Question(s) About How does Copyrighting Work Upon This Forum And/Or The WWW In General?

I hope that the problems you refer to can be resolved satisfactorily, and that you are able to rejoin the Forum in due course. 

...Just to say, a late Thank You for your Replies there, "Just Some Guy".

...I am currently going through certain problems which I shall not detail upon this Forum, & that is why I have not even seen this Forum in the past 'Four Days'. (Reasons Next to nothing to do with this Thread.) I do not know when or if these "problems" shall be resolved (...) but I just wanted to say Thanks for everyone Posting anyway. 

See you all again, sometime - My account as DC stays open, so I may come back --- I just do not know when! 

I have an online game I wrote in the early 90s still being played today. Technically someone's breaching my copyright but the cost of enforcing it would be too great and they're not making any money from it anyway. Instead I take pleasure from people still enjoying some pretty crap programming I did way back then.

I have somewhere around 5000 photographs published online. Some are reproduced on a photograph forum I frequent, but that doesn't infringe my copyright and they have no rights other than publishing on their forum. Nobody else cares, there are a billion photographs online and many of them are better than any of mine. I have nonetheless put copyright notices on my photograph website, and in the photograph metadata, and I can take action should someone misuse them. They do though have effectively no commercial value anyway.

Two of those photographs have been published in the press. That was done with my explicit permission.

I have a dozen fiction stories published online. One of them I turned into a novella and have sales on three continents. The free online versions are still available and it's inevitable that people will take copies, create archives, publish them on other websites. I could prevent this but only through expensive litigation. Instead I accept that part of creating and sharing is, well, sharing. My sales aren't damaged by the sharing and it's flattering if people want to share further. I've also had excellent feedback and support from other authors through the site on which I publish the stories.

My travelogue will become a book on my return from my next trip. Right now only friends and family even know its URL, total readership is about 20 people. If anytthing more people reading and sharing it would increase the chances of the eventual book being a success.

I have around 1400 videos on Youtube, split between two very distinct channels that between them have around 400 subscribers. Youtube have a bunch of authorised uses of those videos, and in return host 1400 videos for me. That is though the one area of copyright infringement that I'm struggling with the most. Around 1300 of those videos include background music as they capture live events, and the music cartels have as a result claimed copyright and monetised those videos. I hate this, the video isn't theirs, the video content isn't theirs and even the music in them has already been paid for three times. One day I'll create my own video site and stop using Youtube entirely, but for the moment there just aren't any other options available to me.

Everything I create, whether software, fiction, non-fiction, photographs, video, is copyright to me unless I'm doing it as part of paid employment. Much of it gets shared online, and almost none of it has its copyright infringed. I know there are people out there that download ebooks, movies, software and other media from unofficial sources and that much of this infringes copyright, but I also know that this isn't damaging me or reducing my incomes. It's part of participating in society, a consequence of contributing to culture and a healthy thing in some ways in its own right.

So I don't worry about it. Unless you're a full time professional in a creative discipline then I'd suggest you don't worry about it either. Embrace sharing and  enjoy the feedback you receive when you contribute.

The thing is, even though you're publishing under a pseudonym, you as a person automatically have copyright over your poem anyway.

Someone else trying to breach your copyright would need to demonstrate that the poem was in fact written by them. It doesn't actually matter whose name it's published under, it's still not them and it's still not their poem.

Hmmmm indeed! This is much more complicated than I ever imagined! In the discussion of copyright I forgot to say I really enjoyed reading your poem! 

This Link is somewhat interesting. This part is what I am here focussed upon:

"  5 - Using a pseudonym
Although it may not be technically correct (it does not state the name of the legal entity that is the copyright owner), it is very common for an identifiable pseudonym or trading name to be used in the copyright notice to afford the copyright owner some degree of anonymity through obfuscation.  "

... E.G. - My Poem above is not "published" anywhere else. But of course my real Name is not "Disallowed Cynosure". This kind of protection is what I was wondering about.  (NAS Copyright, maybe?) I think Mr.Trainspotter explained, in that the entire business is very "woolly" (vague). 

In a Court Of Law, I might prove that I was who I am here, via a Password/SignIn Confirmation, maybe...? But plagiarism/counterfeiting is an age old problem...

Hmmmm....  

