What does Copyright© mean exactly?

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| Author: Sir Wei

| Reprinted from: Weiyue Renhua

| Editor: Corrie

| Design: Liu Yingjie

A few days ago I wrote an article " Is the Apache protocol free software? ", which mentioned the concepts of copyright and copyleft.

A reader asked a question:

"About the word copyleft, I remember that around 1998, I sent an email to Mr. Stallman to ask for the meaning of the word, and wrote a formula: copyleft = freedom + copyright, and he wrote back to express his approval. He further explained that in order to promote this concept within the framework of the current copyright rules (copyright), his so-called copyleft actually implies the content of copyright, that is, software publishers (users) must abide by the GPL, and the GPL is protected by copyright. In other words, the GPL agreement needs to be followed in the sense of copyright.

The article said, "It is worth noting that copyleft does not mean that there is no copyright. Copyleft still has copyright, but except copyright, all other rights have been opened, that is, left to the world."

I find this explanation to be rather ambiguous:

1. "Copyright" is not a formal legal term in the Chinese context. It is copyright in English, and the formal legal term in Chinese is "copyright" (of course, it is not a big problem to mix the two terms now), and it is expressed as a combination of several rights ;Whether it is easy to cause confusion in understanding when it is said that "copyleft is still copyrighted";

2. To take a step back, in Stallman's statement, even if the word copyleft contains the meaning of "copyright", it seems to specifically refer to the "copyright" attribute of the GPL itself.

The above comments, please correct me! ”

This reader is right. The sentence in my original article "copyleft still has copyright, but all other rights have been opened except for copyright" is indeed a bit problematic. The "copyright" in this sentence, I The original meaning of refers to "signature right" and "permission right". But it is inappropriate to say this, because from the definition of copyright, copyright is the right owned by the author.

This prompted me to think again what is copyright?

copyright, copyright, also known as "copyright", symbol: ©. Refers to the rights an author has over his or her work.

"Note: The terms "copyright" and "authorship" are used interchangeably in this article without distinction."

Copyright literally means "the right to reproduce", because the most basic of the author's rights is the right to reproduce. But the rights of the author are not limited to this. The author also has other rights such as authorship rights, modification rights, adaptation rights, translation rights, publishing rights, performance rights, and licensing rights. Most of these rights are related to copying. After all, communication is need to be copied.

In the era when printing was not produced, the method of copying was hand copying, which was fine, after all, hand copying could not make many copies. But in the era of mass copying, it is necessary to define who can copy and who cannot. After all, this will affect the economic interests that people are very concerned about.

During the Shaoxi period of the Southern Song Dynasty in China (1190-1194), Cheng Sheren, a native of Meizhou, Sichuan, engraved "The Story of the Eastern Capital" written by Wang Cheng. "statement of. The meaning of the latter sentence is: I have applied for copyright to the government, and you are not allowed to reproduce it.

In 1710, the United Kingdom promulgated the "Queen Anne Act", which was the first copyright law in the world. The decree stipulates that for books that have been published, the author has the right to reprint the book within 21 years from the effective date of the decree; for books that have not yet been published, the author has the right to publish for 28 years. It abolished the feudal monopoly system in which the royal family issued printing licenses to booksellers, and recognized the author's right to control and dispose of his own works.

my country's law on copyright is the "Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China", the current version is the revised version released on February 26, 2010, hereinafter referred to as "Copyright Law".

With regard to copyright (authorship), the following basic concepts should best be ^established1 :

1. Copyright is the right enjoyed by the author to works such as computer programs, texts, music, photos, art, games, movies, and architectural designs.

2. Copyright belongs to the author, among which property rights can be transferred, and personal rights (such as authorship rights) cannot be transferred. (Personal rights will be introduced later)

3. Computer programs are not only protected by copyright-related laws, but also by software licenses.

4. Copyright only protects the expression of ideas, not the ideas themselves.

5. Copyright is automatically acquired after the creation of the work. Of course, you can also register to obtain a supporting document, which is more conducive to claiming rights.

6. The transfer of the original ownership of works of art and other works is not regarded as the transfer of the copyright of the work, but the exhibition right of the original works of art shall be enjoyed by the original owner.

7. After the death of the author, the copyright shall be transferred in accordance with the inheritance law. 50 years after the author's death (according to Chinese law), the work enters the public domain and can be used by anyone, and is no longer protected by law.

About copyright and publishing rights

Readers who have published or may publish books can read this section.

Publishing refers to the reproduction and distribution of works.

The "Copyright Law" clearly stipulates that the author has the right of reproduction and distribution, but does not list the "right of publication" as part of the copyright, so how to understand the relationship between the right of publication, right of reproduction and right of distribution?

According to the Copyright Law, copyright includes the following property rights:

……

(5) The right of reproduction, that is, the right to make one or more copies of a work by means of printing, photocopying, rubbing, recording, video recording, dubbing, re-photographing, etc.;

(6) The right of distribution, that is, the right to provide the original or reproduction of the work to the public by way of sale or donation;

……

This is how I understand it. The author has the right of reproduction and distribution, but generally does not have the qualification to publish books. If the author wants to publish his work in the form of a book, he must entrust the publishing house to do so. Through a written contract, the publishing house is permitted. Copy and distribute within a certain time and region, so that the publishing house has the publishing right of the work.

Therefore, the publishing right is mainly for the publishing house. This right is obtained through the contract. If the publisher violates the contract or the law, the author can terminate the contract, withdraw the permission of reproduction and distribution, and suspend the publisher's publishing right.

Usually, the author grants the publishing house "exclusive publishing rights", and other publishing houses are not allowed to publish the book during the validity period of the contract.

In the "Copyright Law", there are some clear provisions on this, such as:

Article 31 The exclusive publishing rights enjoyed by book publishers in accordance with the contract for the works delivered by the copyright owner for publication shall be protected by law, and no one else may publish the works.

Article 32... If a book publisher reprints or republishes a work, it shall notify the copyright owner and pay remuneration. After the book is out of stock, if the book publisher refuses to reprint or republish, the copyright owner has the right to terminate the contract.

Article 34 Book publishers may, with the author's permission, modify or abridge a work. ...

Article 35 To publish works resulting from adaptation, translation, annotation, arrangement, and compilation of existing works, permission must be obtained from the copyright owner of the adaptation, translation, annotation, arrangement, and compilation work and the copyright owner of the original work, and remuneration should be paid.

After the contract expires or the contract is terminated, the author can find another publishing house to publish his (her) book.

Under what circumstances can a book be published by two publishers at the same time?

1. The author and the publisher sign a non-exclusive publishing right. For example, Jia Pingwa exercised the non-exclusive right to use his book "Shan Ben". People's Literature Publishing House and Writers Publishing House published the book at the same time, with different book numbers. (However, I guess only big-name writers get this treatment.)

2. After the fiftieth anniversary of the author's death, his copyright is no longer protected, and any publishing house can publish it by itself. (Article 21 of the Copyright Law clearly stipulates this.)

How many years after death does copyright expire?

my country's copyright law stipulates that after the 50th anniversary of the author's death, the copyright will no longer be protected. Canada, New Zealand, and most countries in Asia and Africa also protect according to this period; but in most EU members, such as the United States, Brazil, Israel, Nigeria, Russia, Turkey and other countries, the copyright protection will not be lost until 70 years after the death of the author.

The United States also has a special protection: works created between 1923 and 1977 have an extra-long protection period of 95 years.

After the copyright protection expires, the work enters the public domain (described later), and anyone can use it freely under the premise of maintaining the integrity of the work.

In "Titanic" in 1997, Picasso's masterpiece "The Girl of Avignon" appeared in the camera. But at that time, director Cameron did not have the relevant authorization. Cameron, at the urging of the American Artists Copyright Society (which protects the copyrights of more than 50,000 artists and their works, including Picasso's), after the film's screening, agreed to sponsor the use of "Avignon." "Girl" to pay the corresponding copyright fees.

"The Girl of Avignon" was created in 1907. Picasso died in 1973, and his family continued to hold the copyright of the work until 2043. If anyone wants to use the image of this painting on the website, promotional materials, design products and film and television productions, they must obtain the consent of the Picasso family.

After 15 years, the 3D version of "Titanic" returned to the screen. Since the 3D version of "Titanic" is a newly produced film, the copyright society hopes to re-sign the agreement with Cameron to use Picasso's works. Unfortunately, an agreement was ultimately not reached. Theodore Feder, president of the Copyright Society, said that when he went to see the 3D version of "Titanic", he noticed that in the 1997 version of "Titanic", Picasso's "Lady of Avignon" was replaced by Degas (1834-1917), while works by Degas have entered the public domain.

In my opinion, copyright protection lasts for 50 years after the author's death, and the economic interests of his works can basically cover grandchildren and great-grandchildren, which is enough.

About copyright personal rights

The personal right of copyright refers to the various rights that the author enjoys over his works that are related to the person and have no direct property content, so it is also called the moral right of the work.

The personal right of copyright is enjoyed by the author for life, and is non-transferable, inalienable, and unrestricted.

The "Copyright Law" stipulates that the moral rights of copyright include:

1. The right of publication, the right to decide whether the work is published to the public.

2. The right of signature, the right to sign on the work.

3. The right to modify, the right to modify or authorize others to modify the work. For example, if I do not have authorization, others cannot modify what I wrote, even typos cannot be modified in theory.

4. The right to protect the integrity of the work, that is, the right to protect the work from distortion and tampering.

These rights are non-transferable and not directly related to property rights.

About software copyright

In my country, the laws and regulations applicable to software copyright include: "Civil Code of the People's Republic of China", "Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China", "Computer Software Protection Regulations" (formulated by the State Council), "Computer Software Copyright Registration Measures" (formulated by the National Copyright Administration) ).

