Copyright Management: Protecting intellectual property
The Oxford dictionary defines “copyright” as “The exclusive and assignable legal right, given to the originator for a fixed number of years, to print, publish, perform, film, or record literary, artistic, or musical material.” In other words, copyright refers to all of a creator’s rights over their original works. They allow a creator to prohibit or authorize the reproduction, performance, recording, distribution or translation of their work. That’s why there are several rules that lead us to improve our copyright management.
At Dexero, we entered and specialized in this area in the mid-2000s, working with Québec’s colleges and universities.
A multifaceted concept
Music
Copyright applies to many types of artistic works. For example, musical copyright can apply to movie soundtracks. As someone who had a daughter at a young age, I’ll cite the 2001 movie Shrek as an example. The movie rather famously uses the song All Star by the American band Smash Mouth. The producers of the movie had to make an agreement with the band, pay a certain amount of money and give credit in order to use the song.
Literary work
Obviously, you need to receive authorization or make sure a text is copyright-free before using its words. Who doesn’t remember having to cite their sources for high school and university homework or receiving course notes from a scientific work? At Dexero, we focused on this aspect by developing the Dexero Dda platform.
Other applications
The concept of copyright also applies to general rights (moral and property), performing arts (representation, performance, derivatives, remuneration or similar works) and visual arts (exhibition, reproduction or telecommunication and public display). It’s important not to confuse copyright with patents, trademarks, industrial designs or integrated circuit topographies.
At Dexero, we take all of these factors into consideration when approaching a project to put the best solutions into place based on our customers’ needs. Want to know more about Dexero or how we can help you with your copyright management? Do not hesitate to contact us or to reserve a demo with our team.