Question

CFS 484 - Computer Law.

1. What is the purpose of copyright law? What does fair use mean?

2. the Elephant in the Middle of the Glee Club.” What is the elephant that the article is talking about? Should a show like Glee be given a fair use exception? Why or why not?

3. If you copy a cartoon on Facebook that you did not create, have you committed a copyright violation or is it a fair use exception? Why or why not?

4. If you cut and paste an answer off the Internet in answer to one of my questions, have you committed a copyright violation? Would the court consider it a fair use exception? Why or why not?

5. Why do I give you links to articles on the web rather than copying them and putting them on the Content page?

6. In DC Comics v. Towle, Mark Towle, a custom car designer, was sued by DC Comics for making a copy of the Batmobile. What was the court’s decision? Did Towle infringe DC Comics’ copyright with his replica car?

7. The court created a three-pronged test established in the DC Comics v. Towle case. What is it?

8. Look at the Stanford fair use cases. Pick two cases in which fair use was granted. Tell me about the cases and tell me why they are considered fair use.

9. Look at the same site and pick two cases in which fair use was not found. Tell me why and what was different about the cases in which the court granted fair use and when the court did not find fair use.

Answer 1

Multiple questions asked, solution for the first four problems is provided below, please comment if any doubts:

1)

Purpose of copyright:

• To protect the special and exclusive right of inventors or authors for their works.
• To get the exclusive right of make profit from their creation.
• To enhance the invention and useful art works.
• To avoid misuse of the works and unauthorized use of works without the consent of the intellectual owner.
• To improve the standard of invention and art works.

Fair use:

• Fair use is the exceptions from copyright violation.
• They define certain exceptional situation where the copyrighted work can be used without the consent of the author.
• The exceptional use includes study purposes, news report, critic works, etc.

2)

The elephant that the article talking about is the huge legal liability on Glee club on copy right violation. The violation liability comes around 1 million dollar.

Show like glee should give fair use exception, since:

• The Glee shows are mainly focused on public awareness and other socially important matters.
• Even though Glee shows making profit, it is very less and the usage of the copyright is for social awareness rather than making profit.

3)

Copying a cartoon from Facebook is copy right violation

Explanation:

• The contents in the Facebook mat of may not have copyright registration, but the copyright act mention that the copy right act protects the right of author in case of pictorial and graphical works.
• The court can go in the favour of author in case of a complaint based on this act.
• Thus copying a carton from Facebook is also a copyright violation in primary inspection.

4)

The court will not consider the copy paste of the answer as fair use exception since,

• Fair use exception is valid for study purposes but it is not mean copy paste is comes under fare use policy.
• We can read and understand the copyrighted contents and can right summary of points in it by giving reference.
• We can use the idea and we can take it for research, it will fall under fair use policy.
• Just copy pasting the answer will comes under copyright violation.