Fundamentals of Digital

Copyright
CHARU SRIVASTAVA
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
Differences
Print materials •E-materials

physical ownership –no physical ownership

–license to use
–use subject to conditions (in
license)

no restrictions on use –may not have perpetual access

to licensed content
Digital Copyright in age of
Internet
 The conversion from print to digital had a profound impact on
copyright law.
 Digitization is the conversion of works to a format readable by a
machine.
 It is the ability to record works in a binary format which means that
works are converted to a sequence of ones and noughts, and are
stored and transmitted as such. A digitised work can be 'played back'
to reproduce the original analog.
 The ease of copying and the possibility of reproduction raise the
Question:
Can Copyright adjust to the Internet or should the Internet adjust to the
Copyright ?
The increase in infringement in
the digital world to three factors
1.The simplicity of digital reproduction. Digital copies, can
be done virtually without cost and at very high speed by
every person with home equipment such as a private
computer.
2. The second factor that digital works can be stored in less
space.
3. The third factor is, of course, the ease with which digital
works can be manipulated by private individuals.
This created the possibility that the names of authors can
be altered, removed or even added (thus infringing on the
author's paternity right), or that the work itself can be
altered (and thereby infringing on the author's integrity
right)
 Jurisdiction issues:
In the analogue world copyright was enforced territorially
and not globally. Copyright was viewed as having territorial
application, and the international conventions are built
upon this concept.
Notwithstanding the existence of international conventions
there is considerable variation in different countries' laws,
enforcement policies, and cultural attitudes towards
intellectual property.
 Digital copyright basics
 Images, photos and films
 Video streaming
 Text based materials
 Protecting your own work from breach of copyright
Protected Digital Works

 Individual works:
 email - audio + video clips
 digital images - online newsletter
 Compilations:
 website/blog/intranet content
 digital archives + digital library
 digital databases, wikis
 YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook
How to protect?

 Authors protect their digital works against copyright

infringement through contractual conditions and
technological protection.
Defining E-Rights

 Defined by right or media

 right of reproduction
 right to upload content
 May be called digital rights, database rights, online rights, multimedia
rights, etc.
 Define e-rights for your license agreements
What is a Digital Resource?
 Web site
 Information stored on a computer-type
device
 Desktop or laptop computer
 Digital still or video camera
 iPod, MP3 player, GPS device
 Cell phone, PDA
 Information stored on a USB drive,
DVD, or CD
Digital Reproduction Examples

 Reposting an image or article from a website

 Printing a work found online
 Saving a copy on disk, hard drive or other storage device
 Transmit a copy to another person
 Linking
 Scanning
Licensing Content

 Many companies license their content to educational and

corporate entities.
 Licensing is the right to use materials under the term of
the license agreement.
 Licenses for online content are usually for one year with
renewals needed for subsequent years of use.
 The purchaser of the license must agree to the terms of
use for that license.
What Types of Resources are
Licensed?

 Online databases such as World Book Online, e Library,

etc.
 Computer software (Microsoft Office, iWork, Adobe
Creative Suite, etc.
 Contractual conditions:
'Shrink-wrap' and 'click-wrap' agreements are examples of
contractual protection
1. In the case of a 'shrink-wrap' contract a printed standard
form agreement is affixed to the surface of a package of
computer software and sealed in a plastic wrapper. By
opening the package the purchaser accepts the offer made
on the standard form agreement and a valid contract,
separate from the contract of sale, arises
2. In the case of a 'click-wrap' agreement, the person seeking
access to the content must agree to accept (by 'click-on')
the contractual offer displayed on the computer screen
before he or she will gain access to the material. The offer
made by the author will ordinarily be in standard form: take
or leave.
Problem: Failure to fulfil the conditions on the standard form
agreement amounts to breach of contract. The problem with
this type of protection lies in the fact that it is only effective
between the parties to the contract. If a third party were to
breach one of these conditions, such person could not be held
liable in terms of the contract.
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbVSYJ-I8x8
Peer-to-Peer File Sharing

 Allows users to share files with one another

 Illegal--Napster--sharing music files
 now much digital music is properly licensed

 Napster case
E-Reserves

 Course materials are stored in e-form and may be accessed in the

library or remotely
 licenses may permit e-reserves
 fair use argument
 non-profit education -factual material
 one article in periodical (rather than whole periodical)
 limited access to e-reserves; time limited (delete at end of semester)
Technological Measures

 Technological protection measures are vulnerable to

hacking (circumvention).
 The international community accordingly concluded the
WIPO Copyright Treaty (the 'WCT) in 1996 .
 WPPT: WIPO Performances and Phonograms
Treaty
 Article 11 requires of its member states that they
should adopt legislation that would provide adequate
legal protection against the circumvention of
technological protection.
Legislations

 The provisions of Article 11 have been implemented into

national legislation by member states:
 U.S.: The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998
(DMCA) which implemented Article 11 in US copyright
law
 EC: The EC Directive on the harmonization of certain
aspects of copyright and related rights in the information
society which implemented it into EC legislation
(Directive 2001/29/EC of the European Parliament and
the Council of 22 May 2001.
 India: Section 65A & 65B of The Copyright Act, 1957
DMCA

 The provisions in the DMCA, create a new form of

liability, separate and distinct from copyright
infringement.
 By prohibiting the devices necessary to circumvent
protection measures for non-infringing purposes, it will
be impossible to perform non-infringing acts.
 The EC Directive does not prohibit the devices necessary
to circumvent for legitimate purposes.
 Copyright works on the internet enjoy a three layered
protection:
 the work is protected by law of copyright,
 then by the technological protection measures applied by
the author,
 and the protection measure itself is once again protected by
law (by the prohibition on circumvention).
Issue: The manner in which the prohibition on circumvention
has been implemented in national legislation, threatens
legitimate uses.
Technological protection
measures

 A technological protection measure can either

 control access to a work (an access control),
 or it can control use of a work once it has been accessed
(copy control).
It can be integrated in software or built into the hardware.
The best known examples of technological protection
measures are passwords and encryption.
 Hacking is another issue
Law to outlaw the hacking (or circumvention) of technological
protection measures.
This had to be done by means of legislation.
The international community accordingly concluded the WIPO
Copyright Treaty in 1996.
 Article 11 of the treaty contains the prohibition on
circumvention. It reads as follows:
Contracting Parties shall provide adequate legal protection and
effective legal remedies against the circumvention of effective
technological measures that are used by authors in connection
with the exercise of their rights under this Treaty or the Berne
Convention and that restrict acts, in respect of their works,
which are not authorized by the authors concerned or
permitted by law.
 Article 11 requires protection for both access control
technologies and copy control tech
 The requirement of 'effectiveness' introduces a
knowledge requirement. A person would thus be liable
only if he or she knowingly circumvented a protected
technological protection measures.
 The treaty thus prohibits the circumvention of a
technological protection measure if the measure is
applied to a copyrighted work, and if it prevents the
infringement of copyright in the work. As soon as a
measure meets these two requirements, it is protected.
Computer program: falls under literary work
 Test to determine copyright infringement of a program
is:
 Computer Associates v. Altai Inc. (982 F.2d 693 (2d Cir.
1992)
 “Abstraction-filtration-comparision or successive filtration
test”
 Requires to dissect programs