Of course, software copyright is also automatically obtained, but you can also register with the "China Copyright Protection Center" to obtain a "software copyright registration certificate" in case of emergency. For example, when defending rights, when using copyright as a high-tech capital contribution, when transferring, auctioning, and pledging copyright, when applying for scientific and technological achievements, the copyright registration certificate can be used as evidence.

What is the nature of the software license? Generally speaking, it belongs to the nature of the contract.

The "Copyright Law" stipulates that the author can conclude a license contract with the user, and agree on the user's rights, liability for breach of contract, etc.

Article 24 of the Copyright Law:

To use other people's works, a licensing contract shall be concluded with the copyright owner, except for those that can be used without permission as stipulated in this Law. A license contract includes the following main contents: (1) the type of licensed right; (2) whether the licensed right is exclusive or non-exclusive; (3) the geographical scope and period of licensed use; (4) Remuneration standards and methods; (5) Liability for breach of contract; (6) Other content that both parties consider necessary to be agreed upon.

A software license is such a contract.

For proprietary software licenses, copyright holders are generally more demanding on users for profit considerations, usually requiring users to only use it on a specified number of computers (including virtual machines), and not to decompile or disassemble the software , may not rent, transfer, and share the software with others.

For open source software or free software, the license is much more generous. After all, open source software is not directly used to make money, and usually allows users to run, copy, modify, and redistribute freely, but generally requires retention of copyright notices and trademarks. A copyleft license like GPL also requires users to disclose the source code of the derived program when releasing it.

The open source license itself does not sign a formal contract with the user. Some people may doubt whether this is a contract, but it is generally believed that the author's release of the source code with the license is equivalent to an offer, and the user's use of the open source code is equivalent to an action to express a commitment , so the contract is established and takes effect. ²

About "Public Domain"

If a work falls into the "public domain", it means giving up all rights (not even authorship rights), and everyone in the world can use it at will.

Two common routes into the public domain: the death of the author to meet the number of years required by law; the voluntary relinquishment of copyright by the copyright holder.

On February 7, 2017, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met) in New York announced a major "big benefit" in the art circle - the high-definition pictures of its collection of 375,000 pieces are open to the public for free under the CC0 agreement. This means that no matter artists, designers, teachers, students, professionals or amateurs, as long as they need it, anyone can download it for free and use and share it without restriction.

Although The Met did not say, based on previous knowledge, we can speculate that the authors of these artworks should have been dead for 70 years, and these works were not created between 1923 and 1977.

As mentioned earlier, the museum only has the right to exhibit these works of art, and does not own the copyright of these works. If the copyright of the works is still valid, The Met has no right to publish the photographs of these works of art, because these photographs involve Copyright of these artworks.

Only if the copyright of these works of art has fallen into the public domain, The Met can safely release the copyright of these photography works and put them into the public domain.

Thomas Campbell, curator of The Met, said that the total number of art collections is about 1.5 million. Today, the 375,000 images available for free download include the main collection of the museum, and another 65,000 art collections have been digitized, but due to copyright factors Temporarily closed to the public domain.

Now, more and more museums are joining the ranks. The National Palace Museum in Taipei, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Rijksmuseum, and the British Museum have all released images and figures of some of their collections. resource.

About CC and CC0

The CC (Creative Commons) project was founded by Professor Lawrence Lessig at Stanford University in the United States in 2001. Its goal is to "face the growing restrictions of copyright laws and promote knowledge sharing in participatory culture".

The CC series of agreements are mainly used for text or artistic works, but in theory, CC can be applied to all works protected by copyright law.

CC requires users to abide by four conditions of use: signature (BY), non-commercial (NC), non-modification (ND) and share-alike (SA). The first three are easy to understand. SA means that if you make changes and innovations to the work, you need to use the same agreement to publish your work.

According to the combination of these conditions, CC mainly has these 6 different agreements: CC BY, CC BY-SA, CC BY-ND, CC BY-NC, CC BY-NC-SA, CC BY-NC-ND. There are legal texts and human-language versions of these six agreements on CC's website ^{3 , and those who are interested can go and have a look.}

According to the definition of copyleft, CC BY-SA is a copyleft agreement, see this article for details .

In addition to the above 6 types, there is also a protocol called CC0 (Creative Commons Zero), which does not impose any conditions on users. Using CC0 means that the author has given up all rights, which means it has fallen into the public domain.

CC0 is most used for picture works, and many picture library websites provide CC0 works exclusively. It is safer to use such images, after all, no one wants to be constantly troubled by copyright infringement claims.

The legal text of CC0 reads: "To the maximum extent permitted by law, and without violating any relevant laws, the declarant hereby publicly, completely, permanently, irrevocably and unconditionally waives and Assign all its copyrights, related rights and any related known or unknown, existing and future claims or litigation demands to this work".

The picture below is a CC0 picture. (from cc0.cn website)

https://searchsecurity.techtarget.com.cn/whatis/11-25126
https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/144827875
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/

*The source of the picture in this article is the original text, if there is any infringement, please contact to delete it!

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