Comparative study of copyright and public interest in archives across UK, US, and China

¶ … Copyright and Public Interest in Archives in the U.S.A., UK, and China

What, exactly, is a Copyright? Why is it important? A Copyright in general terms means the set of laws and rules that are set up be a government with the primary purpose of affording protection to the authors or the writers of 'original works' of their own, that they have created. These works may be related to the field of drama or to literature or to art or to music, or to anything else where the original creator and his creation need to be protected by the authorities. The author may have published his works or he may have as yet been in the possession of unpublished works; this dose not matter. Copyright laws are established for the sole purpose of affording protection to the author who is in possession of his own original work and needs to protect it from those people who may copy it for their own use. In the United States of America, it is Section 106 of the 1976 Copyright Act that affords the owner of the Copyright, or the author in possession of his own original piece of work, certain exclusive rights that he may use to protect his work.

To this extent, the author may do one of the following: he may either authorize another person on his behalf to undertake the reproduction of his original works in a series of copies or in phono-records, or he may do the reproduction himself. He may also produce 'derivative' works that derive form his original work, and he may embark on the distribution of the copies of his work either through phono-records or by plain copies, and may either pass the work on to the general public either through a sale of the copies or by transferring the ownership of the material to another individual, or by renting or by leasing or by lending the copies of the original work to individuals who have been approved by him. Section 106 of the 1976 Copyright Act also authorizes the author to perform the work in front of the general public, and this may often happen in the case where the work is a drama or a pantomime or a musical or a choreographed piece of work, or a motion picture or an audiovisual work of art. The author may also appoint another individual on his behalf, or undertake, himself, to display the copy of the original work in public.

This rule pertains, for the most part, to literary works and any type of drama or musical or pantomime or any sort of pictorial or graphic or sculpted pieces of work. In cases where the work is a sound recording, then he may perform the work in public with the help of a 'digital audio transmission'. Since the law is binding, it is illegal for anyone to attempt to overcome or transgress on the Copyright Act as has been stated above, and anyone who violates it would be subject to penalty and punishment. However, the rights provided to the author who is in possession of the original work are not unlimited at all. In fact, when the 1976 Copyright Act is examined in close detail, especially Sections 107 through 121, it becomes quite evident that there are quite a few limitations on this Act. These limitations may be anything from a simple term 'fair use', which has actually been given a statutory basis in the Section 107 of the 1976 Copyright Act. Sometimes, the limitation may include the passing of a 'compulsory license', wherein the usage of the copyrighted work is allowed in a legitimate manner, provided certain specific royalties or licenses are given to the users. The protection awarded to an author through a Copyright Law begins almost as soon as, or immediately upon the creation of the work by the author. The author can in fact claim copyright on his work as soon as it achieves a form or particular shape.

However, in cases where the author of the work is not obvious or clearly evident, then the work would come under the title, 'anonymous', and the work would belong to no one in particular, or where no natural person or individual would be identified as the author of the work. Copyright can also be provided for the following: the design of a building in which there is a particular tangible expression of the idea of the building, like for example, when it is a standing building, or an architectural plan, or a drawing of the proposed building. Since a building is a vast space, it is the various elements that comprise and make up the building that are generally taken into account. For example, the spaces, the arrangement of the various elements, and the composition of the various other design elements are all protected under the copyright law, but the general standard individual features of the building would not be taken under the copyright laws.

When it is literary and artistic works that need to be protected under the Copyright Laws, then the Berne Convention is usually referred to. The Berne Convention was signed at Switzerland, in September 1886, in order to afford copyright protection to those individuals who were in the possession of an original work of art or of literature, and all the provisions and acts that have been underlined within the Berne Convention are generally referred to when an author or an artist needs copyright protection for his work. In a similar manner, the 'best edition' of any piece of work is that which is determined by the Library of the Congress of the United States of America, as being the best suited for its own purposes, and copyright would be accorded accordingly.

'collective work', on the other hand, is a collection of works by individual and separate authors, which has been complied into one work by one individual. This work becomes an original work of creation by the complier, and therefore, copyright can be sought for this type of collective work. A 'derivative' work is that which has been derived from any original work, like for example, a translation, or a dramatization of a play, or the conversion of a book into a motion picture, and so on. The 'Geneva Phonograms Convention', signed in Switzerland in the year 1971, offers protection for owners or producers of phonograms of any kind, and this offers these individuals copyright protection against unauthorized duplication and copying of their phonograms.

When an author is seeking copyright protection in the United States of America, he has to, at the outset, register his work, as being of his own making and belonging to him. When he receives the copyright for his work, he may either lease or sell or lend his copyright to another individual, through the provision whereby the 'transfer of copyright ownership' can be achieved. This may be done in the form of a mortgage, or in the form of a lease, or as an exclusive license, or in any other form whereby the other individual would be able to make use of the right in any manner, which he chooses. However, in the United States, a work can be termed a 'United States Work' only if certain terms and conditions are met. These conditions are: the work must have been first published in the United States, if the work has been published simultaneously both in the United States as well as in any other country that grants a term of copyright protection that may be the same as or extend further than the copyright protection that has been given by the United States.

