So far, we’ve learnt that copyright protection will attach to your original expression automatically. But what does it mean to have copyright protection? 

Copyright law grants to a copyright owner certain exclusive rights in their work.

“Exclusive rights” in the context of copyright means that only the copyright owner or someone with the copyright owner’s permission can exercise those rights (unless the person acting is protected by a legal defence or exception – more on these soon).

The rights are:

For artistic works –

• the right to reproduce (i.e. copy) the work
• the right to publish the work
• the right to make the work available online (e.g. to post to a blog)

For literary, dramatic and musical works –

• the right to reproduce (i.e. copy) the work
• the right to publish the work
• the right to make the work available online (e.g. to post to a blog)
• the right to perform the work in public
• the right to adapt the work (e.g. to produce a screenplay for a film from a book, or to remix a song)

For sound recordings and cinematograph films –

• the right to make a copy of the sound recording or film
• the right to cause the sound recording or film to be heard or seen in public
• the right to make the recording or film available online

For published editions –

• the right is to make an exact copy of the published edition

An understanding of the exclusive rights of copyright owners goes hand-in-hand with an understanding of what it means to infringe those rights. For this reason, this week I am bringing you two posts rather than the usual one. Tomorrow I will publish a post on: ‘What is copyright infringement?’ Stay tuned!