American copyright law mainly protects the following aspects: 1. Prevent others from using unauthorized works (piracy and plagiarism); 2. Prevent unauthorized access to market profits; 3. Protect the rights of derivative works, and the copyright owner has the right to give the derivative works to others; 4. Protect the right to sell a work for the first time, that is, the author decides when and in what form to publish it.
In addition, American copyright law is different from that of European countries. In America, authors have the right to control derivative works. For example, there is a case where a British drama group staged a play, and the British national broadcasting company BBC authorized ABC Company of the United States to play the work for the American audience to enjoy. Because there were no advertisements when the performance was broadcast on the BBC, the works edited by ABC company were supplemented by advertisements; Subsequently, the British Drama Group sued ABC Company to the American court for infringement. Although the BBC company authorized ABC company to use the work, the American court ruled that the British drama group won the case because ABC company only obtained the right to broadcast, but not the right to derivative works.
So, how to define infringement? First of all, the principle of defining plagiarism is generally to identify the similarity and relevance of works. Secondly, selling without permission is also an infringement. Therefore, it is an infringement to obtain the source of content in any form without permission or to disseminate unauthorized content in any way.
On the issue of fair use, the Supreme Court of the United States has a famous case: a company sued a company for unauthorized use of part of its own company's content introduction, arguing that the company infringed the company's copyright. However, the court held that the content introduction is not a creation, but a statement of facts, which belongs to the scope of fair use, so it is not protected by copyright.
In the United States, the factors for judges to determine whether a work belongs to the scope of reasonable use are: first, whether it belongs to commercial activities for the purpose of use or other purposes; Second, whether the nature of the work used is for publication or other purposes, and whether the work has been published; Third, in terms of quantity, the proportion of original content; The most important point is what kind of influence this behavior has had on the original work, especially on its market. For example, in a copyright dispute between Sony Corporation of Japan and Universal Records of the United States, because Sony Corporation replayed its TV program through BETAMAK video without permission, Universal Records and Disney Company took it to court for copyright infringement, and the case was appealed to the Supreme Court. Sony proposed that the operation mode of providing time slots for the audience to choose belongs to the scope of reasonable use and is not infringing in essence. The judge ruled the case without harming the public interest, so Sony finally won the case.
At present, another famous case of fair use in the United States is that 10 publisher filed an infringement lawsuit against Google. Because Google's digital library plan has introduced several university libraries, the plan will turn books into digital files for the public to search for free; The author and publishing house believe that it is an infringement to copy books without authorization, and Google has no right to scan and display books, so it is brought to court on the grounds of infringement; Google, on the other hand, believes that it has no infringement on the grounds of fair use. At present, although the case is still under litigation, how to judge the issue of fair use has caused many disputes.
Reference: A Tour of Copyright Inspection in the United States-Media-People's Network
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