The foreign state may also be a nation that is not a part of any type of treaty party with the United States, and when the foreign state that is not a part of a treaty party, and all the authors and co-authors of the work for which copyright is being sought are either domiciliaries or nationals or habitual residents of the United States of America. When the copyright is for a piece of sculpture or a picture or a graphic, then the work of art must be housed within a building that is located anywhere within the United States of America. The Sections 106 and 106 a of the Copyright Act stipulate that the 'fair use' of a copyrighted work, for such purposes as criticism, for the purpose of teaching, wherein multiple copies of the copyrighted material can be made, for scholarship and research, for reporting, and also for commenting, is possible within the boundaries of the Copyright Act. When the material is put to such various diverse uses, within the description of 'fair', then it will not be considered to be an infringement of the copyright. However, the determination of what, exactly, is considered to be 'fair use' needs to be followed accurately. These include the following: if the copyrighted material is to be used for non-profitable purposes, like for example, in teaching, and not for any type of commercial use where there would be an exchange of money.

The very nature of the copyrighted material is also taken into account when determining 'fair use', and the amount of the copyrighted material being used in relation to the entire original work will also be considered. Another important aspect is the result or effect that the publication of the copied pieces would have on the copyrighted material in relation to the sale of or on the market value of the copyrighted work. 'Fair use' can also be made of a copyrighted material even if it was unpublished until then, if all the above factors were to be adhered to by the user of the copied material. Where libraries and librarians and all the other employees of the library are concerned, it must be remembered that the library or its archives or any of the employees who are acting upon the interests of the library or the archives, will not be penalized if they were to happen to make one copy or one phono-record of one particular book, if the purpose in making such copies was completely non-commercial, both directly as well as indirectly, and also if the library or the archives were to be kept open for the use of the general public.

The same rule applies when either the reproduction or the distribution of the work would pertain to those researchers who are directly or indirectly affiliated to the library in any way. In any case, the copy of the work must in all cases carry a notice stating the copyright of the material that is being used. An important fact to be remembered is that a copyright becomes automatic as soon as the work has been created in some tangible form. However, it is a prerequisite that the application for a copyright has to be submitted and the copyright registered by the author of the work. The reason why such a copyright is strongly recommended is because, in general, the author may desire to have the facts and the various details of the copyright spelt out for the public record. This would also entail him to a certificate of registration of copyright from the Government, and this would in turn protect the author from misuse by the general public, and also make him eligible for the awarding of statutory damages, and also save him from the exorbitant charges of litigation, in case there is any.

In addition, if the work were to be registered for copyright within five years of publication, then it would mean that it would be taken as 'prima facie' evidence in any court of law within the United States of America. In some cases, the author may take the easy way out and send a copy of his own work to himself, and then declare the copyright. This is also known as a 'poor man's copyright', and it has absolutely no standing in a court of law, nor will it considered to be a real registration of a copyright. However, this practice has not stopped completely, and there are authors who adopt this method to secure a 'copyright' for themselves. In the United States of America, when an individual is awarded a copyright for any work of his, he enjoys a copyright in several other parts of the world also, depending on the relationship that his own country enjoys with the other countries. Furthermore, the United States believes in the dictum of 'honor thy neighbor', and therefore, respects the other citizens' copyrights as much as it dose her own citizens'.

In essence, a Copyright Law in any country must endeavor to balance the needs of both the creator of the work that needs to be registered and copyrighted, as well as attempt to balance the needs of the public and their demands for the free and uninterrupted flow of information. In Canada, for example, the Copyright Act of 1997 managed to restore and also to maintain the balance between the various rights of the owners of the copyrights and the rights to the access to the work for the purpose of private research and study, or for teaching purposes. There is however, a limitation to the access to the copyrighted material, and this is because of the requirements of the various researchers who would need the work for their own reference. This inevitably means that there must be an exception to the copyright law wherein new intellectual property is created by the introduction of exceptions and exemptions to the existing library and copyright laws.

In today's world where Information Technology is the password to growth and development, there is a growing need for some sort of control and copyrighting. For example, the twin technologies of computers and of telecommunications are growing rapidly, and this means that the information that is generated by them would have to be disseminated, assimilated and stored in an appropriate manner. This naturally means that way in which scholars and researchers communicate with each other has also been undergoing dramatic changes, and though the possibility of copyright laws and rights of the owner of the material may be violated at more times than ever before, it is a definite possibility that more laws that pertain to the copyrights of the authors whose material is freely available on the Internet can be passed so that the authors in possession of the original work may be protected appropriately.

However, in the course of such protection, it is very much possible that a genuine user of the knowledge may be denied access to it through no fault of his. Therefore, there is a need for the balance between the rights of the owner, and the protection of his rights, and the granting of access of the knowledge contained within the copyrighted material to a wide number of users in this today's world of information technology. Furthermore, it is a very real possibility that when viewed in the long-term, it is very much a possibility that the economic as well as the cultural growth of the country may be hindered.

The advances made in the sharing and in the distribution of information to an increasingly wider audience and a wider number of users from all over the world has in fact served to alter, dramatically, the way in which students in a classroom are taught. In other words, the traditional system of imparting education is fast disappearing, and in its place, there is a growing phenomenon of wide distance learning and long distance education. One of the most important concerns of any individual associated with the traditional method of education within the four walls of a classroom are always confronted with the copyright laws of the material that they are using. This fear also extends to long distance education, wherein the issue of copyright laws and the resulting litigation and so on is always a threat, even though it is a very real fact that the internet as a medium of education may do far better than face-to-face teaching, maybe because of the very nature of the Internet, what with interactive videos and even face-to-face conferences over a long distance, with the help of web cameras.

