Copyright: The common misconception

27th September 2010
By Shireen Smith in Copyright & Trademark
RSS Legal RSS    Views: N/A

Of all the IP laws, copyright is the most wide ranging in scope and application, and hence important for business owners to understand. Obviously, if yours is an industry, like music or technology, where copyright plays a central part, you will need to know the copyright law related to your industry particularly well. This Report provides general information for all businesses. Copyright differs from other forms of IP because there is no official registration, or fee, required to obtain its protection.

Copyrights do not protect ideas

A common confusion is the notion that you can have copyright in ideas. Sometimes people want to protect their ideas for a TV plan, or a novel before they discuss it with broadcasters or publishers. The belief that an idea for a product gives you rights over the end product is the cause for the confusion there is about hoe copyright law works. Copyright cannot protect your ideas. It protects the expression of an idea – that is, the actual written words or drawings etc describing your idea.


So, if you are a creative pitching your ideas, you need to be aware of what others can freely use without permission and what you still retain rights over. If you want to protect the actual writing then it’s a good idea to put others on notice about your copyright claims. However, that will not generally prevent others using ideas embodied in your writing or drawing. The way to protect such ideas would be under a confidentiality agreement – something the other party is likely to be reluctant to sign because of the possible problems they could have if they already had the same ideas.

Patent It or Act Fast

As copyright does not protect the underlying idea, there is little point in putting your ideas down in the form of drawings and full written instructions as a way of somehow showing that you came up with the ideas first, and trying to stop others using the same ideas. If the idea is patentable, then only a patent will protect the idea. Otherwise, if your idea is just a good idea for a new business concept, or the like, you cannot stop others copying it. You just have a ‘first mover’ advantage over competitors who may copy you. You have to try to be better than them, and to stay one step ahead of them. Protecting your brand through trade marks and designs are useful steps you should consider, to prevent others riding on the back of your success.


Copyright protects the words not the concept

If you put your idea down in the form of written work, then it will be protected by copyright. However, you will only have the copyright for that piece of writing; it does not give you the rights over the information that is given in the writing. So really, copyright in your written work does not protect the idea but only the way the idea is expressed by your choice of words.

Copyright for Films and Books

Cookery books are a good example of this point as people are-make meals based on recipes from them all the time. If copyright did protect all the recipes in the book then people would infringe the literary copyright every time they used the recipe from it. The same is also true for TV and films, as the formats of these do not generally qualify for copyright. Control over basic storylines does not exist, otherwise classic storylines would have been infringed so many times (Pocahontas and the recent film Avatar’s storylines are almost identical except that one was set in 1607 and the other in 2154).

However, in some cases copyright will be infringed if one work is identical to characters, places and events of another work. So, if an idea (which must be fixed in some way for copyright in it to be capable of existing) is very comprehensive and unique, then it is possible for copyright in it to be infringed.

The Da Vinci Code’s copyright case is a famous example of an idea being copied and having no protection for it. The authors of Holy Blood Holy Grail Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, took Dan Brown to court claiming that he had stole their ideas and subsequently made his fortune from it. Dan Brown won the case because there was no protection for their idea and also these authors presented their work as nonfiction whereas Brown presented his as purely fictional.

Confidentiality agreement

The best way to get protection for your ideas is to use a confidentiality agreement or letter. However, don’t think that this will now fully protect your idea. The best protection is to be careful who you show confidential information to in the first place. Don't reveal your idea if there is more of a danger of the theft of it, than the gain you may receive from releasing it. Few people have the funds to sue for breach of a confidentiality agreement. It is a good idea, however, to get something signed by the people you are showing your idea to. If they then stole your ideas, you could sue them for breach of their agreement to keep the information confidential, as infringement of your copyright is not an action you could take for use of your ideas.


Shireen Smith is an intellectual property solicitor and technology lawyer at Azrights Intellectual Property Solicitors, London providing advice on how to register trademarks, and International trademark registration, patents and domains and domain disputes.
This article is copyright
Bookmark and Share




Ask a Question about this Article

powered by Yedda