Copyright and Licensing 101

Generally, most people don’t have to think about copyrights and licensing, so it’s understandable if this is a new and confusing topic. But you don’t have to have a law degree to understand some basic principles.

Whenever you create an original work such as a photo or video (i.e., a media asset), it automatically acquires a copyright and you are entitled the basic rights as a copyright holder. The next question becomes how you can choose to monetize that asset.

Not all legally produced user generated content (“UGC”) is worth something, but a lot of it can be if managed properly. And you should be aware of your basic rights as a copyright holder to license your media assets to other parties for fair compensation.

Here are a few excellent sites where you can get either a quick overview or a more in-depth understanding of copyright standards and practices:

•US Copyright Office is perhaps the first place to start for detailed information. They offer a surprisingly well-designed, easy to navigate website along with a PDF summary of “Copyright Basics” that you can download here.

•For those of us who don’t like to read much, The Library of Congress has an online interactive series called “Taking the Mystery Out of Copyright” which you can access here.
•Wikipedia entry on Copyright offers a simple overview that’s easy to read. Note the “See also” listings at the bottom of the page.

•YouTube has one of the easiest to understand rundowns of copyright law as it pertains to user generated content in general in addition to content posted to their site.

•International Copyright is a common topic of question and according to the US Copyright Office, there’s no such thing.

•Brad Templeton’s “10 Big Myths About Copyright Explained” blog entry is a quick primer, especially for online content.

•DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) isn’t exactly for casual reading. But the Wikipedia entry has a brief summary with additional reference links.

•Fair Use doctrine is a common area of copyright debate, misunderstanding and litigation. Mainly because Fair Use is often determined on a case-by-case basis, open to legal interpretation. PeerDeal was developed with the idea that if two parties could have a place where they could agree on an economical licensing deal quickly and easily, then neither would have to argue over Fair Use.

LICENSING YOUR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS

So now that you have a good grasp on what a copyright is, the next step is to understand the practice of licensing (or monetizing) it. To put it simply, when you begin to trade a copyright license for media content, then you’re trading a bundle of Intellectual Property (or “IP”) rights.

Media assets like movies, videos, music compositions, art illustrations, or photographs have IP rights that can be licensed for use based on various options and parameters. The movie franchise, “Star Wars” for example, has thousands of IP licensing deals that start with the right to exhibit and distribute the movies in specific parts of the world for specific “windows” of time. These IP licenses get further segmented and applied to things like merchandising, live performances, theme park rides, books, TV broadcast, graphic novels, and so on.

As you can see, this is why managing IP rights and clearances is extremely complicated for the commercial studios. Licensing rights can have layers upon layers of unique agreements, which depend on who is involved, when, where, and for how long. PeerDeal is taking lessons from the entertainment industry and making licensing accessible to everyday UGC producers.

PeerDeal’s IP licenses are bundled under two primary types: Exclusive and Non-Exclusive licenses.

As mentioned earlier, managing IP rights information gets complicated. For example, you can have a video clip of a rare, historic event that gets high demand and you can sell many licenses of a single media asset over time to multiple Licensees (buyers). That’s a lot of legal paperwork to keep track of. It comes down to managing large amounts of information that’s spread out over multiple file cabinets across many lawyers and legal departments across many countries.

This is where PeerDeal can help!

NOTE: PeerDeal.com provides the contents of this section for informational purposes only. PeerDeal.com does not provide legal advice or services. Please seek the advice of a qualified attorney with any questions or concerns regarding legal matters.