1. A copyright is a legal device that gives the creator of a literary, artistic, musical, or other creative work
the sole right to publish and sell that work. Copyright owners have the right to control the reproduction
of their work, including the right to receive payment for that reproduction. An author may grant or sell
those rights to others, including publishers or recording companies. Violation of a copyright is called
infringement.
Copyright is distinct from other forms of creator protection such as Patents, which give inventors
exclusive rights over use of their inventions, and Trademarks, which are legally protected words or
symbols or certain other distinguishing features that represent products or services. Similarly, whereas a
patent protects the application of an idea, and a trademark protects a device that indicates the provider
of particular services or goods, copyright protects the expression of an idea. Whereas the operative
notion in patents is novelty, so that a patent represents some invention that is new and has never been
made before, the basic concept behind copyright is originality, so that a copyright represents something
that has originated from a particular author and not from another. Copyrights, patents, and trademarks
are all examples of what is known in the law as Intellectual Property.
As the media on which artistic and intellectual works are recorded have changed with time, copyright
protection has been extended from the printing of text to many other means of recording original
expressions. Besides books, stories, periodicals, poems, and other printed literary works, copyright may
protect computer programs; musical compositions; song lyrics; dramas; dramatico-musical
compositions; pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works; architectural works; written directions for
pantomimes and choreographic works; motion pictures and other audiovisual works; and sound
recordings.
on
Legal monopoly that protects published or unpublished original work (for the duration of its author's life
plus 50 years) from unauthorized duplication without due credit and compensation.
Copyright covers not only books but also advertisements, articles, graphic
designs, labels, letters (including emails), lyrics, maps, musical compositions, product designs, etc.
According to the major international intellectual-propertyprotection treaties (Berne Convention,
Universal Copyright Convention, and WIPO Copyright Treaty) five rights are associated with a copyright:
the right to: (1) Reproduce the work in any form, language, or medium. (2) Adapt or derive
more works from it. (3) Make and distribute its copies. (4) Perform it in public. (5) Display or exhibit it in
public. To acquire a valid copyright, a work must have originality and some modicum of creativity.
However, what is protected under copyright is the 'expression' or 'embodiment' of an idea, and not the
idea itself. A copyright is not equivalent of legal-prohibition of plagiarism (which is an unethical and
unprofessional conduct, but not an offense), and does not apply to factual information.
Read more: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/copyright.html#ixzz2Z7iX0RFq

2. Who Owns the Copyright in a Work?
The copyright in a work of authorship immediately becomes the property of the author who created it
at the moment it is put into fixed form. No one but the author can claim copyright to the work, unless
the author grants rights to others in a written agreement (such as to the author's publisher or record
company). Usually, you can tell who the author of a work is -- the person who created it. But sometimes,
it is not quite that easy.
TRADEMARK
A trademark is a device, word or combination of words, or symbol that
indicates the source or ownership of a product or service. A trademark
can be a name, such as Adidas, or a symbol, such as McDonald's golden
arches, or it can be a combination of the two, such as when the NIKE
name is written with the "swoosh" symbol beneath it. In very limited
cases, a shape or even a distinctive color can become a trademark.
People rely on trademarks to make informed decisions about the
products they buy. A trademark acts as a guarantee of the quality and
origin of a particular good. A competing manufacturer may not use
another company's trademark. The owner of a trademark may
challenge any use of the mark that infringes upon the owner's rights.
The presence of trademark protection for the name or logo of a
company or product is often indicated by the small symbol of an R in a
circle placed near the trademark. The R means that the mark is a
registered trademark and is a warning that the law prevents
unauthorized use of it. A party may indicate that it is claiming rights to a
particular mark by displaying a TM rather than an R symbol. Marks
bearing the TM symbol are not registered, but the presence of the
symbol shows an intent to register.

3. The U.S. patent system is designed to encourage inventions that are
useful to society by granting inventors the absolute right to exclude all
others from using or profiting from their invention for a limited time, in
exchange for disclosing the details of the invention to the public. Once
a patent has expired, the public then has the right to make, use, or sell
the invention.
Once a patent is granted, it is regarded as the Personal Property of the
inventor. An inventor's property rights in an invention itself are freely
transferable and assignable. Often employees who invent something in
the course and scope of their employment transfer and assign their
property rights in the invention to their employer. In addition, a patent
holder, or patentee, can grant a license to another to use the invention
in exchange for payment or a royalty.
Inventors are not required to participate in the patent system, and they
can elect instead to try to keep their invention a trade secret. However,
if the inventor begins to sell his or her invention or allows the public to
use it, others can study the invention and create impostor products. If
this happens, the original inventor has no protection because he or she
did not obtain a patent.
There are three types of patents: (1) design patents, (2) plant patents,
and (3) utility patents. Design patents are granted to protect a unique
appearance or design of an article of manufacture, whether it is surface
ornamentation or the overall configuration of an object. Plant patents
are granted for the invention and asexual reproduction of a new and
distinct variety of plant, including mutants and hybrids. Utility patents
are perhaps the most familiar, applying to machines, chemicals, and
processes.

