[cc-licenses] author's rights over the work under CC

Andy Kaplan-Myrth techlaw at uottawa.ca
Tue Aug 21 15:18:46 EDT 2007


Hi,

Canadian and some European copyright laws have two general types of 
rights -- economic rights and moral rights. Moral rights provide the 
kind of protection you're talking about.

CC Licences do not create additional rights for the copyright holder. 
They licence other people to share in those rights. If the law in your 
jurisdiction does not provide moral rights protection (like in the US), 
then CC licences will not create them.

Moral rights appear to be enshrined in section 57 of the Copyright Act 
of 1957:

>>  57. Author's special rights.
>>   
>>  
>>       57.(1)Author's  special  rights. Independently  of  the  author's
>>  copyright, and even after the assignment either wholly or partially of
>>  the said copyright, the author of a work shall have the right to claim
>>  the authorship of the work as well as the right to restrain, or  claim
>>  damages in respect of,-
>>  
>>            (a)  any distortion, mutilation or other modification of the
>>           said work; or
>>  
>>            (b)  any  other  action in relation to the said  work  which
>>           would be prejudicial to his honour or reputation.
>>  
>>       (2)  The right conferred upon an author of a work by  sub-section
>>  (1),  other  than the right to claim authorship of the  work,  may  be
>>  exercised by the legal representatives of the author:

I can't seem to find a similar clause in the Thailand Copyright Act of 
1994, searching it for keywords like "integrity", "mutilation" and "moral".

The Indian provision is similar to Canada's moral rights provision, 
section 14.1 and 14.2 of the Copyright Act: 
http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/ShowDoc/cs/C-42/bo-ga:l_I::bo-ga:l_II//en?page=2&isPrinting=false#codese:14_1

As of version 3.0, the guidelines from CC are to retain moral rights in 
CC licences (not to waive them). CC Canada waived ours in versions 2.0 
and 2.5, but will retain them in version 3.0.

Much has been written about this. See especially: 
http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Version_3#International_Harmonization_.E2.80.93_Moral_Rights

Good luck,

Cheers,
Andy


paola.dimaio at gmail.com wrote:
> Greetings,
> just subscribed
> 
> In Thailand and India a group of us is working on CC translations, and
> we are coming across lots of questions that nobody can understand. So
> any help in understanding the licenses is appreciated
> 
> How can an author who is licensing their work under CC prevent someone
> to use the work
> in a way that is not approved by the author (for example to do
> something unethical)
> 
> Is there a license/clause that allows the author to say 'no you may
> not' use my work (in case the use is questionable or unethical)  or  '
> you may use my work under the following conditions' - I see scope for
> a section of 'additional clauses' that may be added by an author to a
> CC license
> 
> please assist
> 
> Paola Di Maio
> _______________________________________________
> cc-licenses mailing list
> cc-licenses at lists.ibiblio.org
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/cc-licenses
> 

-- 
Andy Kaplan-Myrth LL.B., M.A.
Manager, Law & Technology, University of Ottawa

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