Module 2

Copyright: works, originality, the idea and expression line, authorship and ownership, moral rights, infringement, exceptions and licences

Copyright is the most widely used intellectual property right, and the one most people break without knowing it. It arises the moment a person writes a paragraph, records a song, takes a photograph or writes a program, and it lasts for most of a century. Because it is automatic, there is usually no register to search and no certificate to show, so questions of ownership and scope are often hard to answer. This module sets out what copyright protects and what it leaves free, who owns it at the start, what the owner can control, what counts as infringement, the exceptions that allow use without permission, and how rights are licensed. It ends with the unsettled questions about works made with the help of software that generates text and images.

General education on intellectual property law, using invented businesses, people and figures. It states common principles in simplified form and does not describe any one country’s law, which differs and changes; rules on registration, ownership, infringement and remedies are strict and local. It is not legal advice. Consult a qualified lawyer in the place that matters.