement actions

No action may be brought under this title alleging infringement of copyright based on the manufacture, importation, or distribution of a digital audio recording device, a digital audio recording medium, an analog recording device, or an analog recording medium, or based on the noncommercial use by a consumer of such a device or medium for making digital musical recordings or analog musical recordings.

Later acts amended US Copyright law so that for certain purposes making 10 copies or more is construed to be commercial, but there is no general rule permitting such copying. Indeed making one complete copy of a work, or in many cases using a portion of it, for commercial purposes will not be considered fair use. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act prohibits the manufacture, importation, or distribution of devices whose intended use, or only significant commercial use, is to bypass an access or copy control put in place by a copyright owner. An appellate court has held that fair use is not a defense to engaging in such distribution.

Educational use is regarded as ";fair use"; in most jurisdictions, but the restrictions vary wildly from nation to nation.^[11]

[edit] Transfer and licensing

A copyright, or aspects of it, may be assigned or transferred from one party to another. For example, a musician who records an album will often sign an agreement with a record company in which the musician agrees to transfer all copyright in the recordings in exchange for royalties and other considerations. The creator (and original copyright holder) benefits, or expects to, from production and marketing capabilities far beyond those of the author. In the digital age of music, music may be copied and distributed at minimal cost through the Internet, however the record industry attempts to provide promotion and marketing for the artist and his or her work so it can reach a much larger audience. A copyright holder need not transfer all rights completely, though many publishers will insist. Some of the rights may be transferred, or else the copyright holder may grant another party a non-exclusive license to copy and/or distribute the work in a particular region or for a specified period of time. A transfer or licence may have to meet particular formal requirements in order to be effective; see section 239 of the Australia Copyright Act 1968 (Cth). Under Australian law, it is not enough to pay for a work to be created in order to also own the copyright. The copyright itself must be expressly transferred in writing.

Under the U.S. Copyright Act, a transfer of ownership in copyright must be memorialized in a writing signed by the transferor. For that purpose, ownership in copyright includes exclusive licenses of rights. Thus exclusive licenses, to be effective, must be granted in a written instrument signed by the grantor. No special form of transfer or grant is required. A simple document that identifies the work involved and the rights being granted is sufficient. Non-exclusive grants (often called non-exclusive licenses) need not be in writing under U.S. law. They can be oral or even implied by the behavior of the parties. Transfers of copyright ownership, including exclusive licenses, may and should be recorded in the U.S. Copyright Office. (Information on recording transfers is available on the Office's web site.) While recording is not required to make the grant effective, it offers important benefits, much like those obtained by recording a deed in a real estate transaction.

Copyright may also be licensed. Some jurisdictions may provide that certain classes of copyrighted works be made available under a prescribed statutory license (e.g. musical works in the United States used for radio broadcast or performance). This is also called a compulsory license, because under this scheme, anyone who wishes to copy a covered work does not need the permission of the copyright holder, but instead merely files the proper notice and pays a set fee established by statute (or by an agency decision under statutory guidance) for every copy made. Failure to follow the proper procedures would place the copier at risk of an infringement suit. Because of the difficulty of following every individual work, copyright collectives or collecting societies and performing rights organizations (such as ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC) have been formed to collect royalties for hundreds (thousands and more) works at once. Though this market solution bypasses the statutory license, the availability of the statutory fee still helps dictate the price per work collective rights organizations charge, driving it down to what avoidance of procedural hassle would justify.

[edit] Similar legal rights

Copyright law covers the creative or artistic expression of an idea. Patent law covers inventions. Trademark law covers distinctive signs which are used in relation to products or services as indicators of origin, as does (in a similar fashion), Trade dress. Registered designs law covers the look or appearance of a manufactured or functional article. Trade secret law covers secret or sensitive knowledge or information.

Although copyright and trademark laws are theoretically distinct, more than one type of them may cover the same item or subject matter. For example, in the case of the Mickey Mouse cartoon, the image and name of Mickey Mouse would be the subject of trademark legislation, while the cartoon itself would be subject to copyright. Titles and character names from books or movies may also be trademarked while the works from which they are drawn may qualify for copyright.

