Copyright Law

Copyright

1. Introduction/overview of the UK copyright laws.

     Copyright is when an original work is fixed in a tangible medium, one of the several types of intellectual property (IP) protection intended to preserve the creator's, owner's, or holder's only right to claim the work as their own is copyright.

Any work that is written down, captured digitally, typewritten electronically, or that can be seen, heard, read, or handled is automatically protected by copyright, usually for a short while (Jonathan Layton, J.D.,no date).

2. How does copyright protects your work?

    Copyright shields your work and prevents their usage by others, requiring your approval for any such use, for example, if a designer creates a logo, that logo is the copyright of the creator and cant be use by others without permission.

   

3. How do I copyright my works?

 You get copyright protection automatically - you don’t have to apply or pay a fee. There isn’t a register of copyright works in the UK.

 You automatically get copyright protection when you create:

- original literary, dramatic, musical and artistic work, including illustration and photography
- original non-literary written work, such as software, web content and databases
- sound and music recordings
- film and television recordings
- broadcasts
- the layout of published editions of written, dramatic and musical works

 You can mark your work with the copyright symbol (©), your name and the year of creation. Whether you mark the work or not doesn’t affect the level of protection you have (Service, G.D., 2015).

4. How long does copyright lasts?

In the UK normally copyright takes:

 - 70 years after the death of the author for written, artistic, musical and film works.

- 50 years, for broadcast, from when the broadcast is made.

- 70 years for sound recordings and performers’ rights in sound recordings.

 (Bart, 2017)

5. How can I stop people using your work?

 While government and commercial organizations receive and handle copyright registrations, they often don't deal with accusations of copyright infringement. It is your responsibility as the author, owner, or possessor of the copyrighted content to use your legal rights to prevent further infringement.

 Perhaps the simplest and most popular way to prevent copyright infringement is to send the guilty party a so-called Copyright Infringement Notice directly (Service, G.D. (2015).

References:

1. Service, G.D. (2015) How copyright protects your work, GOV.UK. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/copyright (Accessed: 31 October 2023). 

2. Bart (2017) 2. how long does copyright last?, CopyrightUser. Available at: https://www.copyrightuser.org/faqs/question-2/ (Accessed: 31 October 2023).

3. Jonathan Layton, J.D. (no date) How to avoid copyright infringement, Legalzoom. Available at: https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/how-to-avoid-copyright-infringement (Accessed: 31 October 2023).