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

Greetings, anyone, from me. I am (supposed to be) an Artist/Writer/Designer or whatnot... But I am perhaps 'Internet Autistic' - and I have *Justified* Paranoia!...

The Question is: If an "original work' is Posted in this Forum or upon the Internet in General... Where does the Copyright go? Who has it? What stops anyone from altering the Work and claiming it as theirs? I know how to Program/Hack a little - what stops other people from stealing the Work that way? Pictures/Poems/Stories or anything Posted here in NAS --- We (most of us) use Aliases, so who has the copyright??

*Ahem*... by way of a Test (or excuse), here is an original POEM which I myself only just made up today. How is this Copyright Protected then, is what I am asking! Thanks, anyone (who is not hostile)!

TITLE: Just One Opinion As A Poem About Poetry (If that is okay).

A Poem, to me, should involve much Rhyme;
If rhyme is hard to find then take some time;
To learn a lot of words or use a Dictionary,
And in doing so results are sometimes very...
Unpredictable! But also keep in mind a Rhythm;
That words work together, not to cause a division;
Keep a beat inside the head and go with the flow,
And vocabulary and rhythm should go and grow.
Should the sentence end with an uncommon word,
It involves more thought to keep things from absurd;
Like the finding the Rhyme for "Orange" and "Silver",
Discuss Sporanges and Blorenge, and Lambs called a Chilver...
Sacrifice style for content, or rhythm for meanings?
Follow where the words wind, along with our feelings...
...Always.      :-)

Parents
  • 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.

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

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