Legal Validity – Copyright

The Berne Convention, adopted in 1886, deals with the protection of works and the rights of their authors. It provides creators such as authors, musicians, poets, painters, etc. with the means to control how their works are used, by whom and on what terms. It is based on three basic principles and contains a series of provisions that determine the minimum protection to be granted, as well as special provisions available for developing countries that wish to use them.

The Berne Convention covers more than 180 countries.

WIPO Copyright Treaty

The WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) is a special agreement under the Berne Convention that deals with the protection of works and the rights of their authors in the digital environment. In addition to the rights recognized by the Berne Convention, they receive certain economic rights. The Treaty also addresses two matters to be protected by copyright: (i) computer programs, whatever the mode or form of their expression; and (ii) compilations of data or other materials (“databases”).

UCC Geneva

Universal Copyright Convention, (1952), a convention adopted in Geneva by an international conference convened under the auspices of UNESCO, which for several years had consulted copyright experts from various countries. The convention came into force in 1955.

Its main features are as follows:

(1) no signatory nation should grant its national authors more favorable treatment to copyright than authors from other signatory nations, although no minimum protection is provided for national or foreign authors;

(2) a formal copyright notice must appear on all copies of a work and consist of the symbol ©, the name of the copyright owner and the year of first publication; a signatory nation, however, may require more formalities, provided that such formalities do not favor domestic work on foreigners;

(3) the minimum copyright term in member nations must be the life of the author plus 25 years (except for photographic works and works of applied art, which have a term of 10 years);

(4) all acceding nations are obliged to grant an exclusive translation right for a period of seven years, subject to a compulsory license under certain circumstances to balance the copyright term.

The convention did not revoke any other multilateral or bilateral conventions or agreements between two or more member states. Where there are differences, the provisions of the Universal Copyright Convention will prevail, except with respect to the Berne Convention (q.v.), which takes precedence over the UCC, and conventions or agreements between two or more American republics.

Both the Universal Copyright Convention and the Berne Convention were revised at a conference in Paris in 1971 to take into account the special needs of developing countries, especially with regard to translations, reproductions, public presentations and broadcasting. Liberalized regulations should apply only to education, scholarship and research.

TRIPS

It is a multilateral agreement under the World Trade Organization (WTO) that came into force in 1994. It was the first such agreement to address so-called intellectual property rights (IP).

It was taken into account that copyrights and patents play a fundamental role in international trade, and that a country’s failure to protect IP from another person or company creates a barrier to trade between these countries.

The true standards of copyrights and patents established in the TRIPS agreement are mostly drawn from other international agreements. In copyright, the Berne Convention is the source of most TRIPS provisions. The main areas where TRIPS extends Bern’s copyright provisions are adding explicit protection for software and databases.

Likewise, the Paris Convention provides the source of TRIPS patent provisions, to which the TRIPS agreement adds implementing provisions. Both Berne and Paris Conventions are administered by WIPO.

Proof of Authorship

Proof of authorship is declaratory. And in practice, whoever has the oldest declaration of authorship is considered the author of the work.

However, there is a need for a form in which the content and timing of the statement of authorship is accepted in court in an eventual dispute.

For this purpose, the Autoria Fácil certificate uses two technologies to guarantee the integrity of its content: Electronic Signature and Time Stamp, both accredited by the National Institute of Information Technology in accordance with ICP-Brazil, fully accepted in Brazil and in accordance with international certification standards.

What can be protected?

Intellectual works such as: music, compositions, books, photographs, sculptures, scientific works, drawings, etc.

What cannot be protected?

Unlike the copyright registration, trademarks and patents must be registered with the National Institute of Industrial Property – INPI for the holder to acquire the exclusive use and commercial exploitation of a name or an invention.

Expiration date

The validity changes according to the legislation of each country. In Brazil, the validity of the patrimonial right of a work is of life + 70 years. In other words, the rights are valid for the entire life of the author and another 70 years from the date of his death.

Important warning!

In order for this record to remain valid, it is the sole and exclusive responsibility of the user of this system to keep the source file (digital file where his work is recorded) in a safe place.

Any minor changes to the source file will invalidate the certificate generated on this system. Simply changing the title of the file, or using “save as” in the source file will invalidate it.

As a measure to safeguard the validity of this certificate, it is recommended to “copy” the source file together with the certificate generated by the Autoria Fácil system, on different hardware (CD, pendrive, Dropbox, Google Drive, etc.)

Important Concepts

Author: Individual or Legal Entity, and in the case of legal entity it is only possible in cases of co-authorship, in specific cases, and NEVER as the author of a work.

Holder: The holder will be the one who will have economic rights over the work. That is, the holder of the Patrimonial Rights. The holder can be either an individual or a legal entity.

Moral Rights: Moral rights holders are the authors and co-authors of a work and are listed in Article 24 of Law 9610/98. This type of right is very personal, that is, they are irrevocable and non-transferable.

Patrimonial Rights: The holders of the patrimonial rights of a work, have their economic rights. That is, they are those who can receive royalties, assign, license or sell the economic exploitation rights of the work.