Intellectual Property Registration

Author rights are a set of legal rules and principles that affirm the moral and patrimonial rights that the law grants to authors (author rights) ,for the sole fact of creating a literary, artistic, musical, scientific or didactic, published or unpublished.
Economic rights allow the owner of the rights to obtain financial compensation for the use of their works by third parties. A work enters the public domain when the economic rights have expired. This usually happens after a period of time has elapsed since the death of the author. The minimum term, worldwide, is 50 years and is established in the Berne Convention.
Many countries have extended this term widely, for example in European law, it is 70 years from the death of the author. Once that time has elapsed, said work can then be used freely, respecting the moral rights.

Author rights and copyright

Author rights and copyright constitute two conceptions of literary and artistic property. The first comes from the family of continental law, particularly French law, while the second comes from Anglo-Saxon law.

Author rights are based on the idea of a personal right of the author, founded on a form of identity between the author and his creation. The moral right is constituted as an emanation of the person of the author: it recognizes that the work is an expression of the person of the author and thus it is protected.

Copyright protection is strictly limited to the work, without considering moral attributes of the author in relation to his work, except paternity; it does not consider him as an author as such, but he has rights that determine the modalities of use of a work.

Fields of application:

Author rights protection covers only the expression of a content, but not the ideas. Ideas are not works and therefore their use is free, that is why it is possible to use the ideas of other peoples' works. For its creation, it does not need any formality, that is, it does not require registration in a registry or the deposit of copies, the copyright is born with the creation of the work.

Original works, from the literary, artistic, scientific field, whatever their form of expression, support or medium, are protected. Among others:

  • Dramatic or musical dramatic works;
  • Choreographic works and pantomimes;
  • Musical compositions with or without lyrics;
  • Cinematographic and audiovisual works;
  • Drawing works; painting, sculpture, engraving, lithography;
  • Photographic works; graphs, maps and designs relating to geography, topography or science;
  • Projects, plans, models and their designs of architectural and engineering works;
  • Computer programs and software;
  • Interviews;
  • Websites;

Author rights protection exists as soon as the work is created in a fixed form. The copyright in a created work immediately becomes the property of the author who created the work. Only the author or those whose rights derive from the author can claim ownership.
The authors of a collective work are co-owners of the author rights of that work unless there is an agreement to the contrary.

The author rights of each individual contribution to a periodical or serial publication, or any other collective work, exists apart from the author of a collective work as a whole and is vested initially in the author of each contribution. The mere possession of a book, manuscript, painting or any other copy or phonogram gives the owner the author rights.

The owner of the rights to a work
has the power to prohibit or authorize:

  • Reproduction of the work in various forms, e.g., printed publications and sound recordings.
  • Its public performance, e.g., in a theatrical or musical work.
  • Its recording ("fixation"), e.g., in the form of a compact disc or DVD.
  • Broadcasting, by radio, cable or satellite.
  • Translation into other languages.
  • Its adaptation, as in the case of a novel adapted for a screenplay.

At the level of international copyright protection, administered by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), there are the following international treaties and conventions.

Beijing Treaty on Audiovisual Performances.
Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works.
Brussels Convention Relating to the Distribution of Program-Carrying Signals Transmitted by Satellite.
Geneva Convention for the Protection of Producers of Phonograms against Unauthorized Duplication of their Phonograms.
Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons Who Are Blind, Visually Impaired, or Otherwise Print Disabled.
Rome Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organizations.
WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT).
WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WPPT).