Two historic events have made tremendous changes in the way we disseminate information and communicate. Around 1440 German Johannes Gutenberg perfected the printing press and movable type, which made possible the mass production of books that more than just the elite could have. Almost immediately, the issues of intellectual property ownership, censorship, idea exchange and free speech popped up.
Fast forward a few centuries and those same issues affect the second event–the Internet. We are still struggling with the protection of individual works versus mass information, but this time the media is digital instead of paper.
Juggling the creator’s right to protection and the public’s right to know has always been tricky, but even more so now that anyone who has an Internet connection can express an opinion, either original or based on someone else’s work. That’s where the copyright issue comes in.
Keep in mind that even if you do not see the standard copyright wording (Copyright [date] by [author] All rights reserved) that material, whether words, music, film or any other form of expression, is automatically copyrighted on the Internet, via the international Berne Copyright Convention in 1989.
What can and can’t you do with material you find on the Internet? When you see something on the Internet that you would like to reproduce, ask the author for permission. Most likely you’ll receive a positive reply as long as you describe how you want to us the material. However, you must attribute that material to the original source author.
Use material that you like as inspiration for your own words. CAUTION – Doing a re-write is called a derivative and is still under copyright law, but you can modify an IDEA and write about that in your words.
Searching for a picture to illustrate your blog? Doing a Google search for, say, Pomeranians, and downloading a dog picture without the permission of the poster is a violation of the copyright laws.
There is the fair use issue. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has a good description of fair use, which allows using a small part of someone else’s work if the excerpt is used for a review, as a parody, a comment or a criticism. The EFF is a non-profit group that encourages digital rights and protection on an international basis.
We like Brad Templeton’s readable explanation of copyright issues. Brad is an EFF board member, Internet expert and software developer who also dabbles in photography. All around, a very interesting guy who explains complex issues in an easy-to-understand way.
In this age of instant gratification and easy access, the temptation, or just ignorance of using someone else’s work and passing it off as your own is very real. On the plus side, by honoring copyrights you can exercise your own imagination and write or produce something that is uniquely your own, and you’ll meet interesting people when you do ask for permission use their work.