Another point of distinction is that a copyright (and a patent) is generally subject to a statutorily-determined term, whereas a trademark registration may remain in force indefinitely if the trademark is periodically used and renewal fees continue to be duly paid to the relevant jurisdiction's trade marks office or registry. Once the term of a copyright has expired, the formerly copyrighted work enters the public domain and may be freely used or exploited by anyone. Courts in the United States and the United Kingdom have rejected the doctrine of a common law copyright. Public domain works should not be confused with works that are publicly available. Works posted in the internet for example, are publicly available, but are not generally in the public domain. Copying such works may therefore violate the author's copyright.

[edit] Useful articles

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (April 2007)

If a pictorial, graphic or sculptural work is a useful article, it is copyrighted only if its aesthetic features are separable from its utilitarian features. A useful article is an article having an intrinsic utilitarian function that is not merely to portray the appearance of the article or to convey information. They must be separable from the functional aspect to be copyrighted.^[12]

There are two primary approaches to the separability issue: physical separability and conceptual separability. Physical separability is the ability to take the aesthetic thing away from the functional thing. Conceptual separability can be found in several different ways. It may be present if the useful article is also shown to be appreciated for its aesthetic appeal or by the design approach, which is the idea that separability is only available if the designer is able to make the aesthetic choices that are unaffected by the functional considerations. A question may also be asked of whether an individual would think of the aesthetic aspects of the work being separate from the functional aspects.

There are several different tests available for conceptual separability. The first, the Primary Use test, asks how is the thing primarily used: art or function? The second, the Marketable as Art test, asks can the article be sold as art, whether functional or not. This test does not have much backing, as almost anything can be sold as art. The third test, Temporal Displacement, asks could an individual conceptualize the article as art without conceptualizing functionality at the same time. Finally, the Denicola test says that copyrightability should ultimately depend on the extent to which the work reflects the artistic expression inhibited by functional consideration. If something came to have a pleasing shape because there were functional considerations, the artistic aspect was constrained by those concerns.

[edit] Duration

Copyright subsists for a variety of lengths in different jurisdictions. The length of the term can depend on several factors, including the type of work (e.g. musical composition, novel), whether the work has been published or not, and whether the work was created by an individual or a corporation. In most of the world, the default length of copyright is the life of the author plus either 50 or 70 years. In the United States, the term for most existing works is a fixed number of years after the date of creation or publication. Under most countries' laws, copyrights expire at the end of the calendar year in question.

The length and requirements for copyright duration are subject to change by legislation, and since the early 20th century there have been a number of adjustments made in various countries, which can make determining the duration of a given copyright somewhat difficult. For example, the United States used to require copyrights to be renewed after 28 years to stay in force, and formerly required a copyright notice upon first publication to gain coverage. In Italy and France, there were post-wartime extensions that could increase the term by approximately 6 years in Italy and up to about 14 in France. Many countries have extended the length of their copyright terms (sometimes retroactively). International treaties establish minimum terms for copyrights, but individual countries may enforce longer terms than those.

In the United States, all books and other works published before 1923 have expired copyrights and are in the public domain. In addition, works published before 1964 that did not have their copyrights renewed 28 years after first publication year also are in the public domain, except that books originally published outside the US by non-Americans are exempt from this requirement, if they are still under copyright in their home country (see How Can I Tell Whether a Copyright Was Renewed for more details).

But if the intended exploitation of the work includes publication (or distribution of derivative work, such as a film based on a book protected by copyright) outside the U.S., the terms of copyright around the world must be considered. If the author has been dead more than 70 years, the work is in the public domain in most, but not all, countries. Some works are covered by copyright in Spain for 80 years after the author's death.

In 1998 the length of a copyright in the United States was increased by 20 years under the The Copyright Term Extension Act. This legislation was strongly promoted by corporations which had valuable copyrights which otherwise would have expired, and has been the subject of substantial criticism on this point.

