Copyright issues can be extremely complicated. But in essence, copyright law can be boiled down to a single sentence - if it's someone else's, you cannot reproduce it, or emulate it in any way, without written permission.
Occasionally, we have been asked by clients to copy text, images or coding from other publications or websites.
THIS CANNOT BE DONE.
Under the Berne copyright convention, which almost all major nations have signed, every creative work is copyrighted the moment it is fixed in tangible form - this includes a website, logo, text copy, musical compositions, dramatic works, etc.
Despite popular belief, works do not have to be registered in any way to benefit from copyright protection. The information below is from the US Copyright Office:
The way in which copyright protection is secured is frequently misunderstood. No publication or registration or other action in the Copyright Office is required to secure copyright.
Copyright is secured automatically when the work is created, and a work is "created" when it is fixed in a copy or phonorecord for the first time. "Copies" are material objects from which a work can be read or visually perceived either directly or with the aid of a machine or device, such as books, manuscripts, sheet music, film, videotape, or microfilm.
If a work is prepared over a period of time, the part of the work that is fixed on a particular date constitutes the created work as of that date.
Note also that material does not have to be marked as copyright (© or ®) for copyright laws to be in effect.
This matter is important whether your current project is a local ad which will be seen by a few thousand people or a website which has the potential to reach millions of people.
Please ensure that material you provide for your current project is original to you and your company. Tangled Spider Design Group is not responsible for ensuring that materials given by clients is their own copyright - this is the responsibility of the client.
If you have written permission to use material from a copyright-holder, a copy of this document must be given to TSDG prior to the start of the project.
It is also important to note that HTML coding, javascripting, java applets, metatags and other 'hidden' elements of a website are also protected by copyright laws.
Remember that, if your project is a website, as soon as your site is registered with and indexed by search engines, any material that is the copyright of other people can easily be found by them!
Copyright law is mostly civil law where the special rights of criminal defendants don't apply. However, new laws are moving copyright violation into the criminal realm. Whether you prefer to call it plagiarizing, copying or whatever, it is illegal.
Finally, please remember that you have come to Tangled Spider Design Group for original and creative work. We will always be interested to see samples of designs you like in order to gauge your requirements, but work produced by TSDG will be original and not copied in any way.
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