:-)

A good answer, Thank You, Sir. I suspected this, but I often forget it (...!); and I am glad that I Posted a "Poem" instead of a Picture, then. Owning the originals applies to Pictures, certainly. I was wondering about Text as well, and "where was the first publishing" though, with regards to things done completely Digitally.

For Pictures, I suppose it to be a case of <> 'make certain you keep that Camera/Card/Stick because it contains the First Impression'... (Hope you know what I mean.)

Being concise was  never one of my faults!

Glad Tidings, Mr. Brains-From-Thunderbirds...!

I read this answer first, so you might want to get rid of the duplicate below. I recocgnise very much what you say, honestly I do...

Trainspotter said:

The only way you can be sure that no-one uses your material is to keep it to yourself. 

...including this harshness... *sniffle!*

But, yes, for now, Thanks for stating much of what what I was suspecting anyway, and later I may post a deeper response. (Your Post is long - this takes me long to fully consider!)

In general, unless you have assigned copyright to someone else, if you produce original work, in theory the copyright is yours.

But often small print (such as in facepack) assigns copyright to a website.  Then there is something called 'creative commons' such as on wikipedia where you let others use your work (which applies even if you didn't understand what it means).

Then even if the copyright is yours, enforcing it is something else.  Litigation is expensive and the only people that always gain from legal action are the legal profession.  Damages are often limited to 'loss' and loss for something your write on a free forum will probably be zero.  However if someone uses your work without your permission and you haven't assigned copyright elsewhere you may be able to get the payment they got for it ... but often payment for things is very low anyway - pictures frequently only sell for a fiver for printing in a small publication.

Plaguirism has always been a problem with work.  As is people parodying another work.  Neil Innes wrote the songs for the film The Rutles, in the style of the Beatles.  They were parodies and did not have any of the tunes of the Beatles.  However, he was sued by the Beatles (or Paul McCartney anyway) and in an out of court settlement he had to pay all royalties to the Beatles.    And George Harrison had to pay royalties to the writers of 'He's so vain' since it was nearly note for note the same as his record of 'My Sweet Lord'.

There is little copyright in an idea.  So someone can use the same idea as you have had and produce a similar but different work.  Someone can also use small parts and quote from your work in the production of another work.  They can use something of yours as part of a bigger work as long as it is substantially different.  And all this applies anywhere, internet or not.

You would also have to be aware of the fact someone had taken your work.  Probably not easy, and if it took several years to find out it would be a test to find out where it came from.  Sometimes a similar idea comes simultaneously with someone else.  There is an American comic strip character in a striped jumper called Dennis the Menace.  There is also a British comic strip character in a striped jumper called Dennis the Menace.  It was ruled that it was just a coincidence in the 1950s so both continue.

Copyright exists for different periods of time for different uses of a particular work.  So a gramophone record which is fifty years old can be copied but there may be copyright in the song it contains.  A recording artist however would not get any royalties from a record which had been copied by another company and commercially exploited, but the songwriter probably would if they were still alive or not been dead for seventy five years.  But this only applies to copying the record itself.  The original company could produce a cd and then copyright exists in that cd for another fifty years.  Anyone copying the track from the cd would be in breach of copyright.  Clear?  I didn't think so!  So fraught is the world of copyright.

Now to your poem.  If NAS has small print that anything on the forum belongs to them and you assign all copyright to them, then the copyright is theirs.  If they say nothing about copyright then the copyright is yours.  But I would imagine somewhere you have agreed that you will allow any material to be used as NAS sees fit.  Otherwise there would be endless litigation from people who believed that NAS had used some of their material.  This is what the pages of small print in 'terms and conditions which you agree to is all about.  This probably would not prevent you from submitting it elsewhere, to a book for example and getting paid for it, or someone discovering your work and wanting to use it for an advertisment and you getting riches beyond your wildest dreams.  Well we all can dream, can't we!

And it is also a reason why you should put links to other people's works (for example, pictures on Flickr) rather than copy them and put them on this forum.  That way you are not infringing the copyright.

The only way you can be sure that no-one uses your material is to keep it to yourself. 

Techincally as it is your original work it is automatically copyright protected, but to deter other people from misuse it is customary to use the international copyright symbol below. People often use some form of copyright notice as well. Lots of information about this here: 

www.copyrightservice.co.uk/.../p03_copyright_notices

I find it fascinating! 

I'm not sure about the legalities about the copyright. 

But I protect myself by only posting reduced quality photographs on this and other websites. The original quality is safe on my computer.