How can copyright laws be extended to the materials that would be used in long distance learning over the Internet today? There are many individuals who opine that there is absolutely no copyright protection over the Internet, and this is because of the virtual ease with which information can be copied or replicated and then distributed to a large number of people anywhere in the world. This in fact has led to a new phenomenon, that of copyright owners asking for more and more protection, at times even unreasonable amounts of it. This is an ongoing debate; some copyright scholars offer the opinion that copyrights need not be broadened or increased for digital work. This is because, they state, the owner may only allow certain passages or certain parts of the material to be duplicated, and this may interfere in the coherent meaning of the whole, and would therefore, not serve its innate purpose of imparting knowledge to those who would need it. Yet another disadvantage would be that the readers or the users of the copyrighted material would have to pay extravagant amounts of money to the owner and for no real benefit after all. This would then become a 'right to read' issue, with the user paying not only for the right to copy or to replicate but also for consumption of the copied material.

The actual fact is that every time a computer translates a digital work into a humanly readable format, what happens is that the compute inadvertently creates a copy that can be read by a human being. In the United States of America, even this is taken as a type of copying or duplicating. Therefore an owner is now in a position where he can demand more and more copyright protection, especially for his digital work, and this may be granted to them in the form of a prohibition of encryption. With this type of prohibition, the owner would have a stronger case against duplicators and would have better protection for his original work. The WIPO Copyright Treaty, 1996, recognizes this right of the copyright owner to protect what is legally his. However, there are many individuals and experts who argue that copyright laws must remain separate form anti-hacking laws, because this would only give the owner greater protection and would even force him to ask for better protection. The need of the day is to, however, bring back intense public interest onto the subject of copyrighting, by the method of attempting to fine-tune the copyright laws, and also by modifying all the various limits and the exceptions to the copyright laws in such a manner that the essentials of a copyright law would be preserved and protected, while at the same time, protecting the owner in an appropriate manner.

The Copyright Laws in the United States of America not only protects those works and materials that have been published already, but also protects those works that are as yet unpublished. Therefore, if one were to desire to make use of a part of any work that does not belong to him and is copyrighted, in what is termed as 'fair use', and then there are a few things to be kept in mind before using these manuscripts. At the outset, what must be done is the conduct of a detailed assessment of whether the work is now under the public domain, or, in other words, if it has now passed into the outer boundaries of the copyright, that is, after the copyright has expired. Otherwise, what can be done is, the original owner of the copyright can be located, and his permission sought in making more than 'fair use' of the work. Therefore, it is of vital importance that the holder of a copyright be located before copies can be made of any part of the work. There are a total of eleven prescribed steps to take in the search for the copyright holder.

The very obvious first step would be to attempt to contact the owner of the copyright, because the owner of the work is also generally in possession of the copyright. However, it may also be possible that an individual collector or any type of repository may be in the possession of both the physical work as well as of the copyright. In that case, these individuals would be able to grant the necessary permission to copy material from the manuscript. If both the owners and the collectors may be unreachable, then the Copyright Office may be tried next, since it is a rule that any copyright must be registered with the Copyright Office before it can be granted a copyright. It may be possible that other scholars in the same field may be aware of the owner of the original work, and they may be contacted for information, and if that does not yield any results, then the 'Acknowledgements' section can be perused for more information on the writer. On the other hand, the publisher can be contacted, or even the Guild or the society that the author may belong to. The local librarian may also be of help in attempting to locate a copyright holder; he may be able to conduct a detailed database research that would yield the author's last known contact address, and so on.

If, however, the copyright has expired, and the work has now become public property, then there would be no fear of repercussions when copying large parts of the manuscript for one's own use. Generally, the Copyright in the United States of America depends on when it was granted in the first place, but, more often than not, the copyright lasts for a long time. For example, for those works that were created after January 1, 1978, the copyright would last for the entire lifetime of the author, and also an additional seventy years. In the case of a work having been jointly created by more than one author, then the copyright would last for a period of seventy years after the last surviving author has passed away. Those works that have no real known author, when it is known as an anonymous work, or in cases where the work was done on a 'for hire' basis, and the work is referred to as being 'pseudonymous', then the copyright would last for a period of ninety five years from the date when it was first published, or for a period of one hundred and twenty years from its first date of creation, depending on whichever ends first.

For those works that have been created, but not been published or registered before January 1, 1978, then the copyright would last for a period of seventy years after the death of the original author in whose name the copyright stands, but the copyright will not expire earlier than the month of December, 2002. When the work has been registered or published before December 1, 2002, then the copyright granted to this work would last up to December 31, 2047. Finally, for those works that are still under the terms of copyright, and that had been published or registered before the year 1978, the copyright has been automatically extended for a period of ninety-five years from the original date on which the copyright was initially awarded. Any works that have been created after January 1, 1978 do not have to be subjected to a renewal of registration; rather, there is an option of renewal registration that can be made use of if necessary, after a period of twenty-eight years.

