📚 node [[copyright law]]

Copyright Law

Protects expression, not ideas.

  • Relatively long duration. Life of the author plus 70 years in the U.S.
  • Software is considered a literary work.
  • [[Fair use]] is not considered infringement.
  • Registration is not required. Ownership immediately vests in the author. But in the U.S., registration is a prerequisite for filing a legal claim of infringement.
  • [[Joint authorship]] is an interesting doctrine that tries to distinguish an author receiving assistance versus the existence of a second author with shared legal ownership.
  • Transfers must be in writing, but licenses may be oral, or even just implied.
  • [[notice-and-takedown]] strikes an interesting balance and has stood the test of time in the U.S., having existed more or less unchanged since 1998.
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