4. ……….
Intellectual property describes a wide variety of property created by
musicians, authors, artists, and inventors. The law of intellectual
property typically encompasses the areas of Copyright, Patents, and
trademark law. It is intended largely to encourage the development of
art, science, and information by granting certain property rights to all
artists, which include inventors in the arts and the sciences. These
rights allow artists to protect themselves from infringement, or the
unauthorized use and misuse of their creations. Trademarks and service
marks protect distinguishing features (such as names or package
designs) that are associated with particular products or services and
that indicate commercial source.
Copyright laws have roots in eighteenth-century English Law.
Comprehensive patent laws can be traced to seventeenth-century
England, and they have been a part of U.S. law since the colonial
period. The copyright and patent concepts were both included in the
U.S. Constitution. Under Article I, Section 8, Clause 8, of the
Constitution, "The Congress shall have 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." The firsttrademark laws were passed by Congress in
the late nineteenth century, and they derive their constitutional
authority from the Commerce Clause.
The bulk of intellectual Property Law is contained in federal statutes.
Copyrights are protected by the Copyright Act (17 U.S.C.A. §§ 101 et
seq. [1994]); patents are covered in the Patent Act (35 U.S.C.A. §§ 101
et seq. [1994]), and trademark protection is provided by the Lanham

5. Act (also known as the Trademark Act) (15 U.S.C.A. §§ 1501 et seq.
[1994]).
Many people tend to blend the issues, but these are very separate
concepts.
Plagiarism is an ethical concept based on community standards. In
academic contexts it is
perceived as a serious violation of academic honesty. Plagiarism can be
intentional and
unintentional. It is intentional when a writer seeks to deceive the
audience by claiming work as
one’s own production that was not created but stolen or “borrowed”
from another, with little
or no attribution of that fact, or “created” citations that are unrelated
to the quotations. On
the other hand, unintentional plagiarism can result from failing to cite
or cite adequately a
source or from a mis-use of the summary or paraphrase of a cited
source. See
http://library.duke.edu/research/citing/index.html.
At Concordia University Texas, we use primarily three citation styles:
APA for science and social
science research; MLA for literary research; and Chicago1

6. for historical or theological research.
Check with your professors/instructors about which they prefer. In the
“Research Guides and
Tutorials” section of the CTX Library web page there are a variety of
links to support all of these
styles, or check at the links below:
http://www.concordia.edu/sitefiles/w3/Library/APA.pdf (for
APA), http://www.concordia.edu/sitefiles/w3/Library/mla.pdf (for
MLA), or
http://www.concordia.edu/sitefiles/w3/Library/Chicago%20printed%2
0handout.pdf (for
Chicago).
Consequences are determined by the community (e.g., the CTX Student
Handbook policies) and
are influenced by factors such as intentionality, repetition, and intent to
harm or cheat.
Plagiarizing can lower your grade or even result in your being asked to
leave CTX if repeated.
Copyright is a legal concept to protect “original works of authorship
fixed in a tangible medium
of expression” in order to encourage the production of those works and
at the same time

7. limiting those rights to allow the free flow of ideas in a way that
benefits society. It is
determined by legislative law and court rulings. It began as common
law (customs of a society
recognized and enforced by legal judgments and decrees) and has
evolved over time into black
letter law (general and accepted legal principles, enforced by the court
and passed by
legislatures). The most important copyright law is the 1976 law, which
sets forth the rights of
the rights holders of copyright:
Five Pillars or rights of the Copyright Holder:
1) reproduction,
2) adaptation,
3) publication,
1 Turabian, an earlier and somewhat simplified version of Chicago, is
also used by historians and theologians.
Again, check with your instructors/professors. Here is a link to basic
issues in Turabian:
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/books/turabian/turabian_citationguid
e.html4) performance, and
5) display.

8. These rights include both the right to do something (e.g., adapting a
movie from a play) and
preventing others from doing that act. A violation of any of the
exclusive rights of the copyright
holder is said to be a copyright infringement. To learn more about
copyright:
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf
Consequences
Violating copyright here or internationally (putting something under
copyright on the Internet
opens you to copyright laws in other countries, some of which are
much more complex than
ours) is a legal violation that may land you in court and can result in
huge fines per
infringement (one bad decision might include several infringements)
and even jail time.
Note also that copyright doesn’t cover every use of these items. There
are societal benefits to
limiting copyright, especially in academic and scholarly contexts. The
main exemptions to
copyright are fair use and the limits that allow items over time to be
determined to be in the
public domain.

9. Fair Use
There are various times when the reproduction of a particular work
may be considered fair,
such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and
research. Four factors
must be “balanced” to determine whether or not a use is fair:
1. The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is
of
commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes
2. The nature of the copyrighted work
3. The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the
copyrighted
work as a whole
4. The effect of the use upon the potential market for, or value of, the
copyrighted
work
That a use is “fair” can ultimately only be determined by the courts.
However, if you can
document with something like the fair use evaluator that your intent
was to abide by these
factors and you document that fact, it helps your claim. Note: citing a
source, acknowledging

10. the source, of the copyrighted material does not replace or exempt you
from obtaining
permission. Need more help? Contact the Library at (512) 313-5050 |
library@concordia.edu
02/2012 Concordia University Texas Library
Public Domain
A work of authorship is in the “public domain” if it is no longer under
copyright protection or if
it failed to meet the requirements for copyright protection. Works in
the public domain may be
used freely without the permission of the former copyright owner. See
the “Is it under
copyright?” slider.
Common Student Copyright and Plagiarism Errors
Thinking that if I can do it, that it is okay (copyright infringement):
e.g., sharing of audio files that are under copyright via a computer
network or the Internet
without the permission of the rightsholder.
e.g., scanning chapters of a library book to your email and then sharing
them with other
members of your class.

11. Thinking that if I’m given one kind of permission it is total permission
(confusing copyright
with plagiarism and vice versa):
e.g., since something is in “the public domain” according to a web site
and can be used without
penalty, you don’t have to put the words in quotation marks or include
a citation (public
domain is copyright permission; citations fall under plagiarism).
e.g. since you cited something, thinking that you have met the
requirements of copyright
(citations relate to plagiarism, not copyright)