What Is Not Covered - Page 2

Not everything put on the Internet is afforded the protection of copyright. Titles, names, short parts of works, slogans, ideas, methods, or concepts are fair game, although they may be covered by Trademark law which would protect them.

There is also a thing called "Fair Use," that is not a copyright infringement. "Fair Use" includes items for use in nonprofit educational purposes, if the amount of the work used is minimal (such as a pull quote from a story), or the degree to which the use of the work will have on its commercial value.

The problem is that one person's view of "Fair Use" can be vastly different from another person's view, and there is no assurance that the courts will agree with you should you find yourself in such a situation.

Fair use was created to primarily allow parody, commentary, news reporting, and education. Notice those are all written situations. Chances of getting away with taking a screen capture of Anna Kournikova on TV and posting it on a Web site while calling it "Fair Use" are virtually nil. Makes you wonder how there legally can be thousands of pictures of her on hundreds of Web sites, doesn't it?

Other items not covered would include information that is common property without original authorship, such as calendars, height and weight charts, tape measures and rulers. However, if you create a fancy calendar design, it can be copyrighted.

What About Public Domain?

Many people think that because something is on the Internet, it is in the "public domain," and therefore freely usable by the public. That is false. That would be true only if the author has denounced ownership or died more than 70 years ago.

For example, you go to a Web site that offers graphics for use on your Web site at no charge. That gives you permission to use a graphic on your site, but you cannot include that graphic in a collection for sale to other people. The graphic is not in the public domain.

Generally speaking, if something has been around for centuries and does not appear to belong to anyone, it is said to be in the public domain. If it has a copyright label affixed to it, no argument is going to convince a legal mind that it is open to public use.

What Can They Steal From Me?

While cruising the Internet, someone sees a site and admires the layout. It is very easy to see the source code, copy and paste it into a new document and use it for their own. It is also illegal because even HTML coding is covered by copyright law. The same is true for JavaScripts and Java applets.

But what if cruising the 'Net you see a page that looks just like one you earlier created, but it clearly was created before you did yours? Are you guilty of copyright infringement? No, because it just so happens the pages looked alike but were created independently, not because of theft on anyone's part. It is considered innocent infringement at most. However, one should not make the mistake of copying a page and then claiming innocent infringement, if they want to be assured of protection.

Thus, in addition to the obvious photos and words, the coding or programming involved in the Internet can be copyrighted, as can novels, e-mail, music, software, screenplays, Usenet messages, or short stories that appear.

Some think that if they change a few words, they are not guilty of plagiarism or copyright infringement. That, of course, is false. The idea cannot be copyrighted, but the words can, so to use that information and avoid infringement, it would be necessary to extensively rewrite the copy in your own words.

Otherwise, it is no different than making a bootleg copy of a performer's music CD or putting a different cover on a book, changing the byline, and publishing it for profit. You have to figure someone will notice.

While anyone can link to a page, it is only good manners to first get permission from a Web site owner to do so. That is called Netiquette. However, most people do not do that, and in most cases there is not really any harm.

In fact, linking is probably the safest way to go to bring attention to another person's page, while the use of frames (and opening links in them) is perhaps the most risky.

Even though linking to a site within your frames may not have any financial bearing on the site being displayed, copyright infringement can include the damage created by associating the one site with the other.

For example, if I had a porn site set up in frames, and I linked to a page of a famous person who is not involved in the porn industry, the appearance created by having that person's page appear on my site can be considered damaging. At that point, should the famous person wish to pursue the matter, it could get expensive for me. And that doesn't include the fact my wife would kill me for having a porn site.

Another issue involving frames is, using the above example, that if the famous person's site is used by you on a page containing advertising in another frame, it can appear that the famous person is offering an endorsement of the advertised product. That is a no-no.

Yet another problem with frames is that people may think the page of that famous person belongs to the owner of the Web site using the frames. Book 'em, Dano (a pull quote). That, too, is a no-no.

In these cases, we've discussed home pages. But what about the other pages on a site? Should a site owner wish to keep people from linking to interior pages of their site, it must be done so through technical means. Otherwise, copyright law won't prevent people from viewing the pages, although printing and copying and stealing images and words fall under the law in other areas.

Internet and Copyright Law
Hark, I've Been Infringed. What To Do? - Page 3