Legal Dictionary of Pakistan
Quick lookup for English, Urdu, and Latin legal terms used in Pakistani jurisprudence.
Copyright
n. 1. A property right in an original work of authorship (such as a literary, musical, artistic, photographic, or film work) fixed in any tangible medium of expression, giving the holder the exclusive right to reproduce, adapt, distribute, perform, and display the work. 2. The body of law relating to such works. Federal copyright law is governed by the Copyright Act of 1976. 17 USCA §§ 101-1332. -Abbr. c. - copyright, vb. - copyrighted, adj.
Copyright Clause
U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 8, which gives Congress the power to secure to authors the exclusive rights to their writings for a limited time.
Patent and Copyright Clause
The constitutional provision granting Congress the authority to promote the advancement of science and the arts by establishing a national system for patents and copyrights. U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 8.
Register of Copyrights
The federal official who is in charge of the U.S. Copyright Office, which issues regulations and processes applications for copyright registration. - Also termed (erroneously) Registrar of Copyrights.
Registrar of Copyrights
See REGISTER OF COPYRIGHTS.
Universal Copyright Convention
An international convention, first adopted in the United States in 1955, by which signatory countries agree to give the published works of a member country the same protection as that given to works of its own citizens. - Abbr. UCC.
common-law copyright
A property right that arose when the work was created, rather than when it was published. 0 Under the Copyright Act of 1976, which was effective on January 1, 1978, common-law copyright was largely abolished for works created after the statute's effective date, but it still applies in a few areas. Notably, a common-law copyright received before January 1, 1978, remains entitled to protection.
common-law copyright.
See COPYRIGHT,
copyright infringement
The act of violating any of a copyright owner's exclusive rights granted by the federal Copyright Act, 17 USCA §§ 106, 602. ( A copyright owner has several exclusive rights in copyrighted works, including the rights (1) to reproduce the work, (2) to prepare derivative works based on the work, (3) to distribute copies of the work, (4) for certain kinds of works, to perform the work publicly, (5) for certain kinds of works, to display the work publicly, (6) for sound recordings, to perform the work publicly, and (7) to import into the United States copies acquired elsewhere.
copyright notice
A notice that a work is copyright-protected, usu. placed in each published copy of the work. ( Since March 1, 1989, such notice is not required for a copyright to be valid (although it continues to provide certain procedural advantages).
copyright owner
One who holds exclusive rights to copyrighted material. 17 USCA § 101.
creativity. Copyright
The degree to which a work displays imaginativeness beyond what a person of very ordinary talents might create. Cf. ORIGINALITY. "Where creativity refers to the nature of the work itself, originality refers to the nature of the author's contribution to the work. Thus, a public domain painting may evince great creativity, but if a copyright claimant adds nothing of his own to it, by way of reproduction or otherwise, then copyright will be denied on the basis of lack of originality. Conversely, a work may be entirely the product of the claimant's independent efforts, and hence original, but may nevertheless be denied protection as a work of art if it is completely lacking in any modicum of creativity." 1 Melville B. Nimmer & David Nimmer, Nimmer on Copyright § 2.08[Bl[21, at 2-88 (Supp. 1995).
derivative work. Copyright
A copyrightable creation that is based on a preexisting product, such as a translation, musical arrangement, fictionalization, motion-picture version, abridgment, or any other recast or adapted form, and that only the holder of the copyright on the original form can produce or give permission to another to produce. Cf. COMPILATION (1)."[W]hile a compilation consists merely of the selection and arrangement of pre-existing material without any internal changes in such material, a derivative work involves recasting or transformation, i.e., changes in the pre-existing material, whether or "[W]hile a compilation consists merely of the selection and arrangement of pre-existing material without any internal changes in such material, a derivative work involves recasting or transformation, i.e., changes in the pre-existing material, whether or
fair useCopyright
A reasonable and limited use of a copyrighted work without the author's permission, such as quoting from a book in a book review or using parts of it in a parody. ( Fair use is a defense to an. infringement claim, depending on the following statutory factors: (1) the purpose and character of the use, (2) the nature of the copyrighted work, (3) the amount of the work used, and (4) the economic impact of the use. 17 USCA § 107 "[Fair use is] the most troublesome [problem] in the whole law of copyright." Dellar u. Samuel Goldwyn, Inc., 104 F.2d 661, 662 (2d Cir. 1939) (per curiam). "Fair use is a judicial safety valve, empowering courts to excuse certain quotations or copies of copyrighted material even though the literal terms of the Copyright Act prohibit them." Paul Goldstein, Copyright's Highway 84 (1994).