In the United Kingdom, the Copyright Law actually originated as an offshoot from a common law called the 'Statute of Ann' in 1709. This law evolved into a statutory one when the Copyright Law was passed in the year 1911. The Copyright Act today in the United Kingdom is known as the 'Copyright, Designs and Patents Act' of 1988. In the same way as the Copyright Act in the United States of America covers the copyrights of authors and artists and musicians and sculptors and dancers and choreographers, the Copyright Designs and Patents Act of the UK also covers the copyrights of all the various authors, artists, sound recorders, musicians and music producers, and so on and so forth. The Copyright Act affords these individuals the right to be able to control and coordinate the various ways and means in which their works may be utilized by others during the course of a drama or a recital, and so on.

The Copyright Act also gives the authors the right to control the adaptations and the copying, and also the renting or the leasing of their own work to the public in general. In most cases, the creator of the work would also be the author and the owner of the work, and therefore, this gives him the right to object and to protest any sort of distortions of his creation. In most countries, including the United States of America and the United Kingdom, there are International Conventions that give these authors the much-needed protection that they seek against the duplication and the misuse of the works of their own creation. However, these rules would be always subject to the norms of the national laws in the states where the authors are nationals and citizens.

In order for a particular work to qualify for the awarding of the copyright, the author must be able to prove that the work is, indeed, something of his own creation, and he also has to prove that the work demonstrates a certain amount of skill and labor and effort, that all make up the finished piece. The interpretation of a particular piece of work is in fact more finely attuned to the independent creation, and not the actual idea behind the creation. In other words, when an author has in mind an idea for he next book that he would want to author, the Copyright Act will not protect this idea; rather, the actual work that has been printed and then bound would be eligible for a copyright. This would mean that anyone else can actually write a book that has as its basis the original author's ideas, al long as he does not copy it directly, but, if he were to copy the printed words, then he would find himself in trouble and eligible for punishment.

This same principle is applicable to names, or titles or any other specific words that may occur within the book; however, if there was a design of a logo that would in essence combine all the elements of design and style and graphics and also the written word, including the title of the work, then it may not be copied, and would be covered under the Copyright Act. In a nutshell, what this means is that the particular printed or created work may be protected by the Copyright Laws, but not the actual idea behind the creation, and no individual may be able to seek protection for his idea, as there is no proof that the idea is, indeed, his, and is entirely of his very own creation.

The UK Copyright Law is found under Part 1 of the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act of 1988. Under this Act, Copyright is defined as being a 'Property Right' that would apply to 'original' dramatic or literary works, or to musical and any types of artistic creations. It would also include films, any sort of sound recordings, short films and documentaries, broadcasts, and to cable programs. In a more detailed expression of the various broad categories under which copyright can be sought, a 'literary work' would include any work that can be either written down, or spoken out aloud, or sung, and this does not include dramatic performances and works based on music. This 'literary work' may include some sort of table, or a compilation or list of compositions, or it may also include computer programs within this same category.

The category 'Dramatic work' would include any work that is based on dance or mime, and a 'Musical work' would be based on music, excluding any words or actions or anything else that has been intended to be sung or performed on stage. However, a copyright would not be relevant to any of the above mentioned dramatic or musical or dance works, unless and until the same work has been recorded, either in writing or in some other relevant form, and it can be irrelevant whether the recording has been performed with the permission of the author, or by the author himself. 'Artistic Work' for the purpose of the registration of copyright would generally include any graphic work or creation, any type of artistic work, including a collage or a sculpture, and the question of whether or not this artistic work is good enough or not for the purpose of registration is completely inapplicable.

A graphic generally includes any sort of painting or drawing or a chart or a map of any kind, and would also include artifacts like a woodcut or a lithograph or an engraving and so on. A 'Work of Architecture' would include the model or the design for a building that has been created by the author, or the building itself. This can be a fixed structure or a part of a fixed structure, or a part of the building. Any work that would come under the category of 'artistic craftsmanship' would also be included under the same category. A 'sound recording' would include a basic recording of a set of sounds, from which the sounds may be produced or reproduced, and a 'film' would include any sort of moving image from which a picture or an image could be produced or reproduced. What is important here is that the copyright would not cover a sound recording or a film taken from another previously made film or sound recording, because of the fact that it was already in existence, and therefore, no copyright can be awarded to this piece of work.

Under the broad category 'broadcast' is included any type of transmission through a wireless, of visual sounds or information through audio or visual means, that can be legitimately and legally viewed by the general members of the public, to whom the information can be transmitted. Under the same category, an 'encrypted transmission' would include that information that cab be legally viewed by the public, if the decoding equipment and information has been granted to the public or to an authorized member of the public who has been appointed by the author or the persons representing him. The person who has been authorized to make the broadcast is either the person who is actually transmitting the program, provided he has any sort of authority over the contents of the program that he is transmitting, or he can be the individual who has made the arrangements for the transmission of the program with full authority, and granted the permission of the broadcast to the transmitter of the program.

The place from which a broadcast is generally made is the place from which the transmitter receives the incoming signals of the transmission, and the copyright would not be extended to any broadcast that would impinge upon the broadcast of any other program that is being transmitted, because of the fact that it may be infringing upon the copyright of the other broadcast. A 'Cable program', for the purpose of categorizing for the registration of copyright, is any item that would be included in the service of the transmission of the cable program, and, in general, a 'cable program service' would include any service that would consist of sending or transmitting a set or group of audio or visual images and pictures over a telecommunications system, to the general members of the public, and this would not include wireless telegraphy.

'cable service program' does not include the following: a service that, while the person providing the information is in the process of sending the information across through visual or pictorial means, the same system, at the same time, may send out other information from the same place. In the same way, the cable service program that is basically a service that is being run for the sole purpose of conducting a business wherein no other person except for the individual who is actually responsible for the transmission is concerned in the upkeep and in the maintenance of the equipment and the apparatus needed for the broadcast, and also when the sounds and the images that would be transmitted by the system are meant for the sole purpose of providing the service for the insiders of the company and not for outsiders. If the transmission were not connected in any way to the telecommunications system, then too, the copyright would not cover it. In cases of a 'joint authorship' of a broadcast, where the work that has been produced actually owned by two or even more authors, where the authorship of each one is not clear, then the broadcast would be taken to be a work of joint authorship because of the fact that two or more people are involved in the broadcast.

It was towards the end of October 2003, that the Copyright Laws in the United Kingdom underwent a vast change. The reason for this change was that a 'European Union Directive' was passed in the year 2001, so that there would be a better harmony and cooperation amongst the various member states on the issue of Copyright Laws. The Copyright Act of 1988 had been effectively providing copyright protection for a great many years, but the need for change was sorely felt and expressed, and this was why these demands were laid forth before the Parliament on October 3, 2003.

The European Union council of Ministers was commended for their adoption of the Directive on Copyright. This is a law that serves to harmonize and to unite all the registrations of all the Union Members for the purpose of Copyrighting to an acceptable level. However, there are some individuals who voice the opinion that this is not at all a fair ac; rather, it is very similar in its behavior, to the controversial American 'Digital Millennium Copyright Act', otherwise known as the DCMA, which, according to the criticism made by those who protested the Act, serves no purpose other than make a complete mockery and charade of the very idea of 'fair use', and creates very special exemptions of the rule for schools and for libraries, and finally defeats the very purpose of copyrighting by placing the total and full right of awarding the material to be copyrighted into the copyright owner's hands.

Critics feel that the Commission states that this then is 'fair use' and a so-called 'balanced compromise'. For example, when the copyright owner has full and complete control over his copyright, it becomes virtually impossible to make a simple criticism of a digital work possible, because of the fact that it becomes illegal to make copies of the original work, which is in the sole possession of the copyright owner. Another example would be the critics and independent film reviews that one is so often used to reading and viewing on the Internet, in this, today's world of Information Technology at its best. If such reviews were to be made possible, then one would have to have access to the actual film or at the very least, bits and pieces of it. Instead, when the author holds the copyright, it may not be possible for the critic to have access to even minute clips of the film. Therefore, it would not be possible to post a good film review or critique on the Internet.

In the past, the usage of small clips and parts of the film was considered to be 'fair use' of the film, and this is not possible today, because of the granting of complete and independent ownership of the copyright to the author of the work, because it is no longer possible for the film critic to break open the encryption of the DVD on which the film is recorded. The studio would allow the bits and pieces that it would see fit, and there would go any semblance of real and true criticism. In other words, protestors of the new copyright Act state, unless one would be willing to, after viewing the clips from the film that were allowed by the studio, state that the film is good, one would be forced to break the law to gain access to those clips or scenes and other bits and pieces that the studio may have considered to be not meant for public viewing and criticism.

James Boyle, in November 2004, talks about Copyright Laws and the right to the registration of copyright laws by comparing them to an example from the Drug and Pharmaceutical industry. He states that in the same way as a representative form the Drug Company would visit the regulator and state that the particular drug should be approved, despite the proven fact that he is only aware of the stories and incidents that have been quoted by those people who are actually interested in taking the particular drug, with no idea of the side effects of the drug and the impact that it may have on the human body after the drug has been ingested, and the drug is passed and approved; it is in much the same way, the rights over intellectual property is handled.

He also says that it is a difficult task to try to create and develop the basic ground rules for today's information age. This is because of the fact that various representatives of the intellectual work visit the regulators and put forth their demand for a large chunk of monopoly rent for the same property, having as their stronghold the statement that the greater the rights that are awarded to him, the better initiative he would have to innovate and come up with better ideas. Therefore, in order to be able to innovate, one would definitely need greater rights and a larger monopoly over the intellectual rights of the property that they are in possession of. This puts the regulators into a dilemma, and this is because, after all, does anybody want to prevent innovation?

An important development and the subsequent developments pertaining to intellectual rights of any given property was the WTO's 'Agreement on Trade Related Prospects of Intellectual Property Rights', which was initially brought up in the year 1986, and then in 1994, and this agreement was responsible for introducing certain intellectual property rules into the system of multilateral trading, for the very first time. This agreement later came to be known as TRIPS, and it covers the copyrights and the intellectual rights of trademarks, copyrights, industrial and architectural designs, any types of geographical signals, and patents, and also the designs and plans of Integrated Circuits, and also, certain undisclosed and unrevealed trade secrets that needed to be protected. It is a fact that the creation and the development of any type of ideas would be useful and pertinent in any given field, and newer and more innovative ideas are now a part of and indeed a requisite of the trading of today. For example, the value of a brand new drug or even a brand new piece of machinery actually lies in the idea, in how it was tested, in how it was invented, in how innovative the design is, and also in how much of research has gone into its making.

Therefore, the more steps involved in its making, the more popular and the better it would sell. Most films, books, and even computer software are generally bought not for the paper or the materials that were used to make them, but for the value and the content and the ideas that are contained within them. In fact, many of the products that were originally traded as being 'low technology' goods are now made better with more creative ideas and more design value in them, like for example, designer clothing, which commands a higher price than unbranded clothing in the market, because of the fact that they are more innovative and packaged better. This means that the creators or he makers of these items have the right to protect their products and its designs from being used by others who like them and would wish to use them too, by either applying for a copyright, or by negotiating terms with others who would wish to copy parts of the design from their product.

These rights are also known as 'intellectual property rights', and are named differently for different products, like for example, when the work is a book or a piece of art, it would have to be copyrighted, if the work is an invention that has been created by the owner, then it would have to be patented, if the work is a brand name or a logo design, then it would have to be registered as a trademark. Whatever the name, it is nothing but a permission that is granted by the Government to those people who are seeking copyrights the right to produce ideas that would prove to be of benefit to the entire society as a whole. Since the protection has its own limits in different countries in different parts of the world, and the copyrights also lasts for different amounts of time in different parts of the world, it was decided that there must be a single agreement that would narrow down all the various gaps and bridges that were glaringly obvious in the manner in which copyrighting was being protected all over the world.

A serious attempt was made to bring all the rules under one single International Agreement, and this, then, was the TRIPS Agreement. TRIPS manages to establish the minimum levels of the protection awarded of the copyrights of the citizens of different nations and fellow WTO members, by different governments, and in making this type of agreement, a balance has been struck between the several long-term benefits that such an agreement would bring, and the several short-term costs that the society would have to bear. When long-term intellectual protection is afforded to the creators of any piece of work, what would happen is that the concepts of originality and creativity and innovativeness would be encouraged, and even when the term of the copyright expires, and the inventions happen to enter the public eye, the Government of that country would take upon itself the reduction of short-term costs, so that the creator would feel free to be more innovative and creative in his ideas.

Where the National Archives and the public interest in them are concerned, the United Kingdom runs the 'National Archives', a body that provides advice and the central Government. The Public Records Act of 1958 places the responsibility of maintaining and keeping the records in proper order to these record keepers, and they would keep them inn proper condition. The Oral History Society, based in the United Kingdom, provides the necessary guidelines to those people who are in charge of recording and maintaining oral history interviews, and to preserve the life histories and the stories of important people whose history would otherwise be forever lost to the general public. This Society claims copyright for whatever information it may provide to the public, and this is but one example of the multifarious problems that libraries and archives of this kind that have during the course of their basic duty of providing information to the general public, whenever requested to do so.

There is nothing, however, in the UK Copyright Law, that may effectively prevent certain individuals or groups form either playing sound bites to a group or to individuals, or to prevent individuals from listening to sound bites or from viewing videos, and also to prevent them from taking down the notes of a particular song based on the recordings that they may have heard, and also to prevent them from transcribing the speeches of important figures that may have as yet been unpublished. This is because of the sad fact that the Copyright Law in the UK is more concerned with preventing individuals from copying and duplicating material, or publishing or broadcasting any material that they may have duplicated, especially over the Internet, than in actually protecting the rights of the copyright holders. All the rights that are granted to copyright holders allow them to license or legalize the copying as well as the distribution, or even the performance of their own original work of art or their own creation.

This 'intellectual property' may include musical compositions, any sort of recorded or written words, and so on and so forth, in a business sense, that is, in the expectation of payment for parting with copies of their works. In fact, a copyright can actually be the only good source of income for the thousands upon thousand of writers and musicians and performers and others of the same ilk, who sell the copyrights to those who would want to use them, for a fixed sum of money. Furthermore, a copyright owner has the right to sue any individual, who has made unauthorized use of the author's original work, through unauthorized publications or recordings, and so on. They also have the right to seize the 'infringing copies', or, in other words, those works done by any other individual that seem to imitate the original work of the author in possession of the original work.

A copyright owner also has the right to sue those individuals who publish their testimonies illegally and in a misrepresentative manner. However, the fact remains that individual recorders of oral history, for example, cannot really expect to be paid for their work if any of their words or recordings happen to have been copied or duplicated from the original; and they also cannot sue those who copy their words. It may be for this reason that most interviewers are found transferring the responsibility of recording their work to museums or to sound archives, or to a library, wherein the copying of original works would be liable for prosecution. Though it is a fact that the subject of Copyrights in the United Kingdom is still to a large extent based on the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act of the year 1988, this Act has been amended and changed over the years by quite a few other Acts that came into being later.

One such act was the Broadcasting Acts of the years 1990 and of 1996. In the year 2002, there came into being the Copyright Etc and Trademarks Act, after which there was the Copyright Act for visually Impaired Persons in the year 2002. After the European Commission came up with their directive, there were many more changes, and in general, the opinion is that though these various changes may have brought law into sharper focus, what with stricter laws against copying and duplication and so on, the fact remains that in certain areas, like for example, in the area of oral history, all these additions and changes have only served to confuse and complicate the existing issues, and this serves no purpose at all.

Today, the issue of Copyright Exceptions or the question of 'users' rights' has become a topic of heated debates, and the subject has become a highly controversial one. For example, most recently, the various Member States of the European Union have in fact been forced to bring about drastic changes in their own sets of exceptions so that they may comply with the set of directives that had been issued by the Information Society Directive. There is also varied opinion about whether it is the Copyright Laws of the UK or the U.S.A. that are better and more suitable for more people. One individual, Michael Geist, writes in the Toronto Star that were Canada attempting to improve her copyright laws, she would do better were she to follow and emulate the copyright laws of the UK and not the U.S.A. There are various reasons cited for this. The first one is that Canada is at present in a position where she is able to produce an enormous amount of work in the form of publications and artwork and so on.

If the cultural deficit in Canada were taken into consideration, and changes brought about so that more and more Canadians would find it easier to avail of the cultural productions of their own country, then the UK and her various policies on the issue could be taken into consideration, rather than that of the United States of America. This is because of the truth that very recently, the British Library developed a plan whereby it would not only digitize copyrighted works, but also post them freely on the Internet. According to this plan, thousands of historical papers that had already passed form copyright ownership into the public domain were posted, and a large number of readers were able to access them and enjoy them. In a similar manner, the BBC or the British Broadcasting Division has successful been able to create and establish a BBC Creative Archive, wherein hundreds of clips of factual programming were posted on the Internet for those users who wanted to make use of them in any way that they wanted, including storing, manipulating and sharing, provided they were used for non-commercial purposes.

The actual fact is that Canada has been adopting copyright polices that has only succeeded in diverting more than millions of dollars out of the country into the United States of America, and this is because of the phenomenon of the payment of copyright royalties from Canada to the U.S. government. Though there is talk about establishing an international copyright that would automatically protect the work of any author anywhere in the world, this has not been created as yet at this point of time, and this is because of the fact that the protection awarded for the copyright holder would be according to the laws and rules of that particular country, and were the work to be protected internationally too, the national laws of that country would apply again.

However, it is also true that most countries of the world offer some modicum of protection to foreign works, under certain specific terms and conditions that have been laid out for such issues, and today, most of these terms and conditions have been simplified and improved by international treatises and conventions on international copyright laws. The United States, for example, belongs to multilateral as well as international and global treaties, and these are the 'Universal Copyright Convention' or the UCC, and the Berne convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. By founding as well as joining the UCC, the United States offers protection for its members by stating that a work that has been done by a domicile of the country that belongs to the UCC, and then he would be protected under the UCC for his copyright. When the U.S.A. joined the Berne Convention in 1989, the U.S.A. was able to gain copyright protection for all its citizens in all the Member Nations that belonged to the Berne Convention, even though they had had no diplomatic relations up until then.

Some of the other member countries of the Berne Convention are: Australia, Austria, Denmark, Fiji, France Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, Malaysia, New Zealand, Spain, Thailand, United Kingdom, China, and the United States of America. All the member countries of the Berne Convention form a Union, and protection is provided for the authors who belong to any of the member countries listed under the Berne convention. Not only are the same rights, as they would enjoy as the nationals of their country are awarded to the authors, but also any other specialized rights that are granted to them by the Convention. Most European and Commonwealth countries are members of the Berne convention, while the U.S.A. acceded to the Universal Copyright Convention, and it was only later that the U.S.A. accepted membership into the Berne Convention. According to the Berne Convention, any work that has been first published in any of the member countries of the European Union would be protected in all the several different member countries belonging to the Berne Convention.

China is one of the member countries of the Berne Convention, and the copyright of any individual who belongs to any of the other member countries would be protected in China. In China, like in the United States of America and also in the United Kingdom, the copyright for any piece of work is granted to his or her own nationals when the author or the artist as such has completed the work. However, the one difference is that there is no requirement for registration when applying for a copyright, and in case it is a foreigner who is applying for the copyright, then their work must meet the following requirements: either the work must have been first published in China before it was published elsewhere, or, the author of the work must belong to a jurisdiction which is attached to China in any form of agreement or treaty or Convention, like for example, the Berne Convention.

Any form of written work, or an oral work, or a dance item, or a musical, or a choreography, or a photograph, or a film, or an artistic piece of work like a sculpture or a painting, or an audio visual work, or a television item, or a graphic, or a map or a sketch or any type of graphic representation, or any sort of computer software, and any other type of work would all be covered under the copyright laws of China. On an average, the term of a copyright would be up to fifty years, and this can be applied in cases when the author is either a form of corporation or any other type of non-juristic member, or when the author has produced a photographic work, or a cinematograph, or an audio visual, or a documentary, or a film.

When China became a member of the World Trade Organization in the year 2001, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative had this to say about the event, that China was indeed making tremendous progress and taking all the necessary steps to improve its economy, by embarking on a series of reforms. However, though it is a fact that China was making progress, it was not adequate or sufficient enough to meet the enormous demands of the World Trade organization in this regard, and the primary areas of concern here were about intellectual property rights, copyrights, telecommunications, and in trading rights, and a few other areas. However, it is the concern about intellectual property rights that would be of serious concern in this regard, and it is a fact that upon joining the WTO, China undertook to refurbish and overhaul its entire legal regime in order to be able to cope with all the changes that a membership in the World Trade Organization would naturally entail. Therefore, the issue of Intellectual Property Rights was changed and modified so that it would match the WTO's Agreement on the 'Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights', or in other words, TRIPS.

China has in fact adopted a large variety of laws and rules and regulations that pertain to the TRIPS and the other Agreements, and this did a lot of good for the entire legal system and for the improvement in the protection of the copyrights of individuals. China has made progress on WTO commitments, but problems remain as stated in a Report from the Office of an U.S. Trade Representative made from Washington on 14 December 2004. It is mentioned that all the efforts of China with regard to overhauling and revamping its services as far as the Intellectual Rights to Property is concerned were indeed being made and they were not satisfactory, and it was generally expected that all China's commitments in this regard would be fulfilled by the end of December of the same year, and the year 2005 would most probably see a finish of the undertaking to establish new laws and rules and regulations, and it would probably be at the end of the year that one would be able to catch a glimpse of what China would be capable of actually achieving as a full fledged member of the WTO. The Bush Administration in the United States would press China into fulfilling her commitments and finishing what she had started, and this would mean that China would become a fully compliant member of the WTO soon.

China is generally seen as a land of vast contrasts, and the reason for this is that while part of the country is ultra modern with high rise buildings of steel and concrete, alongside these structures are small humble huts and tenements occupied by the poorer sections of the population of China. One example of this phenomenon can be seen in the city of Shanghai, where there are futuristic constructions, cheek to jowl with little shacks and hutments made up of pieces of cardboard and tin, where a large number of Chinese people spend their entire lives.

This then is China, a land of extreme contrasts, where the rich and the poor of the country jostle with each other for space and copyright laws as such are given a backseat in most cases. However, according to the copyright Law that was adopted by the People's Republic of China in September of the year 1990, the law was enacted in order to provide protection for those authors of any type of literary or scientific or artistic work, so that the creation and the propagation and dissemination of these works would be made simpler and more possible to carry out. The expected result of such actions would be to build up a completely socialist and material civilization, so that the basic socialist culture and science would also be promoted and made possible at the same time. Any citizen of China, with or without any legal connection to any legal entity would be able to enjoy a copyright for any work that he has produced. Any work that had been done by a foreigner of any nationality would also be awarded this copyright so that he may protect his work in a suitable manner, within the boundaries of the Copyright Law.

In a similar manner, a foreigner who belongs to a country that has an Agreement of nay kind with China for the purpose of copyrighting would be protected by the copyright Law. The different types of work that would be considered for copyrighting in the People's Republic of China would include written, oral, and dramatic, the traditional 'quyi', which is a form of a storytelling art, dramatized and choreographed to perfection, and choreographed works, and also musicals. Art works, photographic works, television, videos, and so on and so forth come under the same category. However, any work that has been banned for production under the law of the country would not be awarded copyrighting and protection, and in a similar manner, the Copyright would not be applicable to any laws and rules and regulations that pertain to any state Legislative or Judiciary or the Administration.

All news and current affairs and all reports and documents that pertain to them, and also all types of forms and items such as calendars and tables and lists that are all meant for public and general usage, like, for example, calendars, time tables and so on would also be exempted from copyrights. In the case of a work of a traditional type of folklore, the decision of whether or not to award the copyright must be taken by the State council, separately. If the work were a scientific or a technological one wherein protection has been given in the form of patenting, then the laws pertaining to that particular patent would be applicable to them. The State Council of the Republic of China and the Copyright Administration Department that it heads would be completely and fully responsible for the implementation and the administration of copyrighting, all over the nation. When taken individually, each province, each autonomous region, and each separate municipality that would come directly under the leadership of the Central Government, would be held responsible for the administration of copyrighting in their particular separate areas.

Who, actually, are termed as 'copyright owners'? These are the people who may be he authors of original works, and they may also be other citizens, and also citizens without any connection to the legal aspect of the country, and legal entities, provided the copyright is in accordance with the Copyright Law that is in existence in the People's Republic of China. Copyright, when taken in its exact sense, would include the following meanings: the right to either publish or not to publish a particular piece of work, that is, in other words, the author has the right to decide whether to make his work available to the public or not. He also has the right to decide whether or not to claim the authorship of a piece of work, and have his name mentioned prominently in connection with his work, or opt otherwise. The author would also be given the right of 'alteration' wherein either he would give the right to altering his work to someone else, or he may approve of the altered piece of work, and give his permission to the other person to make use of it.

However, this would also include the right to 'integrity', wherein the author would have the right to protect his own creation against any sort of distortion or mutilation. The 'right of exploitation' and the 'right to remuneration' mean that the author would be given the right to allow others or even himself to exploit his work and use it in the copied format in broadcasts, live performances on stage, exhibitions, demonstrations, the distribution of the duplicated and reproduced material for the purpose of videography, photography, for translations, condensations, annotations, and so on and so forth. When the authority to exploit the author's work is given to any individuals, the author has the right to expect and to demand remuneration for the use of his original work in the forms that he approves of.