[A83] Re: Upcoming Software From Hays
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[A83] Re: Upcoming Software From Hays
First, IANAL. This is not legal advice. If you need legal advice, please
consult an attorney licensed to practice in your jurisdiction.
Second, you are both incorrect. You cannot copyright a short phrase such as
the one indicated. There is another kind of protection used for names:
trademarks. Copyright protects "original works of authorship". A short
name or phrase does not fall under that classification. A trademark is
anything that identifies and distinguishes a product and/or service.
Trademarks, like copyrights, are automatically protected. However, there
are additional benefits obtained from registering a trademark. Trademarks
are different from copyrights in several aspects. One notable difference is
that you must actively defend your trademark, or else you risk it becoming
generic and losing it.
Everything created after April 1, 1989, is automatically granted copyright.
For example, all emails I write are copyright by me. You can register a
work for a fee of $30. According to a FAQ by the copyright office, you must
do so in order to collect damages in court. However, I am not sure if this
is law or simply good advice. The DMCA has changed the way copyright
infringements are handled by ISP's. I have seen nothing to indicate that a
work must be registered to be protected by the DMCA. One effect of the DMCA
is that an ISP must immediately remove any material that a copyright holder
says is infringing.
A simple Google search would have explained all of this to you. I did one
before posting this to verify that everything I had previously thought was
indeed correct, but you encouraged to verify this for yourself.
> I think this was explained sometime in the past... (plus I don't believe
you
> "copyrighted" that phrase)
> Using the (c) symbol on your work does not signify a real copyright,
unless
> you have filed for one legally. I'm assuming that you never took the time
to
> find out what a copyright is, so I'm not gonna go into much detail on
this.
>
> (That's everything I know)
>
> > The phrase 'Ti-World' is copyright ©1998 by the Hays Corporation
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