Copyright Law

Copyright laws are very complex and sometimes hard to interpret. The statement, "If it doesn't have a copyright notice, it's not copyrighted." used to be true, but this is no longer the case.

This was true in the past, but today almost all major nations follow the Berne copyright convention. For example, in the USA, almost everything created privately and originally after April 1, 1989 is copyrighted and protected whether it has a notice or not. The default you should assume for other people's works is that they are copyrighted and may not be copied unless you know otherwise. There are some old works that lost protection without notice, but frankly you should not risk it unless you know for sure. (10 Big Myths About Copyright Explained)

For your protection I recommend you get permission to use most information you download from the Web if you plan on including it on your Web Site.

There are some sites where this is not necessary such as most United States Government sites and sites that tell you that the information is available for your use for free. The information from these sites still belongs to the owner and you usually are not allowed to make any changes to the information. You are also expected to site your sources on your Web Site.

This is a list of sites that was put together by Western Washington University

http://www.benton.org/Library/KickStart/kick.intellectualproperty.html

Until now, most people have needed only a passing acquaintance with the principles of copyright law. But today, the new technologies involved in the Information Superhighway make it important for the general public to acquire a basic knowledge of copyright.

http://www.benedict.com/

This site endeavors to provide real world, practical and relevant copyright information of interest to infonauts, netsurfers, webspinners, content providers, musicians, appropriationists, activists, infringers, outlaws, and law abiding citizens.

http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html

An attempt to answer common myths about copyright seen on the net and cover issues related to copyright and USENET/Internet publication.