Copyright ©
The battle between intellectual property and freedom of speech today is what Marx referred to as “contradiction”. This battle represents a conflict in the spheres of culture, politics and law. “A conflict of interests and a conflict of values” (Balkin, 2004, p.14).
The digital transformation offered a technical infrastructure that increased the opportunities of the individual to cultural participation and expressions of thoughts which created a democratized atmosphere. Intellectual property protection includes digital rights management arrangements, technological devices that stop copying of and regulate access towards digital content (Balkin, 2004, p.5)
What’s the first thing that pops into your mind when you hear the word “copyright”? Most of us believe that copyright regulations exist to protect our ideas and creativity. Actually, copy right law is there to protect what has been expressed out of this idea.
We tend to believe that only copyright law covers creative work like movies, literature or art that requires a threshold of creativity. In fact, according to the Supreme Court the level of creativeness needed is very low “no matter how crude, humble or obvious”. Thus, for a work to be protected by the copyright law it has to be “original, fixed in a tangible medium of expression and moderately creative”. Also, the Supreme Court has clarified that “originality does not signify novelty”. (Packard, 2013, p. 162)
Therefore, what copyright law protects is the original work of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression. (Packard, 2013, p.166)
History of Copyright Law
1978 — (Packard, 2013, p. 173)
copyright of a work lasted for the entire life of a creator and additional 70 years.
A work of an anonymous or pseudonymous is protected 95 years post publication or 120 years post work creation.
1988 — (Packard, 2013, p. 173)
Copyright protection was stretched additionally by 20 years.
1993 — (Packard, 2013, p. 173)
EU members had their work protected by Copyright law law throughout their entire lifetime and additional 70 years.
In USA copyright protected lasted also 50 years after the authors death. Later, the Congress extended the protected duration 20 to guarantee protection for work produced by American in EU countries.
Today
The copyright law differs between countries.
USA: “Copyright in a work created on or after January 1, 1978, subsists from its creation and, except as provided by the following subsections, endures for a term consisting of the life of the author and 70 years after the author’s death.” — Copyright Law of the United States
Lebanon: Article 49: “The term of protection granted under this Law to the economic rights of the author, shall be the life of the author and 50 years after his death, to be computed from the end of the year in which the death has occurred.” — Lebanese Law on the Protection of Literary and Artistic Property
Copyright is the most directly applicable to digital media products. It protects all forms of art, literature, music, video, imagery, sound recording, architectural work, sculptural and software that a digital artist or producer is likely to create.
“No area in the law has been affected by digital media more than intellectual property” (Packard, 2013, p.163). We now own smart machines that allow us to “copy, modify, annotate, collate, transmit and distribute content by storing it in a digtal form” at low costs (Balkin, 2004, p.6).
Balkin (2004) believes that copyright laws stands as an obstacle for the individual’s cultural participation. But what about intellectuals and their property? Aren’t their creations and productions must be protected from thieves just like their personal stuff like cars and money?
Here are some copyright violation with Harry Potter novel/film series.
Harry Potter is a well known series of fantasy/fiction novels written by J.K Rowling, a british author. Harry Potter novels were then made as film series, distributed by Warner bros and consisteed of eight fantasy films.
J.K Rowling build an empire with her unlimited imagination. Her brilliant idea of Harry Potter tranformed her life from being extremely poor to extremely rich. According to the The 2017 Forbes list of the world’s highest-paid authors, Rowling gets paid 95m$. Yes, Rowling has a lot of money now, but this empire she built was not earned easily. Rowling has suffered a lot in her life before reaching success. What changed her life is this one fantastic idea that was inspired by her life events. Hence, copy right laws come her as a guardian to her empire? So why not practice her rights fully?
1- Unethical Inspiration
According to the Legal Language Services, Steven Vander Ark, a librarian, came up with a website called “The Harry Potter Lexicon” that collected and organized all facts of Harry Potter series. Rowling admired the site for it was extraordinarily comprehensive.
But when a publishing company attempted to publish Ark’s collection as a book called “The Harry Potter Lexicon”, Rowling did not accept the books publishing for she wanted to publish her own Harry Potter encyclopedia someday.
The copyright lawsuit took a long of time but later in 2009 an accepted verison of Ark’s Lexicon was published with the title of “The Lexicon: An Unauthorised Guide To Harry Potter Fiction”.
Ark’s work came out of inspiration from the story of Harry Potter. But what the publishing company did was unethical for it misued this inspirational work for money purposes.
In an interview by Tom Leonar with Rowling in New York. Rowling stated “the book violated her copyright and “constitutes wholesale theft of 17 years of my hard work”.
2- Domain Name Violations:
Title and Names: Tittle and names cannot be copyrighted, which is why so many works carry the same name. However, some titles and names receive protection under the trademark law… or laws related to unfair competition. (Packard, 2013, p.166)
Before the releasment of the 1st film “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” a website that included “Harry Potter” in its URL exsited. Warner Bros. company did not accept this and immediately sent messages to the website owners about their violations to them as copyright holders and asked them to change the website’s name.
Criticism was being thrown on Warner and Bros. company over their action for many of the sites including the title “Harry Potter” are fan webpages mastered by Harry Potter fans teenagers. Afterwards, Warner Bros did allow “Harry Potter” usage for fan pages as long as they were non-moneymaking websites.
3- Parody or Inspiration ?
Rowling and her publishers have sued against international authors who wrote inspirational Harry Potter novels. The authors argued that they did not steal but imitated the style of Harry Potter. A lot of the courts accepted the argument of the international authors for readers are able to read such fiction novels also when traveling aboard. Some of the books sued by Rowling and her published were:
- “Tanya Grotter and the Magical Double Bass” by Dmitri Yemets, published in Russia
- “Porri Gatter and the Stone Philosopher” by Andreyi Zhvalevskiyi and Igor Miyt’ko, published in Belarus
- “Barry Trotter and the Shameless Parody” by Michael Gerber, published in the United Kingdom
Looking at greater achievements inspire your ideas and work. So what was wrong with what those international authors did? Why Rowling does not accept the fact that she’s an inspiration for a lot of authors by her style, work and imagination. In other words, she’s a school of fiction and literature.
Copyright law is a controversial argument. The creativity of some individuals like J.K Rowling inspire a lot of people. People tend to look up to them for motivation and encouragement. Such people feed people’s wills for a better tomorrow. Intellectuals must know that they inspire others and others, not in all cases, are not thieves but rather admires. This however does not give poeple the right to administer others properties (ideas, creatitions) as their own properties.
Sources:
Packard, Ashley (2013) ‘Intellectual Property: Copyright’ in Digital Media Law, Wiley-Blackwell, Hoboken, NJ
Balkin (2004) “Digital Speech and Democratic Culture” in New York University Law review, Vol 79
Lebanon “Law on the Protection of Literary and Artistic Property”, (№75 of April 3, 1999)
Copyright Law of the United States and Related Laws Contained in Tıtle 17 of the United States Code
Leonard, Tom (2008) “JK Rowling wins copyright battle over Harry Potter lexicon” in The Telegraph
Katherine (2006) “Harry Potter and the… Copyright Violations?” in Legal Languages Services
Flood, Alison (2017), “JK Rowling’s return to Harry Potter makes her world’s richest author in 2017” in The Gaurdian
