How is videogame medium protected by copyright in practical terms? Before some people get all worked up, the question is being asked in the context of modding. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_piracy Video game piracy is the unauthorized copying and distributing of video game software, and is a form of copyright infringement. Okay, so at least in one (and probably the major and common one) case it the sharing is illegal due to copyright law rules. But how exactly are game files protected and what exactly is protected? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property_protection_of_video_games#International_standard This standard treats the whole game as a singular component but does not define what would be covered by such a protection and what would be excluded. WIPO had recognized the complexity inherent in copyrighting video games, saying: &quot;Although Article 2 of the Berne Convention provides a solid basis for eligibility for protection of video games by copyright, they are in fact complex works of authorship, potentially composed of multiple copyrighted works.&quot; WIPO has also stated in one of its reports that &quot;there is no clear classification of video games and their protection will vary depending on each particular game and the elements that are part of it. In this sense, video games can be treated as computer programs and, thus, are classified as works of authorship; in that case, the source code for a video game is classified as a literary work. If pictorial or graphic authorship predominates, a video game may be classified as a visual arts work. Similarly, if motion picture or audiovisual authorship predominates, a video game may be classified as a motion picture/audiovisual work.&quot; I understand that things differ between countries, let us stay in International/USA space. So, according to this standard videogame medium considered a whole piece and even a small portion of that piece, even if it makes not sense outside of the whole or bears no value (copyrightable value i.e. creative and original content) is protected? Let's take, for example, a typical videogame that is made on a generic-purpose videogame engine such as Unreal Engine 4 or Unity3D Engine. When the game is packaged as a final product it contains a lot of stuff that is fairly easy to determine as protected and copyrighted work: audio assets (music, sound effects), graphical assets (textures, sprites, etc), other visual assets (3D models aka meshes, protected design-wise) and so on. This packaged game is our videogame medium. But along with this game, a bunch of meta-data is packaged as well. This metadata has no possible copyrightable value by definition (and can be actually considered as a &quot;fact&quot; or &quot;factual data&quot;) and it does not even belong to the IP holder/wonder but rather, in some way, to the creators of the tools itself (Unreal Engine, for example). Let say all this data is in one single file that is being shared - how would copyright law protect against this kind of sharing? For the context, this is somewhat follow-up to Can digital signature/Hash sequence be copyrighted?
The general rule under united-states law is that copyright is infringed when a copyrighted work, or any part of it, is copied or distributed without permission, or a new derivative work based on the copyrighted work is created or distributed without permission. There are several exceptions to this. There is, for example, a specific right to create a backup of a computer program to which one has lawful access. The best known and widest exception to copyright in US law is &quot;fair use&quot;. What use is a fair use is a highly fact-driven question: It cannot be answered in general, except by quoting the statutory provisions. There are no exact rules for what is and is not fair use that apply in all cases. There have been several detailed discussions of fair-use on this site, including https://law.stackexchange.com/a/66608/17500 not long ago. Note that fair use is a strictly US concept, and does not apply under any other country's law. Other countries have their own exceptions to copyright, which will cover some of the same cases as fair use, but not all of them, and will get to results by different routes. If hashes were distributed separately, to confirm the authenticity of a program, they would probably not be protected by copyright for lack of originality. Under US law, and particularly the Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co., 499 U.S. 340 (1991) case there must be a &quot;minimal degree&quot; of creativity for something to be protected by copyright. The decision said: Many compilations consist of nothing but raw data—i.e. wholly factual information not accompanied by any original expression. On what basis may one claim a copyright upon such work? Common sense tells us that 100 uncopyrightable facts do not magically change their status when gathered together in one place. ... The key to resolving the tension lies in understanding why facts are not copyrightable: The sine qua non of copyright is originality. Since a hash or other digital signature can be computed automatically from the document to be signed (indeed that is its value), it is not creative and copying a hash alone would not be an infringement. Whether this would be true of other metadata depends on the exact nature of that data, and the degree of creativity that it represents. Without specific facts no judgement can be made, and making that kind of very specific judgement might be beyond the scope of this site. A comment said: Just because a work is copyrighted, doesn't mean every part of that work is copyrighted, ... I would put it that every part of a work is copyrighted, but some copying does not amount to infringement. Extracting facts and rewording them so that none of the expression is copied is not infringement. Extracting a completely non-creative part of a work and reproducing it is not infringement. Copying a limited amount for use in a review or commentary is often fair use, and fair use is not infringement. Video Games There is nothing in US law specific to video games. There is little that is specific to computer software, although the right to make a backup copy is