Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 3.1
Copyright Tip Sheet
Copyright is intended to protect “creative” works. Generally speaking, creative works
are the types of things that you would expect an artist to produce. However, in the context
of copyright, creative works are defined fairly broadly. The category goes well beyond
things like sculptures, paintings, and songs. Copyright essentially protects any slightly
creative thing that is written down—notes to yourself, doodles on a pad, the finger paint-
ing of a child. It also protects software code as a “literary work” in the same way that it
protects a novel.
As the name implies, copyright is primarily concerned with copying of the works that
it protects. While plenty of other actions are regulated by copyright (for example, publicly
performing a protected work, even if it does not create a copy, can violate the copyright),
as a general matter copyright violations occur when a protected work is copied without
the permission of the person who owns the rights to it. This copying can take the form of
literal copying (e.g., duplicating a movie file) or nonliteral copying (e.g., turning a novel
into a movie).
Getting a copyright is easy. Copyright automatically protects the types of works that
fall within its purview. While there are many reasons to register your copyright, a covered
work is protected from the moment it exists (“fixed in a tangible medium” is the technical
term). That means that everyone is the owner of thousands, and possibly tens of thousands
of copyrights—whether they want them or not.
How long does that protection last? For quite a while. For most works, protection lasts
for the entire lifetime of the author plus 70 years after his or her death. The reason so
many of us feel surrounded by copyrights is because they are so easy to get and last for so
long.
