Copyrights

Information on copyright law, active lawsuits, copyright registration, the “Public Domain”, “Fair Use” opportunities, Piracy, and copyright protection … all from some of the most experienced copyright professionals in the world.

1. What are "Copyrights"   2. Why are copyrights important?   3. The Copyright Rebellion   4. How do you register your copyrights?   5. What is "Piracy"? (storyline - less than 3 minutes)   6. What is the "Public Domain?   7. The "Public Domain" storyline (less than 2.5 minutes)   8. What is "Fair Use" (storyline - less than 2 minutes)   9. Historical lawsuits 11. Active lawsuits 12. The U.S. Copyright Office 13. International copyrights 14. The Copyright Alliance 15. What to do if your work is infringed? 16. Who are some of the copyright "experts" 17. Other copyright resources 18. The Pirates Web (July 2000) 19. Copyrights: Code Red - The Pirates Web 2.0 (January 2008)

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The Copyright Rebellion

Why your participation could cost you a lot more than you think

It started with the first wave of commercialization of the Internet in the mid 1990s and has actually grown to worldwide proportions with the explosive growth of Web 2.0. Some have appropriately called it "The Pirate's Web 2.0". It is a digital piracy epidemic that threatens the economic future of this country like nothing we have seen in decades. Read on and I'll tell you why.

We now have somewhere around a billion people with Internet access around the globe. 1.1 billion, I read recently. Before we know it, this number is expected to double. Most with high speed broadband access ... as hard as that might be for those of us who have been asleep at the wheel to fathom. A healthy percentage of these people around the world routinely download stolen property from the Web on regular basis ... and, I'm sad to say, most don't even know what they are doing is wrong. The amount of jobs and money we are losing to this crime epidemic is astronomical. And it get worse every single day!

Is this the fault of the copyright industries? No, I really don't think so.

How about our education system? Not this time ... the teachers don't have a clue what's legal and not legal either.

Is this the fault of rogue or irresponsible government officials? Partly, I would say, but not primarily.

It's those left wing radicals again, isn't it? NO, not this time.

How about those right wingers who support everything big business has to say? Nope ... wrong again.

As shocking as it might seem to you, this infringement epidemic is caused primarily by members of our own copyright-dependent industries (movies, software, music, artwork, photography, journalism, publishing, and the like) here in the United States taking hypocritical positions, and confusing their customers purposely, let alone other unsuspecting Internet browsers ... and, all the while, employing unlawful business practices and unethical legal tactics to accomplish selfish goals. I exposed three such members of our copyright industry "inter-circle" back in mid 2000 with a report I was asked to prepare for Congress. Unfortunately ... due primarily to restrictions placed on me by my own lawyers and federal judges at the time ... the report never saw the light of day. If you want a somewhat dated, yet potentially still relevant, long read, you can get access to this initial report, called "The Pirate's Web", by clicking here.

If nothing else, check out the last few pages where I made specific recommendations as to how to solve this cascading piracy problem back in July 2000. Unfortunately, no one wanted to listen to me at that time (this was before the now infamous dot.com bust). Sure hope the same isn't true today. Real world experience, in my view anyway, can substitute for hundreds and hundreds of articles or theories on the subject, by fair minded journalists, lawyers, and politicians. Many of these observers, especially those who lack real world experience, are simply only that ... casual observers on the sidelines. That's not true with me ... whether you believe in what I'm doing or not. I've been in the middle of this raging fire for over ten years.

In fact, some of the public companies in the software, entertainment, and technology sectors, have established a de facto oligopoly in this country, in my view, even while many of them would rather poke a sharp stick in their eye than talk to each other about serving the common good in their industry ... or this country ... from the way I see it. This is shameful. I am hoping the new Copyright Alliance up in Washington will help to change all of this. Although not political at all, Imageline decided to join this copyright coalition in September 2007 when invited.

Much of today's copyright infringement activity begins with "image search". Here are some of the charter members of this exclusive club:

1. Google - the founding father and the proprietor of the "do no evil" banner ... and all related merchandise sales.
2. Microsoft - the shrewd cat who entices the rats into a corner with no obvious escape routes and then prances on their prey.
3. Yahoo - the company that got too big, too fast, and never learned how to effectively compete after falling behind.
4. Time Warner/AOL - the one time leader of the pack who still yearns for the early days of dial up and price fixing.
5. IAC/Ask.com - the company that abandoned Jeeves just when it needed some really thoughtful answers in order to survive
6. The Rest of the World. International companies, like Baidu in China, Daum in Korea, Yandex in Russia, and Rediff in India. Many of these booming companies apparently didn't even know what "copyright" meant until their investment bankers, lawyers, and underwriters forced them to include PR and hypocritical disclaimer statements in the public company filings they submitted here in the U.S. to our own stock exchange regulators. Investor's beware.

But this "rebellion" doesn't stand a chance ... there are over 11 million people employed by the copyright industries in this country.

Hold up, chemosabe, let me get my calculator out for this one. What's 11 million people divided by 1.1 billion people? Let's see ...10 % would be 110 million people ... right? So that puts our team at roughly 1% ... and probably at half of that in a couple years or so. Those are not good odds in a rebellion!

Here's essentially what many of the rebellionites have to say:

Copyright infringement is not stealing.
All information should be free and accessible to anyone.
Free distribution of copyrighted works fuels the world's spirit for further creative development
Large companies need not be paid for their hard work, let alone small companies and individuals.
If it was not meant to be free and shared equally by all, it should have never been created.
I am sick and tired of giving Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and the 34-year-old co-founders of Google all of my money
While everything else should be free and open, keep your stinking hands off my family photo album.

How many of these people who believe our copyright laws are outdated and should be abolished do you think work in one of the copyright-dependent industries? Better yet, how many of them have ever given a dime, let alone a cup of hot coffee, to a starving artist, musician, painter,or writer who has lost their job due to piracy?

So, you're probably thinking I'm a real cynic about now, aren't you? And I've written off this "copyright" cause to go sail away on my boat.

Nope, believe it or not, I am more determined than ever to try and fix some of these problems that are still dividing so many of us. I truly believe that one or two of these huge public technology companies in this country (the ones that are creating the bulk of these copyright problems) are going to turn back to the side of common sense, good business ethics, and common decency as well. Perhaps I'm naive ... but this is the way I've chosen to think ... and to participate is this depressing saga. How you decide to react is completely up to you.

Let's avoid the need for the rebellion altogether. Wouldn't that be a much more rewarding way to spend the next few years ... both on line and off?

Please let me hear your thoughts. I am not nearly as smart as I think I am, you know .. and this subject matter can be complex!

George P. Riddick, III
Chairman/CEO
Imageline, Inc.

griddick@imageline2.com

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