Do you know what's in the copyright laws?

Question

I see and hear a lot about copyright laws, but very few people seem to have actually read and/or understand them.

The key concept for us is "The Right of Fair Use"  See US Copyright Laws Section 107 [http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107].

As to scanned photos digital copies are not copyright protected. US Copyright Laws Section 113 [http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#113]

A good and simple source is Ancestory.Com [http://freepages.computers.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~pasher/copyrtfaq.htm]

I would like to see a write up called Copyright.under "C" in both the Help Category and Help Index.  

Comments/thoughts?

Melissa

Comments

My understanding..  The pictures uploaded to Find-a-grave of monuments is this copyrighted?  The scan of a birth or death certificate, is free public domain???

What about images that were scanned to Ancestry.vom by members - non copyrighted because they did nit create??

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Documents created by the federal government are not copyrighted BUT your use of an image of that document found on a site (Ancestry, HeritageQuest, FamilySearch, etc.) is limited by the Terms of Use of that site under "contract law" not copyright law.

Answer 1

US copyright law is not the only law to consider. If the copyright holder resides in a different country their laws and courts might be used in a claim.

Comments

I agree and that should be researched.  But for now it can be written and noted that it is based on US law.

Something is better then nothing and people guessing.

I am sure there has to be an international standard.

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AND, in addition to copyright, what so many people seem to not GET, are LICENSE AGREEMENTS. It's not just about copyright, folks.

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Melissa,

There is not one international standard on copyright - there are many different agreements, conventions, protocols, and treaties; countries may be signatories on some of these but not on others, and may claim reservations or exclusions on specific clauses of any given agreement.

If you are interested in *some* of the relevant international law a good starting point is the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) (see for example WIPO administered treaties page)

Adding complexity to the issue is that the operation and applicability of law between two (or more) given countries is itself often subject to separate treaties. Being online makes the subject even more confusing as the issue of jurisdiction is often unclear or ambiguous.

...and to reiterate Jillaine's comment copyright is not the only thing that a person needs to be concerned with... often restriction on reproducing content from elsewhere are part of the terms of use and license agreements - which is contract law and has nothing to do with the copyright status of a work.

Sidebar comment - US Copyright law is in many ways the most permissive of the copyright regimes in operation in the world.

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Thanks that info is very helpful.

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Copyright can also be embedded in the Metatag or IPTC of photos. Today's cameras can embed the information or you can set up the template when you batch import photos through Lightroom or several other programs.  The copyright is not always as visible as one anticipates.

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I wish I could agree that something would be better than nothing. That's generally true.

Many people ask why we don't have more help pages regarding copyrights.

Unfortunately, nothing can be better than something imperfect when it comes to legal liability in the US. If WikiTree gives members legal advice, and they follow it, and it turns out to be wrong, the organization could be held accountable.

It's unfortunate, but if we say nothing, we're generally safer. This is why we don't have a lot of help pages on legal issues and can't allow members to create their own in any context that might appear to be officially endorsed.

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Chris, is this acceptable:

http://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Space:Links_to_Usage_Contracts&public=1

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Jilliane;

I like what you have so far, but it is a little misleading.

For example, Familysearch.org: If you read down further in the Terms and Conditions you will find exceptions to what you have quoted.

Under the title Collaboration with Others they say "You acknowledge that a primary purpose of this site is to enable collaboration between users of this site and other sites that wish to expand their genealogical databases and knowledge. You acknowledge that we may utilize Contributed Content, including any personal information of living individuals, that you submit for the purpose of collaborating with other individuals and organizations (including commercial genealogical organizations) in order, for example, to create a global common pedigree for the purposes of increasing participation in family history and preserving records throughout the world. You acknowledge that collaboration between multiple individuals and organizations allows us to obtain additional data that we may provide to users of this site—thus allowing users to extend their own ancestral lines."

Which I take as using the material on Wikitree is okay.

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Melissa,

Nothing in the paragraph you cited says it's ok for you to use their material elsewhere - it says that you give THEM permission to share any material that you contribute with other sites and users.

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I read it the way Rob does.

Answer 2

Writing copyright guidelines for a project such as Wikitree is a very complex and difficult process.  For years, I served as a copyright adviser to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and drafted such guidelines for their project which mostly involved old published books. That simplified the task of writing guidelines a great deal, but by its very nature, genealogy sources can't be simplified by such a limitation.

The rules are complex, especially for a project involving the Internet. Copyright laws differ from country to country and the law of many countries has not addressed internet issues.  For different questions, the laws of different countries may be involved, and there are very few experts knowledgeable about the copyright laws of multiple countries.

Second, copyright law changes over time, so the guidelines need to change and be kept up to date.

Third, it is very time consuming.

Most importantly, for a high visibility project like Project Gutenberg or Wikitree, copyright issues can be very risky. I can attest that various copyright holders from various countries can and will take action based on their copyright claims causing serious headaches for the project even if the project stays within the boundaries of the law of the country from which it operates.

Wikitree, by its collaborative nature, invites participation from genealogists in a lot of different countries. So it can't really confine its operations to the laws of a single country and post guidelines based on the copyright law of that one country.  That one fact makes both the creation of guidelines or help pages infinitely more complex and the risks infinitely greater.

Because of this complex situation, genealogists have to rely on general information posted by lawyers in their own countries like https://www.legalgenealogist.com/ on U.S. law and abide by the policies of the various sites they use.

I once was an expert on U.S. law on these issues, but after leaving academia and switching legal specialties about 17 years ago, I haven't kept up with all the changes.  I can say, however, that the information I found on https://www.legalgenealogist.com/ is in keeping with my knowledge of the subject when I stopped specializing in copyright law and it relies on citations to experts in the area that I know have kept up with the changes.

As a genealogist and researcher, I am frustrated by the limits this imposes on sharing sources and especially photos, but I've accepted its just one of those things in life we can't change and have to live with.

Mary Jensen