Copyright means an exclusive right that is given to the author, composer, or his assignee to print, sell or publish the copies of his real work for a specific period of time. Copyright protects the literary and artistic creation of human beings because these are the unique creation of humans. The Act protects these intellectual creativities.
Independent evidence of your literary creative work creates a verifiable record of the content you have created with your hard work. The copyright will come into existence when you will create some kind of poetry work. According to Section 48 of the Copyright Act, the registration of copyright of any sort of literary, artistic, musical, software work depicts that it is a prima facie valid/evidence.
Table of Contents
What is Copyright?
What is the meaning of copyright? Copyright is a type of intellectual property right that gives the creator or author an exclusive right over his/her original literary work to make copies of it, usually for a limited period of time. The creative work includes educational, artistic, literary, musical, software forms of work. Copyright aims to protect the original work of your particular idea that you are going to generate with creativity. It is subject to certain limitations which are based on public interest.
Copyrights are generally granted by public law where it is considered as “territorial rights”. They are granted according to the laws set by the government of certain territories which may vary from country to country. According to the Copyrights Act in India, the duration of a copyright is valid till the lifetime of the author plus 60 years after his death from the beginning of the year with an organization the article is being published, depending upon the jurisdiction of the states. Many countries need various copyright formalities to establish copyrights. Some countries recognize copyrights in any form of completed work without indulging in the long procedures of registrations, which is very different from recognized formal registrations.
History of copyright
History of copyright- The copyright derives the meaning from its expression, copy or words. Firstly it was used in 1586. It was the first item that was recognized as Intellectual property.
There is a well-settled doctrine of “Ubi jus ibi remedium”. “Means where there is a right, there is a remedy”. This doctrine is also applicable to copyright. It provides various rights to the author or artists and remedies to protect those rights.
Objects of Copyright
The object of the Copyright Act is to protect the rights of the owner of the literary or artistic work from unauthorized reproduction or any exploitation of his original work.
It encourages the authors or artists to create more original work by giving them the exclusive right for a specific period of time.
Characteristics of Copyright
The essential feature of Copyright are-
- Creation of Statute
- Multiple rights
- It purely exists in the expression of the idea.
- The work must be original
Creation of statute
The Statute grants the Copyright. There is no other common law right. There will be no existence of any work as copyright which is not given in section 16 of the Copyright Act.
Multiple Rights
Copyright is a bundle of rights in the same work. It comprises of in case of literary work, right to adaptation, and right to reproduction of work, right to translation, right to change the work into cinematographic version, and right to serial publication or work. Copyright also gives the monopoly right to the author or artist. It also gives the right to protect his work from unauthorized reproduction or exploitation and restrain others from copying the work.
It purely exists in the expression of the idea
The copyright exists only for the original work. The mere idea to do a job is not to be used as copyright. For instance, if a brilliant person has an idea for a book but he does not do anything to express the idea, he cannot claim the copyright for that mere idea because the idea should be expressed.
The work must be original
The originality of the work is the main essential requirement for claiming the copyright. The work which is going for copyright must be the original work or that person. The work which is not copied by another person is called original work.
Who is the author?
Section- 2 (d) of the Act defines The term “author”. Different categories of person will be regarded as the author in relation to various categories of work:
- Dramatic or literary work, the author of work.
- Musical work, the person who composes the music.
- For artistic work except for photographs, the artist of that work.
- Photograph, the person who clicks the photograph.
- Movies of film, the producer of Movie.
- Sound recording, the Producer.
- Any dramatic, literary, or musical work generated by the computer, the person who created the work.
Significance of Copyright
Copyright registrations are valid for the whole term of the copyright. The copyright office will complete the work of registering within a period of 8 to 10 months or less than that depending upon your application. It is necessary to claim your authorship and damages in respect of any amendments related to your poetry work.
- Record of Author: When an author or owner of the copyrights registers their works of poetries it leads to the creation of a public record. The poet holds complete ownership of the copyright of his/ her poetry. Such records may be very helpful and defensive from using the content of your poetry by the infringers.
- Presumption of ownership: The Publication or registration of the copyrights of the poem will establish a prima facie valid. All the statements mentioned under the documents of registration of copyrights including the name of the author which depicts copyrights as presumed.
- Assigning work: The author can assign or sell his/her poetry to the second or third party in return for royalty but without the signs of the real owner it will not come into force, the author will remain the legal representative of the copyrights for the other parties as well. The term work assignment should be specified in the Copyrights Act because the term of protection will be 5 years and will extend to the whole country.
- Enforcing copyright: The most significant thing of registering copyrights of the poems is the ability to file the application for the infringement of the author’s copyrights. The poet who has copyrights cannot file an application to enforce its copyrights unless the Copyright Office has issued the registration.
- Claiming damages: When the copyrights of the poems get registered and in spite of that they got infringed, the author has full right to claim the damages and he/she is completely eligible to get the monetary compensation. This is really valuable because getting damages in case of infringement of copyrights may be a difficult job. Damages award allows the author or owner of the copyright to recover the amount for the work that has been infringed.
Rights of owner of Copyright
Copyright Act gives the different types of rights to the owner such as:
- The owner can enjoy the monopoly right.
- The owner can transfer his rights to any other person to enjoy his rights.
- The owner has the right to sue if any person uses his work without permission.
- [Copyright] Act gives moral rights. He can claim the authority of the work even when he has assigned his work.
- Act gives the right to protect the honour and integrity of the owner.
- The owner has the right to claim the damages, if any occurred, by any person to his work.
- The owner has the right to modify or distort his work.
Terms of copyright
There are different terms for each category, such as:
- For literary, dramatic, or musical work- Lifetime of author + 60 years after his death.
- Anonymous and pseudonymous works-> Lifetime of author + 60 years after his death.
- Posthumous work-> Publication after the death of the author is called posthumous work. The term is 60 years from the day of publication. Provided that, if there is joint authorship, the term will be the lifetime of joint author + 60 years after his death.
- Photographs-> Lifetime of photographer + 60 years after his death.
- Cinematography films-> 60 years from the date of publication.
- Sound Recording-> 60 years from the date of publication.
- Government Work-> 60 years from the date of publication.
- Work of public undertaking-> 60 years from the date of publication.
- Work of International Organizations-> 60 years from the date of publication.
You can follow us on Instagram and Linkedin to get notifications of new articles published by Legal Study Material.