Copyright refers to the legal right of the owner of intellectual property to control copying of an original work. A creative commons license allows the copyright owner to specify terms for how others can use and share the work, such as requiring attribution or prohibiting commercial use. There are six main types of creative commons licenses that vary based on conditions like requiring attribution, allowing modifications, and restricting commercial or non-commercial use. A creative commons license provides broad rights to use and share works consistently with the specified license terms in order to facilitate sharing and derivative works.

1. Legal and ethical issues –
copyright and creative
common licence
Submitted by
ASHA A M
No. 26
Physical science

2. COPYRIGHT
Copyright refers to the legal right of the owner of intellectual property.
In simpler terms, copyright is the right to copy. This means that the
original creators of products and anyone they give authorization to are
the only ones with the exclusive right to reproduce the work.
Copyright law gives creators of original material the exclusive right to
further use and duplicate that material for a given amount of time, at
which point the copyrighted item becomes public domain.
When someone creates a product that is viewed as original and that
required significant mental activity to create, this product becomes an
intellectual property that must be protected from unauthorized
duplication. Examples of unique creations include computer software,
art, poetry, graphic designs, musical lyrics and compositions, novels,
film, original architectural designs, website content, etc. One safeguard
that can be used to legally protect an original creation is copyright.
Copyright ownership gives the owner the exclusive right to use the
work, with some exceptions. When a person creates an original work,
fixed in a tangible medium, he or she automatically owns copyright to
the work.
Under copyright law, a work is considered original if the author created
it from independent thinking void of duplication. This type of work is
known as an Original Work of Authorship (OWA). Anyone with an
original work of authorship automatically has the copyright to that work,
preventing anyone else from using or replicating it. The copyright can be
registered voluntarily by the original owner if they would like to get an
upper hand in the legal system in the event that the need arises.

3. Not all types of work can be copyrighted. A copyright does not protect
ideas, discoveries, concepts, or theories. Brand names, logos, slogans,
domain names, and titles also cannot be protected under copyright law.
For an original work to be copyrighted, it has to be in tangible form.
This means that any speech, discoveries, musical scores, or ideas have to
be written down in physical form in order to be protected by copyright.
Many types of works are eligible for copyright protection, for example:
• Audiovisual works, such as TV shows, movies, and online videos
• Sound recordings and musical compositions
• Written works, such as lectures, articles, books, and musical
compositions
• Visual works, such as paintings, posters, and advertisements
• Video games and computer software
• Dramatic works, such as plays and musicals
Difference between copyright and trademark
Copyright is just one form of intellectual property. It is not the same as
trademark, which protects brand names, mottos, logos, and other source
identifiers from being used by others for certain purposes. It is also
different from patent law, which protects inventions.
Trademark laws protect material that is used to distinguish an
individual’s or corporation’s work from another entity. These materials
include words, phrases, or symbols—such as logos, slogans, and brand
names—which copyright laws do not cover. Patents cover inventions for
a limited period of time. Patented materials include products such as
industrial processes, machines, and chemical positions.
Rights provided by copyright
• Reproduce the work in copies or phonorecords.
• Prepare derivative works based upon the work.

4. • Distribute copies or phonorecords of the work to the public by sale
or other transfer of ownership or by rental, lease, or lending.
• Perform the work publicly if it is a literary, musical, dramatic, or
choreographic work; a pantomime; or a motion picture or other
audiovisual work.
• Display the work publicly if it is a literary, musical, dramatic, or
choreographic work; a pantomime; or a pictorial, graphic, or
sculptural work. This right also applies to the individual images of
a motion picture or other audiovisual work.
• Perform the work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission
if the work is a sound recording.
Copyright also provides the owner of copyright the right to authorize
others to exercise these exclusive rights, subject to certain statutory
limitations.
The length of copyright protection depends on when a work was created.
Under the current law, works created on or after January 1, 1978, have a
copyright term of life of the author plus seventy years after the author’s
death. If the work is a joint work, the term lasts for seventy years after
the last surviving author’s death. For works made for hire and
anonymous or pseudonymous works, copyright protection is 95 years
from publication or 120 years from creation, whichever is shorter.
Works created before 1978 have a different timeframe. Learn more
about copyright duration in our Duration of Copyrights Circular.
Copyright registration
Copyright exists automatically in an original work of authorship once it
is fixed, but a copyright owner can take steps to enhance the protections.
The most important step is registering the work. Registering a work is
not mandatory, but for U.S. works, registration (or refusal) is necessary
to enforce the exclusive rights of copyright through litigation. Timely
registration also allows copyright owners to seek certain types of
monetary damages and attorney fees if there is a lawsuit, and also

