Copyright for Library Technicians

Broadly speaking, creators have two types of rights: Economic rights and moral rights. These are covered in the sections below.

Economic rights protect the creator's right to benefit financially from their work.

Creators can assign (permanently) or license (temporarily) their economic rights to another party. They can also waive (give up) these rights all together. The terms of these arrangements are usually set out in legally-binding contracts. 

Moral rights protect the creator's reputation.

Creators cannot assign or license their moral rights to another party, but they can choose to waive these rights. 

There are three aspects to moral rights: 

1. Attribution protects the creator's right to be credited for their work 
2. Association protects the creator's right to not have their work associated with a particular product or cause (for example, an ad for a political party)
3. Integrity protects against damages to the creator's reputation

In Canada, moral rights apply to all works. In the United States, only visual artists have moral rights. 

In the 1980s, Eaton Centre Mall in Toronto commissioned artist Michael Snow to create an installation of 60 Canada geese in flight.

During one holiday season, mall administration tied red bows around the birds' necks. Snow sued Eaton Centre for damage to his reputation as an artist (Integrity) and won.

Digital rights management (DRM) is the use of technology to control access to copyrighted material. It also enables creators and copyright owners to manage what users can do with their content (Fortinet).

Examples of DRM include features that prevent users from sharing or copying content, or limiting the number of times a user can view content