As a curiosity, the famous work Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up has a complex – and disputed – story of copyright expiry.

[edit] Typefaces

In the United States, the Copyright Office maintains that typeface designs are not covered by copyright, and it will not accept applications for their registration. See 37. C.F.R. § 202.1(e). In Tufenkian Import/Export Ventures, Inc. v. Einstein Moomjy, Inc., 338 F.3d 127, 132 (2nd Cir. 2003), the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit recognized this rule when it held, “the public domain includes, for example, both the generic shape of the letter 'L' and all of the elaborately more specific 'L's' from the hundreds of years of font designs that have fallen into the public domain.” However, if a design is novel and ";non-obvious,"; it may be covered by design patent. See, for example, U.S. Des. Patent No. 289,773 , May 12, 1987), Charles A. Bigelow and Kris A. Holmes, inventors. Germany (in 1981) passed a special extension (Schriftzeichengesetz) to the design patent law (Geschmacksmustergesetz) for protecting them. This permits typefaces being registered as designs in Germany, too. So far, the United States courts have not published any opinions discussing whether a computer program creating a particular font might be intellectual property protected by the copyright laws.

The United Kingdom (in 1989) has passed a law making typeface designs copyrightable. The British law also applies to designs produced before 1989.

[edit] Accessible Copies

It is legal in several countries including the United Kingdom and the United States to produce alternative versions (for example, in large print or braille) of a copyrighted work to provide improved access to a work for blind and visually impaired persons without permission from the copyright holder.^[13][14]

[edit] See also

Wikibooks has a book on the topic of

US Copyright Law

• Compulsory license
• Copyfraud
• Copying
• Copyright education
• Copyright in architecture
• Copyright infringement
• Copyright infringement of software
• Copyright on the content of patents
• Copyright on religious works
• Digital rights management
• Digital watermarking
• File sharing and the law
• Freedom of panorama
• Glossary of legal terms in technology
• List of copyright treaty membership
• List of leading legal cases in copyright law
• List of countries' copyright length
• Model release
• Moral rights
• Paracopyright
• Photography and the law
• Production music
• Public domain
• Reproduction fees
• Related rights
• Rent-seeking
• Software copyright
• Threshold pledge system

[edit] National copyright laws

See also List of countries' copyright length

• Australian copyright law
• Azerbaijani copyright law
• Canadian copyright law
• Copyright law in the People's Republic of China
• Copyright law of the European Union
• Dutch copyright law (The Netherlands)
• French copyright law, which is based on another philosophy, not founded on ";copyright"; but on the ";Right of the Author"; (droit d'auteur).
• German copyright law
• Hong Kong copyright law
• Indian copyright law
• Japan copyright law
• Jordanian copyright law
• Philippine copyright law
• Polish copyright law
• Russian copyright law
• Spanish copyright law
• Copyright law of Switzerland
• Copyright law of the United Kingdom
• United States copyright law

[edit] US Legislation

• Digital Millennium Copyright Act (US)
• Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (US)

[edit] EU Legislation

• EU Copyright Directive
• Directive on harmonizing the term of copyright protection (EU)

[edit] International treaties

• Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works of 1886
• Universal Copyright Convention of 1952
• Rome Convention of 1961
• The WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), of 1994
• WIPO Copyright Treaty of 1996
• WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty of 1996

[edit] Critique

• Alternative Compensation System
• Anti-copyright
• Copyleft
• Copynorm
• Copyright-free
• Creative Commons
• Creative Commons Licenses
• Creative Commons International
• Crypto-anarchism
• Digital freedom
• Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity by Lawrence Lessig
• Opposition to copyright
• Permission culture — neologism by Lawrence Lessig.
• The Uneasy Case for Copyright: A Study of Copyright in Books, Photocopies, and Computer Programs by Stephen Breyer.

[edit] Other

• The Disneyland Memorial Orgy
• The day the violence died, an episode of The Simpsons featuring on a copyright case.

[edit] References