Copyright law protects certain classes of creative activities. Protected works are collectively termed “copyright works”. If there is one area of law that webmasters need to come to terms with, it’s copyright law.
The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act has two main purposes:
- To ensure people are rewarded for their endeavours
- To give protection to the copyright holder if someone tries to copy or steal their work.
The online law of copyright is the same as the offline law. The website is conceptualised in English law as a collection of copyright works, legally distinct even if actually intermingled. Literary copyright protects website text, as well as HTML and programme code; artistic copyright protects images and photos; musical copyright and sound recording copyright protect music hosted on a site; and copyright or database right (a close relative of copyright) may protect datasets of database-backed sites. The complexity of copyright protection in a single website can be daunting.
Restricted acts:
It is an offence to perform any of the following acts without the consent of the owner:
- Copy the work.
- Rent, lend or issue copies of the work to the public.
- Perform, broadcast or show the work in public.
- Adapt the work.
The author of a work, or a director of a film may also have certain moral rights:
- The right to be identified as the author.
- Right to object to derogatory treatment.
Acts that are allowed
Fair dealing is a term used to describe acts which are permitted to a certain degree without infringing the work, these acts are:
- Private and research study purposes.
- Performance, copies or lending for educational purposes.
- Criticism and news reporting.
- Incidental inclusion.
- Copies and lending by librarians.
- Format shifting or back up of a work you own for personal use.
- Caricature, parody or pastiche.
- Acts for the purposes of royal commissions, statutory enquiries, judicial proceedings and parliamentary purposes.
- Recording of broadcasts for the purposes of listening to or viewing at a more convenient time, this is known as “time shifting”.
- Producing a back up copy for personal use of a computer programme.
The centrepiece of UK copyright legislation is the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This statute sets out details of when copyright arises, who owns copyright, how copyright can be transferred, and when copyright may be infringed. It is well drafted, and the starting point for research into most practical questions of UK copyright law.
Myths
“I didn’t know so I’m not guilty”
You won’t get way with saying ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t know’. If you copy things and pass them off as your own, you are guilty of breaching Copyright.
“If it doesn’t have a copyright notice, it is not copyrighted.”
Nope, you won’t get away with this one either. Any original work is copyright, whether it has a copyright notice on or not. If something looks copyright then you should assume that it is.
“If I don’t charge for it, I can copy it”
False. It doesn’t matter if you charge someone or not, copying is copying is copying, whichever way you look at it.
Breaking the copyright laws can result in very heavy penalties – you can get a hefty fine and even get sent to jail!
The main online copyright law resources
- Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 – The UK’s principal piece of copyright law (link opens in a new window).
- Directive 2001/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 May 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright law and related rights in the information society – aka the Copyright Directive (opens a PDF).
- Directive 96/9/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 1996 on the legal protection of databases – This measure was implemented in UK law through The Copyright and Rights in Databases Regulations 1997 (link opens in a new window).
- Council Directive of 14 May 1991 on the legal protection of computer programmes (91/250/EEC) – (opens a new window).
Other online law resources
- 10 Things Webmasters Should Know About… Copyright – The Website Law guide for webmasters (opens a new window).
- Copyright FAQ – From the Arts and Humanities Data Service (opens a new window).
- The UK Intellectual Property Office’s copyright pages – The UK IPO website pages on copyright law, which include a wide range of copyright-related resources (opens a new window).
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