Copyright LawsCopyright law is defined as the legal foundation protecting the work of major industries. These include the publications of books, movies, software, and music recordings. A copyright occurs automatically after two things. The first being the creation of original work and the second is that work being created and recorded into a tangible expression. So what are copyright laws, and where did they come from? Before the printing press was invented in the 15th century, there was no such thing as copyright laws. There was not much need for these types of laws before then. Very few people knew how to read, and the publication of books was extremely expensive and time consuming. Copyright Laws were first seen in 1709 when the British Parliament passed a modern law that governed copyright protection. This was known as "the Statue of Ann", named after Queen Ann who reigned from 1702 to 1714. This statue gave authors the exclusive right to print and reprint their books for a set number of years. Since then copyright laws have been amended several times all around the word. These include the Copyright Act of 1976 and 1985 in the United States. When the U.S. Constitution was drafted in 1787 the constitutional convention delegates where familiar with the Statue of Anne and wanted to draft the importance of copyrights into the constitution. They knew this would encourage authors to create new literature. Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution gives the United States Congress the power "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times, to authors and inventors, the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." This wording may be a little confusing, as with a lot of the rest of the constitution, but in short this gave the United States government the power to create and enforce copyright laws. The first copyright law in the United States was adopted in 1790. As new inventions developed, copyright laws were further amended. A major revision occurred in 1909 which remained active until 1978, and then replaced by the copyright Act of 1976. This too has been amended a few times but remains the legal basis of copyright laws today. The 1976 act is what established the idea that copyright laws come into effect as soon as work is permanent. Such as written down or recorded. Under this law copyright protection remained in effect for the lifetime of the author plus 50 years. In 1998 The United States Congress enacted the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, also known as CTEA. This act extended the term of the copyright protection up to 70 years past the life of the author. | |
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