Lawmatters.in

Adaptations, Derivations and Transformations in Copyright Law

Nandita Saikia — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:37:07 +0000

Copyright law protects the original expression of an idea when that expression takes the form of a protectable work such as a book or a musical work. In addition to protecting the original work, copyright law also proscribes persons from making adaptations of protected works without the permission of the owner of the copyright in the [...]

The Proposed Accessibility Exception to Copyright

Guest — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 15:46:14 +0000

By Bihu Sharma and Nandita Saikia (This is a Working Paper and is based on the proposed Copyright Amendment.) Introduction The disabled in India are, for the most part, an invisible minority with disability, and often the disabled themselves, being stigmatised. In a country where access to information and education is limited by a variety of factors, including [...]

Films and the Copyright Amendment

Nandita Saikia — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 19:23:49 +0000

Download this article. In 2006, the Copyright Office first put up a draft of proposed amendments to the Copyright Act on its website. Since then, the proposed amendments appear to have been revised (if media reports are anything to go by). On December 24, 2009, the PIB released information about the proposed copyright amendments. Although the [...]

Hyperlinks and Copyright Infringement

Nandita Saikia — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 11:29:50 +0000

Download this article. A hyperlink usually links one document (an anchor) on the Internet to another document (the target). Usually referred to as a links, hyperlinks may be one directional, bi-directional or may be used in more complex patterns. There are several types of hyperlinks, with the common ones being: Surface links which link to the homepage of [...]

Audio-Visual Recordings and the Broadcast Reproduction Right

Nandita Saikia — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:59:18 +0000

(Download the complete article: Time-Shifting Audio-Visual Recordings and the Broadcast Reproduction Right) There are times when the use of ‘and/or’ can be annoying. In a blog post, speaking of contracts, Ken Adams suggests that you ‘steer clear of ‘and/or’ unless using it would spare you some verbiage’. The ‘and/or’ alternative certainly is more compact but it [...]

Rapist Claims Copyright

Law Matters — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 16:08:10 +0000

True, the threshold for ‘copyrightability’ is low for literary (and other) works. A literary work must be original. It should not infringe another work’s copyright. It should be written or otherwise fixed in a tangible form. Writing it should generally involve some form of skill and labour being expended. And it need not contain an [...]

Wherever, Whenever, Whatever

Nandita Saikia — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:19:06 +0000

It isn’t unusual to have a contract which assigns “all rights in perpetuity throughout the world”. Obtaining worldwide rights isn’t enough to satisfy some entities though and they’ve begun to have contracts drafted in which rights are assigned “throughout the universe”. The phrase “throughout the universe” isn’t commonly used in India but seems to be becoming [...]