protected. A good deal of case law has focused on the issue of temporary copies made while running a program, which does not seem relevant to this question. Other cases have focused on the protectability of user interfaces, and of APIs, also not relevant here. whether a work is packaged as a single file or as many related files should not affect its copyright protection. (I know of no case on that specific issue.) Whether copying a part of acomputer file is infringement or not would depend on the purpose of the copying, and on the effect or potential effect on the copyright holder, and perhaps on other factors. Copying a non-creative hash, as a way of detecting whether a file is modified or not, does not seem likely to be infringement, unless the holder could show harm, but no one knows for sure how a court would rule in such a case. Copyright does not protect facts, but it does protect the way in which facts are expressed, unless there is only one or a few such ways available to express such a fact. Copyright also may protect the selection and arrangement of facts, except where the arrangement is &quot;obvious&quot;. Placing facts in alphabetical order (as in a phone book) or chronological order (as in a timeline) has been held to be obvious and not protected. International Standards The question and a comment ask about international standards for copyright. In effect there are none. The only significant international agreement on copyright is the Berne Copyright Convention. That is a treaty to which almost every nation belongs, thus rendering the Universal Copyright Convention and other international copyright agreements obsolete. But the Berne Convention leaves details to national copyright laws. The making or authorizing of copies, and the authorizing of derivative works are part of copyright in every Bern-compliant country. Berne provides for exceptions to copyright, but leaves the details to national law. Moreover, there is no intentional court in which copyright claims can be made. Anyone wishing to sue for copyright infringement must do so in the courts of some specific country, and so all the case law which defines details on what is and is not infringement is national, not international. It should be noted that a copyright holder may sue in any country where infringing actions have occurred. When an allegedly infringing work is distributed over the web, that often means that a plaintiff may sue in almost any country, although enforcement will be limited if the defendant has no presence and no assets in the chosen country. Thus the copyright laws of multiple countries may be relevant to a particular case.
German perspective: In German law, there is the concept of Schöpfungshöhe (threshold of originality), which is required for authorship rights (Urheberrecht) to apply to a work. Basically, the idea is that a minimum of creativity is required for something to be protected. However, that bar is rather low. Thus, for example: Literary works are protected practically always. Maps are generally protected, even though you might argue they "slavishly copy nature", because the act of choosing what to show and what not is already creative. However, a faithful photographic reproduction of a painting is not eligible for Urheberrecht to apply (LG Berlin, AZ 15 O 428/15) So yes, a "slavish copy" of a work would not qualify for protection if there is no creativity involved. Note, however, that other types of protection apart from Urheberrecht might apply, such as Sui generis database right.
Fair use is a four-factor test. Whether the use is commercial is part of just one of the four factors. Fair use is determined on a case by case basis, and it would be rather silly to assume that everything a user could post would be covered by fair use. Rather than just rely on the possibility of fair use, you may want to utilize the DMCA protections. Doing so can protect you from copyright liability for the user-generated content. You will have to register a DMCA agent, and expeditiously respond to takedown notices and counternotices.
This answer is limited to United States law. The situation in other countries is definitely different. Under United States law, the owner of a lawfully made copy of a copyrighted work has, as a right of the physical possession of that work, the right to the work's ordinary use. Licenses grant you additional rights such as the right to make derivative works, the right to make copies beyond what's needed for ordinary use, and so on. A pure license doesn't ask for anything in return, it just gives you new rights. Those rights may be conditional, but the conditions are just things you have to do to get new rights. They're not conditions imposed on any existing rights you had. A contract is an agreement between two parties. Both parties must agree to a contract for the contract to be enforceable. Contracts can take away rights you otherwise have. You don't need a license or contract to use a copyrighted work if you lawfully possess a copy of that work. Say you download a copy of a work covered by the GPL. You can refuse to accept the GPL license and you can still use that work. Why? Because no law prohibits you from doing so and there is no civil cause of action for using a lawful copy of a work under US law. But now say you want to give a copy of that work to your friend. This is illegal under US law because 17 USC 106 restrict that right to the copyright holder and there's no applicable exception since that's not part of the ordinary use. For a work covered by the GPL, the license offers to give you that right, a right you wouldn't otherwise have. It imposes conditions on you that are specifically in exchange for the grant of the new right. If you do accept the GPL, it functions as a contract. You got in exchange a right you didn't have before and if you don't comply with the GPL's terms, you don't have the copyright holder's permission to exercise those rights which is required under the law. By contrast, a click-through or EULA takes effect when you agree to it and such agreement is a condition for using the software. That's a pure contract and usually doesn't give you any rights you wouldn't have in the absence of such an agreement other than the use of the software.
