IP and Copyright

WHAT DOES COPYRIGHT PROTECT?

Copyright protects the rights of creators over their artistic and literary works, provided that they are original. The scope of IP protection extends to the following works:

• Books, leaflets, handouts, writings, speeches, conferences (and their translations)
• Songs and musical compositions, with or without lyrics (and also their adaptations)
• Theatre plays, musicals, choreographies, pantomimes
• Movies and other audiovisual works
• Paintings, drawings, comics and fine arts
• Advertising spots
• Sculptures
• Photography, regardless if they are made by professionals or by amateurs
• Software, apps and other computer programs
• Data bases
• Architecture
• Charts, maps and designs related to topography, geography and science in general

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WHAT ARE MY RIGHTS AS AN ARTIST?

Law grants artists two types of rights over their creations:

Moral rights

Authors have the following unrenounceable and inalienable rights:

• Publication: Right to choose whether you want to publish your work or not, and in what form

• Attribution: Right to be identified and named as the author of the work

• Integrity: Right to ensure that your work is not subjected to derogatory treatment, which is any act in relation to the work that is in any manner harmful to the author’s honour or reputation

• Modification: Right to carry out some modifications to the artwork, as long as you don’t infringe third parties’ rights

• Withdrawal: Right to withdraw the work from the market, according to intellectual or moral beliefs of the author (after compensation for damages to other rightholders)

• Access: Right of access to the sole or a rare copy of the work that is in a third party’s possession

Exploitation rights

These rights grant their owners the possibility of getting an economic compensation for letting third parties use their works. The rightholders are entitles to authorize or prevent certain uses of their works. Should such uses be permitted by some limitation or legal exception to copyright protection, rightholders may get an economic compensation through the relevant copyright collecting societies such as SGAE, AIE, AISGE or CEDRO (in Spain).

These are the main exploitation rights:

• Reproduction: Fixation of a work such as by printing a book, recording a song, watching a movie, etc.

• Communication to the public: public movie screenings, display of artworks on websites, theatre performances, broadcasting of songs through radio channels or in public places, exhibitions of artworks, radio broadcasts, etc.

• Distribution: It is the making available to the public of the original or copies of a work in a tangible medium by sale, rental, loan or in any other manner.

• Transformation: acts such as translating, adapting or in any other way amending the original work so that a new work is created.

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WHAT ARE COPYRIGHT RELATED RIGHTS?

IP law does not only protect the rights of authors over their works, but also the so-called “related rights”, whose beneficiaries are as follows:

• Audio-visual performers: they have rights over their performances
• Phonogram producers: they have rights over their phonograms
• Audiovisual producers: they have rights over their recordings
• Broadcasters: they have rights over their broadcasts

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OUR LEGAL ADVICE

Domènech Corbella – Legal Services regularly advises in all kind of IP-related matters. We will provide you fast, effective and professional legal advice on all matters relating to the legal protection and commercial exploitation of your copyright: