Copyright Registration
- Before we explain, the procedure and requirements for copyright registration in Pakistan, it is essential to understand what a copyright actually is? Copyright is literally, the right to copy, though in legal terms “the right to control copying” is more accurate. Copyrights are exclusive statutory rights to exercise control over copying and other exploitation of the works for a specific period of time. Your exclusive packaging design or main page of your website may also be copyrightable in addition to trademark registration. Copyright initially only granted the exclusive right to copy a book, allowing anybody to use the book to, for example, make a translation, adaptation or public performance. At the time print on paper was the only format in which most text-based copyrighted works were distributed. Therefore, while the language of book contracts was typically very broad, the only exclusive rights that had any significant economic value were rights to distribute the work in print. The exclusive rights granted by copyright law to copyright owners have been gradually expanded over time and now uses of the work such as dramatization, translations, and derivative works such as adaptations and transformations, fall within the scope of copyright.
Copyrights are a form of protection provided to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works.
What can be registered as a Copyright?
As defined by Pakistan’s Copyright Law, Copyright is a form of protection provided to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including:
- Literary
- Dramatic
- Musical
- Artistic
- Calligraphy
- Product Packaging
- And certain other intellectual works
This protection is available to both published and unpublished works.
What rights does a copyright owner earn after copyright registration in Pakistan?
The copyright owner is given two sets of rights, a positive one and a negative one:
- Positive Right
An exclusive, positive right to copy and exploit the copyrighted work, or license others to do so,
- Negative Right
Negative right is to prevent anyone else from doing so without consent, with the possibility of legal remedies if they do. In general, the owner of copyrights has the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do the following:
- To reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords.
- To prepare derivative works based upon the copyrighted work.
- To distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending.
- To perform the copyrighted work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual works.
- To display the copyrighted work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other audiovisual work.
- In the case of sound recordings*, to perform the work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission.
It is illegal for anyone to violate any of the rights provided by the copyrights law to the owner of copyrights. These rights, however, are not unlimited in scope, the copyrights law establishes limitations on these rights. In some cases, these limitations are specified exemptions from copyrights liability. One major limitation is of “fair use,” In other instances, the limitation takes the form of a “compulsory license” under which certain limited uses of copyrighted works are permitted upon payment of specified royalties and compliance with statutory conditions. For further information about the limitations of any of these rights, consult the copyrights law.
How is copyrights enforced and what is anti-infringement mechanism?
Copyrights are generally enforced by the holder in a civil law court, but there are also criminal infringement statutes.
An unskippable anti-piracy film included on movie DVDs equates copyright infringement with theft. Copyright infringement, or copyright violation, is the unauthorized use of works covered by copyright law, in a way that violates one of the copyright owner’s exclusive rights, such as the right to reproduce or perform the copyrighted work, or to make derivative works.
For electronic and audio-visual media, unauthorized reproduction and distribution are also commonly referred to as piracy.
Who can claim copyrights?
Copyrights protection subsists from the time the work is created in fixed form. The copyrights in the work of authorship immediately become the property of the author who created the work. Only the author or those deriving their rights through the author can rightfully claim copyrights.
In the case of a work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment; the employer and not the employee is considered to be the author if the parties expressly agree in a written instrument signed by them that the work shall be considered a work made for hire.
The authors of a joint work are co-owners of the copyrights in the work unless there is an agreement to the contrary.