5. provide a presumption that information on the registration certificate is
correct.
Copyright registration also provides value to the public overall. It
facilitates the licensing marketplace by allowing people to find copyright
ownership information, and it provides the public with notice that
someone is claiming copyright protection. It also provides a record of
this nation’s creativity.

6. CREATIVE COMMONS LICENSE
A creative commons license is a license issued by the copyright owner
to allow anyone in the world to use his or her copyright work in any
manner consistent with that license. Creative Commons licenses are
essentially standard form license agreements which can be attached to a
work to enable its use under certain circumstances without the need to
contact the author or negotiate terms of use.
Every time a work is created, such as when a journal article is written or
a photograph taken, that work is automatically protected by copyright.
Copyright protection prevents others from using the work in certain
ways, such as copying the work or putting the work online.
CC licenses let you easily change your copyright terms from the default
of “all rights reserved” to “some rights reserved.” They are legal tools to
give permission in advance to share and use your work – on conditions
of one’s choice.
Standard rights and obligations
CC provides six core licences, each of which allow members of the
public to use the material in different ways. While there are different CC
licences, all CC licences include certain standard rights and obligations.
There are six types of Creative Commons licenses: CC BY, CC BY-SA,
CC BY-NC, CC BY-ND, CC BY-NC-SA, CC BY-NC-ND.
The letter pairs indicate conditions for use.

7. CC BY is the most open license. It allows the user to redistribute, to
create derivatives, such as a translation, and even use the publication for
commercial activities, provided that appropriate credit is given to the
author (BY) and that the user indicates whether the publication has been
changed.
CC BY-SA is also an open license. The letters SA (share alike) indicate
that the adjusted work should be shared under the same reuse rights, so
with the same CC license.
NC (non-commercial use) and ND (no derivative works) are conditions
that make the CC licenses more restrictive and thus less open.
• Attribution;
• Attribution – ShareAlike;
• Attribution – No Derivatives;
• Attribution – NonCommercial;
• Attribution – NonCommercial – ShareAlike; and
• Attribution – NonCommercial – No Derivatives.
The Creative Commons form licenses are particularly useful for people
who want to share their work as broadly as possible on the Internet.
Rights granted are broad and are intended to facilitate sharing as well as
mashups and derivative works. Although some creators find Creative
Commons licenses useful for expanding access to their works, this may
not be the appropriate approach to take with works you think may have a
commercial value you may be interested in exploiting now or in the
future.
As long as the use of the work is consistent with the license, a Creative
Commons licenses attaches to the work and authorizes everyone who
comes in contact with the work to use it according to the terms of the
license. This means that if Charlie has a copy of your Creative
Commons-licensed work, Charlie can give a copy to Susan and Susan

8. will be authorized to use the work consistent with the Creative
Commons license.
User rights
Every CC licence allows you to:
• Copy the work (eg download, upload, photocopy and scan the
work)
• Distribute the work (eg provide copies of the work to teachers,
students, parents and the community)
• Display or perform the work (eg play a sound recording or film in
class, or stage a play to parents)
• Communicate the work (eg make the work available online on the
school intranet, learning management system or on a class blog)
• Format shift verbatim copies of the work (eg copy a MP3 version
of music onto a CD or an MP4 version of a film onto a DVD to
play in class).
All CC licences allow works to be used for educational purposes. As a
result, teachers and students can freely copy, share and sometimes
modify and remix a CC work without having to seek the permission of
the creator.
Finally, because Creative Commons is a non-profit organization, and not
a licensing entity, tracking of uses to ensure consistency with the license
grant and enforcement against any breaches is up to the copyright owner
electing to use the Creative Commons license. This is in contrast with
some other licensing entities and collecting societies that license specific
uses of the work of their members for particular terms and are
responsible for monitoring and ensuring compliance with license terms,
and collecting and distributing royalty payments to the authors.