I have a friend who is a successful man and he’s produced a massive amount of material on a certain subject.  He has done this for no other reason than it is his passion and what he feels is God’s calling on his life.  His material came to the attention of a non-profit organization that wanted to bring him on board and give his material a wide and vast audience.  A contract was signed.

This situation probably happens more often than we think.  The question that came to my mind when I heard the story is… Did you give them your intellectual property (IP) rights?  Why would I ask that?

Well, in a situation such as this, it is common for the author, my friend, to give up his rights in order to have the material obtain an audience.  It may be even more common for nothing to be said or signed at all in regards to the IP rights of the material.  The danger in signing away rights to material you produce is that the person, or in this case the organization, now owns them and owns how the material will be distributed.  That includes controlling how, when, and why the original author uses the material.

The danger in not having the IP rights addressed is that both sides will think they own them and that could lead to some nasty legal battles down the line.  Some might say this case is special because this is a non-profit organization and everyone should be willing to sacrifice for the greater good and no one in the organization should be able to get royalties for their IP.   In this situation, I told my friend that protecting his IP doesn’t have to be about profit or royalties.  He did not have to take royalties for his intellectual property to retain the rights.  I encouraged him to make it clear in the future who owns the rights and to make it clear on paper.

If you have a passion and that passion produces something tangible, protect what you produce.  You do not have to be in the mindset of making a buck to protect your IP.

“Listen. Can you hear it? The music. I can hear it everywhere. In the wind… in the air… in the light.  It’s all around us. All you have to do is open yourself up. All you have to do… is listen.”  This quote is from the motion picture August Rush.  The movie is about a young musical prodigy and his search for his parents.  The point that I wish to make is that there are people in this world who are born artists.  History is full of them, whether it is Beethoven, John Grisham or Picasso.  There are people who are just creative.  The great thing about copyright law is that it protects both the genius, like August, and those of us who are still on our way to creative fame.  Let’s look at some basic foundational rules of copyright law.

In a nutshell, it is a bundle of legal rights that provides the creator of a work of art, literature, or other work that conveys information or an idea protection and allows the creator the right to determine how the work is to be used.

Copyright law is designed to encourage the creation of new intellectual and artistic works.  There are three requirements for the expression to be protected by copyright; fixation (it must be written down somehow), originality, and minimal creativity.  For works dealing with words, only an author’s original words are protected.  If it is an original work, it is protected.  Even derivative works, such as screenplays can be protected.  Expressions such as music, motion pictures, graphic, and pictorial works are also protected by copyright.

There are some things that aren’t protected by copyright, such as ideas and facts. The words used to express the idea or fact are protected, but not the idea or fact itself.  It may be a bit confusing, but here is an example; Steven King writes a book using historical facts in the story.  The historical facts are not protected by copyright, but Steven King’s novel is protected to the extent that his idea has been written down in a tangible medium of expression.

A work is protected the moment it is put down on paper or fixed in a tangible form.  The copyright notice is not necessary, but an owner is highly encouraged to affix the symbol, ©, along with the publication date and copyright owner’s name to the work.  Lastly, you can register your work with the U.S. Copyright Office, which offers the most robust protection and additional advantages to the owner.

Photo credit, fotologic