RE: Client woes..

Mike,

You are correct.

Copyright law varies from country to country, just as enforcement varies 
among the countries.  Generally speaking, (Disclaimer - I am not a lawyer.) 
the Australian and USA intent of the law is the same - once something is 
created, it is protected by copyright.

However, in the USA if you wish to protect your work, you must display the 
copyright symbol and register your work before you can effect an action 
against infringement.  You also stand a better chance to recover damages, 
and greater damages, against an infringer if you register your copyright as 
soon as possible.

Yeah, so, what good does it do on the Internet because so many rip off the 
works of others all the time?  Is it worth the effort?

Well, if you publish a work without a copyright notice, you effectively 
give up all your rights from the getgo.  If someone sees your work, and 
finds no copyright notice, it's fair game from them to steal it, publish it 
and copyright it, ... and you are out of luck.  It's even possible for them 
to sue *you* for copyright infringement, and win, because you took no steps 
to protect your own work.  If someone thinks their creativity is not even 
worth protecting via the display of the copyright, perhaps they deserve 
such an insult.


Dennis


At 12:16 2001-10-23 +1000, Mike Kear wrote:
>I thought whether you have copyright notice or not makes no difference to
>whether the site is copyrighted.  Regardless of the presence of a statement,
>it's copyrighted.  All you have to do to protect your rights is to be able
>to prove that YOU did the work, and it wasn't as Work For Hire.    Having
>the statement on there only helps to deter people from ripping it off, and
>makes it easier later on to prove that you never intended for the content to
>be public domain.  But it isn't essential.
>
>Or have I got the wrong idea here?
>
>Cheers,
>Mike Kear
>Windsor, NSW, Australia
>AFP WebWorks
>
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Ben Russo" <i.am.ben(at)sympatico.ca>
>To: "HWG Techniques" <hwg-techniques(at)hwg.org>
>Sent: Monday, October 22, 2001 9:54 PM
>Subject: Client woes..
>
>
> > Hey...
> >
> > I'm having issues about the copyright on a site I just finished.  Without
> > warning, they ripped off the copyright.  I asked them (kindly) to put it
> > back, they said no.
> >
> > One major problem is there is no contract on this project.  It was a
>favour,
> > and it turned ugly.  Lesson learned:  Do NOTHING unless it's been signed
> > for.
> >
> > Anyway.  I saw some talk about this sort of thing before.  Just wondering
>if
> > those people could enlighten me a bit about this.
> >
> > I want the copyright on.  They don't.  I figure there might be some legal
> > action I can take.  We're both in the same city, so we'd fall under the
>same
> > laws.  So I'm hoping I'm the victim because I'm the artist and they ripped
> > my signature off.  Do I have any rights, or am I just dreaming?
> >
> > Please email me and not the list, cause we are off topic.
> >
> > and THANKS!!!
> >
> > - Ben
> >
> >
> >


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