Who own the copyright - the artist or the subject in the drawing? If an artist draws a picture of some famous political figure, who owns the copyright to that image/drawing - the artist or the political figure in the drawing? What if the artist drew a picture of the political figure in a famous setting (such as a president by his inaugural address) - does that effect anything? Similarly, what if the artist simply copies a famous scene that was taken with a digital camera and converts it to an almost identical drawing?
The artist is always the initial owner of the copyright unless, under US law, the artist was hired to do the drawing under circumstances which make it a &quot;work made for hire&quot;. This requires a regular employment relationship, or an explicit written contract saying that it is for a work made for hire. In the US this makes the employer the original owner, and then legal author. That is not true in most other countries. In many countries the natural person who creates a work is the author, even if by contract the copyright is immediately transferred to the author's employer. This matters because the author's life is used to measure the copyright term. In the US a work-made-for-hire has a fixed term (of 95 years from publication, or 120 from creation, whichever ends sooner), not measured by anyone's life. However, once the work has been created, the artist may sell or give away the copyright, including to the subject, if s/he so chooses. However, although the subject does not normally own the copyright, the subject may have relevant &quot;rights of publicity&quot; which may limit what the artist can do with the drawing. In particular, using it to advertise anything may be unlawful unless the subject's permission is obtained. Whether such rights exist at all, and exactly whatn they cover, varies significantly by jurisdiction. Inn the US this varies by state.
The work and the copyright to the work are different property rights Buying one does not give you rights to the other. Copyright laws differ by country so its impossible to say which need transfers to be in writing and which don't. For example, the United States requires them (and also allows owners to rescind the transfer after a number of years) but in Australia, it isn't necessary and the Copyright Act makes a number of presumptions in civil actions (ss126-131) which favor the person claiming the copyright so that, in the absence of contrary evidence, their assertion will prevail.
In the US, the original author still owns the copyright, unless the original work was out of copyright (in which case no one owns the copyright): copyright is not granted for just pressing a "scan" button, and mechanical reproductions are not eligible for copyright (copyright protects creativity, and a scan involves zero creativity). To quote 313.4(A) ("Mere Copies") of the Compendium of US Copyright Office Practices, Third Edition: A work that is a mere copy of another work of authorship is not copyrightable. The Office cannot register a work that has been merely copied from another work of authorship without any additional authorship. [...] Examples: [...] Photocopying, scanning, or digitizing a literary work. That doesn't necessarily mean the repository can't put any restriction on your use of the copy; the repository may have a terms of service. Terms of service are rooted in contract law, not copyright; just because the work is in the public domain, doesn't force the repository to show it to anyone who asks, and they can force you to agree to a contract first. The enforceability of that contract is fact-dependent.
That post is probably illegal. Because she is making false assertions about you (that are presumably damaging your reputation), she is likely liable for defamation. Because she has copied a picture of you without authorization, she is likely liable for violating the copyright of whomever owns that picture. Commenters have suggested she might invoke a fair-use defense, but I would expect it to fail. The four fair-use factors are: The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes: Both Plaintiff and Defendant are using using the photograph to identify the holder of an account -- a Facebook account in P's case, a business account in D's. D is using the photograph in connection with a profit-making enterprise, not for educational purposes, and her use is not transformative. The nature of the copyrighted work: Photography is a creative art at the core of copyright's purposes, generally entitled to thick protection. Ets-Hokin v. Skyy Spirits, Inc., 225 F.3d 1068, 1074 (9th Cir. 2000) (&quot;[P]hotography entails creative expression warranting copyright protection.&quot;) The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole: There is no indication that D took anything less than the entire photograph. The effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work: The question is not only whether the defendant's use affected the actual market for the protected work, but whether many people doing the same thing would depress the potential market for the work. Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., 510 U.S. 569, 590 (1994) (Courts must consider &quot;whether unrestricted and widespread conduct of the sort engaged in by the defendant would result in a substantially adverse impact on the potential market.&quot;) The potential market for the image is probably very small, but widespread unauthorized copies, publicly displayed, would undoubtedly depress whatever market exists. So all four factors cut against the defendant. Fair use is a loser defense here.
No you don't. There are two copyright holders regarding the derivative work: yourself, for creating the original. the other artist, for creating the modified version. The other artist has received the right to use your original through the CC-BY license, under the condition that they attribute you appropriately. However, you have not received any rights to the other artist's work.
It would seem that your song is a derived work. You took the original work and found words that sound the same. If the original work had used different words, your work would have ended up differently. So you have a derived work. Same as making a translation; if the original was different, then the translation would be different, so the translation is a derived work. I was asked "How is this not straight up infringement". But it is. Not only copying is an exclusive right of the copyright holder, but also the creation of derivative works.
Per a decision of the US Copyright Office last month, AI generated images are not subject to copyright. That means you can use the generated images for any purpose you want1, but so can anyone else. However, the specific usage of a given image might be protected - so if you put a caption on the image and arrange it in the form of a comic (as the artist in that example did), that specific text and arrangement can be protected, but the underlying image can't be. Laws may differ elsewhere in the world, but that's the current stance in the US. 1 Subject to any appropriate laws, including any copyright laws which the new image itself may violate. Just because the image isn't protected itself doesn't mean that it can't infringe on someone else's copyrights. See the other answer for more details.
It is true that any work of the US government is not subject to copyright in the United States; it may be subject to copyright abroad (the relevant law excludes US government works from US copyright protection; other countries have their own copyright laws that generally don't explicitly exclude US government works, and so the works may be copyrighted there). A government work is defined as something produced by a government employee in the course of his official duties. It doesn't include everything released by a government agency; for instance, if a contractor makes something and the contract specifies that the government gets the copyright, the work is copyrighted (since it wasn't made by a government employee). If a foreign cosmonaut or astronaut composes and sings an original song in a livestream, then NASA may not have copyright in the livestream but the foreign astronaut would have copyright in the song. That said, NASA has a page of guidelines for reuse of their media, where they say that their stuff normally isn't copyrighted unless otherwise noted. They don't make any sort of guarantee, but they suggest you'd probably be fine embedding it, at least as far as they're concerned.