From the legal code of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license (emphasis in the original): 1.a Adapted Material means material subject to Copyright and Similar Rights that is derived from or based upon the Licensed Material and in which the Licensed Material is translated, altered, arranged, transformed, or otherwise modified in a manner requiring permission under the Copyright and Similar Rights held by the Licensor. For purposes of this Public License, where the Licensed Material is a musical work, performance, or sound recording, Adapted Material is always produced where the Licensed Material is synched in timed relation with a moving image. 1.b Adapter's License means the license You apply to Your Copyright and Similar Rights in Your contributions to Adapted Material in accordance with the terms and conditions of this Public License. 1.f Licensed Material means the artistic or literary work, database, or other material to which the Licensor applied this Public License. 2.a Subject to the terms and conditions of this Public License, the Licensor hereby grants You a worldwide, royalty-free, non-sublicensable, non-exclusive, irrevocable license to exercise the Licensed Rights in the Licensed Material to: 2.a.1.A reproduce and Share the Licensed Material, in whole or in part; and 2.a.1.B produce, reproduce, and Share Adapted Material. 2.a.5.B You may not offer or impose any additional or different terms or conditions on, or apply any Effective Technological Measures to, the Licensed Material if doing so restricts exercise of the Licensed Rights by any recipient of the Licensed Material. 3.a.4 If You Share Adapted Material You produce, the Adapter's License You apply must not prevent recipients of the Adapted Material from complying with this Public License. In short, if the original is CC-BY, you can license derivative works under whatever terms you want, so long as the license of the original work is not infringed by the new terms for the derived work. In particular, ordinary copyright (aka. &quot;all rights reserved&quot;) is a perfectly acceptable copyright for a derivative of a CC-BY work (but the original credits should be included -and augmented- in order to also comply with the original CC-BY). Also note this doesn't restrict anybody's rights to use the original material under the original license. The other non-ShareAlike license that permits derivative works (Attribution-Noncommmercial) has a different version of clause 2.a.1.B: produce, reproduce, and Share Adapted Material for NonCommercial purposes only. so any license of a derivative work cannot permit commercial use of the original work. It may be possible to permit commercial use of those portions of the derivative that can be separated from the original; this gets into an extreme edge case of copyright law and you'll probably want to consult a lawyer if you find yourself in such a situation. Another way to consider this issue is by noting that you are only licensing your modifications. For example, if you add a mustache to a CC-BY portrait and use a CC-0 license, only your mustache is CC-0; you can't eliminate the original author's requirement of attribution this way. The derived work would still have to be used under a CC-BY license (or compatible).
The GCIDE dictionary itself is licensed under GPL-3.0. It consists of a bunch of files with markup, no software involved. Indeed, the GPL can also be applied to non-software works, though it is unusual. When you use material under some license, you must comply with the terms of the license. In case of the GPL, there are two highly relevant conditions: Everyone who receives a copy of the covered work (original or modified, in whole or in part) must receive the complete corresponding source code of the work, under the terms of the GPL-3.0. If you create a derivative work of the covered work, the derivative work can only be distributed under the GPL-3.0. However, selling the covered material is perfectly fine. The GPL does not forbid you to make money, however you must not profit from your requirement to provide the corresponding source code. Here, the core question is whether your mobile game would be a derivative work of the GPL-licensed dictionary. If your game merely loads the dictionary as a data file, I don't think they would form a single derived work. However, if you compile the dictionary into your app, this would be more difficult to argue. Ultimately, what is a derivative work will depend on a court. It could therefore be helpful to keep your app as clearly non-derivative as possible. I would avoid baking the dictionary into the app's binary but store it separately as a data file, would show attribution notices in reasonable places (e.g. a screen with attribution notices and the complete license text), and would make it possible for users to export a copy of the dictionary files. Furthermore, the GPL-3.0 may require you to allow users to modify this file, for example by making it possible to import a modified dictionary into your app.
No, it isn't. A sound recording of a song has a few different elements that are distinct from one another, but they are each protected by copyright (unless the song is old enough to have passed into the public domain): the lyrics the melody and other aspects of the musical composition the instrumental arrangement the recording itself A sound recording is protected by copyright even if it is a recording of something that isn't protected by copyright. If you use a portion of the recording that has no lyrics, or if you use technical means to suppress the lyrics or filter them out, you still have to contend with the copyright protection of the other elements. But sometimes it is allowed to use copyright-protected material. There is a lot of discussion about &quot;fair use&quot; and other circumstances under which one can use copyright-protected material without permission. The most clear-cut way to use copyright-protected material without violating copyright, however, is to have permission in the form of a license. You can always ask.
You are correct that facts in general are not protected by copyright, and most raw data are facts. However, a collection of data may be protected by copyright as to its selection and organization. A use which copies such selection might possibly be copyright infringement. If data constitutes a trade secret it may be protected as such, and &quot;improper&quot; access might be unlawful. This would not apply to publicly available data or collections of data. If, to access a data set, one must sign or agree to a contract, that contract may limit the use of such data. Again, this would not apply to most publicly available data.