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| Copyrights and Trade-Marks
I just wanted to make all aware of at least the basics of copyright and trade-mark issues on the Web. Infringements run rampant and there are currently several Websites dedicated to just this issue. Grey Day is an annual event that asks Website owners to change all their page backgrounds to grey as a form of protest to copyright infringement on the Web. As someone who reviews Websites on almost a daily basis, I see plenty of copyright piracy. One of the more prevalent is the use of Oscar (the symbol of the academy award) by some award sites. One has to wonder how anyone could even consider pulling off such a lame act, but I can assure you I have seen it several times. This act lives at the very pinnacle of avarice and pure stupidity and is inexcusable. However, many innocent misrepresentations also occur. For example, the name or phrase "Surfers Choice" was established in 1995 when I posted it to the Web with the copyright symbol next to it. This clearly established and branded it as belonging to Technomax, my company at the time. Today it is a trade-mark associated with the services and products it represents. I have been informed on several occasions since then about its use by others. For the most part these have been purely innocent and a result of lack of research. Let's look at what a copyright is and what it means. Basically copyright applies to certain intellectual creations such as literature, music, poetry, works of art and other creations that are recorded, written or saved to any other media. A copyright grants the creator EXCLUSIVE rights to his or her creation and to determine what can or cannot be done. This applies equally to the Web - content, graphics, etc can be copyrighted. Assume you produce a Website for a client. What does that mean in terms of how the client can make use of your work. Regardless of the fact that you received good money for your work, this does not mean the client can do as he or she sees fit with your creations. For example, if I happen to own an original Picasso (wouldn't it be sweet), does that mean I can use it to run lithographs and sell them for thousands each? Absolutely not. I think Pablo's heirs might just have a say in the matter. This applies equally to software such as perl scripts and other programs - even if they are freeware. If the author prohibits the distribution or selling of the script, then these wishes must be adhered to. The client for whom you produced the Website cannot reproduce it for use on another domain or even sell it without permission from you, the copyright owner. Here are a few sites that present some good info regarding copyright: http://whatiscopyright.org/ United States Copyright Office http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/ Canadian Intellectual Property Office http://cipo.gc.ca/ WHAT ABOUT TRADEMARKS? A trade-mark can be registered for a symbol, words and phrases or a combination thereof. Whereas a copyright has no expiry date a trade-mark is normally issued for a period of years. A typical example of a trade-mark is the Coca-Cola symbol combined with the words - "It's the real thing". We see examples just about every waking minute. Recently litigation resulted on several fronts when well known trade-marks were used by imprudent Web promoters in the keyword meta tags of Web pages for the purpose of gaining an advantage in search engines. These people were of course stopped and in a few cases substantial fines were issued. The link below to the Franklin Pierce Law Center has more info about both topics - http://www.fplc.edu/tfield/ipbasics.htm I am not an expert about trade-marks or copyrights, but I am aware enough to take care and also respect these issues. I think all of us should be. Research is freely available on these topics on the Web and if, in business or on the Web, one should be enlightened in such matters. New links added 05/01 Association for the protection of Internet Copyright United States Patent and Trademark Office Article copyrights © belong to Surfers Choice Internet Awards. Do not copy, in whole or in part, or use anywhere without permission. | |||||||