According to the copyright videos, copyright only means having legal rights to what you create. It was amazing to find out that if I have a play that I created, if it is not in video or script form, I cannot copyright it. Be aware that if you create something, it must be script or video to have ownership. I also learned that copyright is not about usage but it is about permission to use it. For example, if an artist want to use part of another artist song, beat or lyrics, they should ask permission and pay the artist for their work. Some copyright materials are free for usage so no law will be broken if you use it, but credit should be given to the owner. It was also amazing to me to see the video Good Copy Bad Copy. I was astonished to see that music can be a copyright issue by just taking one beat from a song and changing its tempo and tone to meet your song is a copyright issue. Most artist are not creating their own beats or if so they are extremely similar to other artist. When an artist use any portion of another artist beat they need to get permission from its originator.
Copyrighting seems like it is a big deal but it is not only if you ask permission from the owner of the work. In so many words, copyright is similar to plagiarism. When writing and using text from someone else written piece, you have to cite your work which means give ownership to the original author. That is what copyrighting does for all works, materials or creations by people.
Chanda,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your straight forward explanation of copyright. I agree it is very common for artists to use and reuse beats. The issue becomes complex. I was most surprised that there is no really good way of knowing how copyright issues will be decided in the courts. Organizations creating best practices are trying to create norms and set a standard but it still remains somewhat mysterious as to how any particular case will be decided in the end. I guess the best practice is to use as little of other peoples work as we possibly can and hope we are covered by Fair Use for anything we cannot avoid using.
There is a relationship between plagiarism and copyright abuse, basically misrepresenting the work as one's own creation. Good summary.
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