Copyright statement with domain name I am curious is there any legal force in a statement like Copyright (c) MyDomain.com. In other words, the copyright holder is a domain name or the owner of the domain.
Copyright exists whether they make that statement or not. Giving such notice informs the public that the work is copyrighted, who owns it, and when it was published. If the work is infringed, the defendant will not be able to use an innocent infringement defense. There's nothing special about using the domain name, as it's probably the name or DBA of the business that owns the domain.
Yes, assuming the material was given the standard license. You would be creating a derivative work, and only the copyright owner has the right to authorize creation of a derivative work. See the copyright FAQ for general information. The owner can file a DMCA takedown notice with YouTube and they will by policy notify you of the infringement claim and unless you file a counter-notice (you legally couldn't given the facts you're asserting), they will take it down. The owner can also sue you.
Yet I publicly wear shirts with copyrighted designs all the time. I'm unclear about this; do you mean T-shirts you have made yourself using copyrighted images or T-shirts you have bought? If the former then it is a prima facie breach and you could be sued by the copyright holder. You would probably not be as it would be impracticable. If the latter then there are 2 possibilities: The manufacturer/distributer/retailer chain all hold valid licences to put the image on a T-shirt and display it in the usual way so there is no breach involved. The manufacturer/distributer/retailer chain does not hold a valid licence in which case there is a breach and the copyright holder would target, say Wall-Mart rather than you. what about displaying ... works of art in my yard? Notwithstanding that it can be viewed from a public space, your yard is not public; therefore this is not public display.
More generally, can anyone just copy an existing website (without copying the code or images)? Yes. Could I make a website that lets people post pictures like Instagram but call it MyPics? Yes. In general, copyright protects particular expressions of ideas, not higher level ideas or concepts.
Distribution on YouTube implicates, at least, US copyright law. Shropshire v. Canning 809 F.Supp.2d 1139 (N.D. Cal. 2011), Subafilms v. MGM 24 F.3d 1088 (9th Cir. 1994) Are you infringing? Is the original work eligible for copyright? &quot;It is undisputed that computer programs— defined in the Copyright Act as a set of statements or instructions to be used directly or indirectly in a computer in order to bring about a certain result, can be subject to copyright protection as literary works.&quot; 17 USC 102, Oracle Am., