| Hi Madeline, Kim and Katie: |
|
You have our permission to use the copyright statement at the bottom of
our web site pages as an example, and to use our logo as well. You may
only use the logo for this project and please include the following attribution:
"The AOL logo is a registered trademark of America Online, Inc. in the
United States and other countries. Used with permission." If you'd like
to include any of the text from the legal section of either the aol.com
website or Netscape website, you may do so, as long as you say where you
got it. These sites explain our policies on the use of our copyrighted
materials. The URLs are:
http://home.netscape.com/legal_notices/copyright.html
http://www.aol.com/copyright/permission.html.
|
|
As far as information to include in your project, there are lots of websites
with good information, including:
the Copyright Office site: "http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/"
Some others are: A Guide To Copyrights: http://www.ior.com/~malhotra/copy.html
This site contains information on licensing material protected by intellectual
property rights: http://www.oikoumene.com/oikoumene/nobomediarights.html |
| One of the main ideas to
get across is that if someone else created something, then the creator
is the copyright owner and has the right to decide how it can be used,
by whom, and also to distribute it and create derivative works based upon
it. I think my main pieces of advise to anyone who wants to use a work
(story, photo, drawing, cartoon character, etc.) created by someone else
are 1) Always ask permission, it's better to be safe than sorry; and 2)
Don't assume because someone else has used it that you can. Just because
a photo of Christina Aguilera is on someone's personal website, doesn't
mean it's ok to use it. Or if someone sends you their picture by email
you don't have the right to then send it to someone else or post it on
your website without permission. |
| A portion of the work
I do is helping individuals and companies whose works have been copied
onto an AOL member's website or are being offered for sale on such a site
without permission. These people are committing copyright infringement. |
You might want to visit the websites of some of the organizations whose
job it is to protect the rights of artists. Two are the Recording Industry
Association of America (RIAA) which works to stop unauthorized distribution
of recorded music, including over the internet:
http://www.riaa.com/; and the Motion Picture Association of America:
http://www.mpaa.org/home.htm. |
| Please let me know
if there's any other specific information you'd like and I'll try to provide
it. Best of luck with your project!
Liz Compton
Senior Intellectual Property Paralegal
America Online, Inc. |
|
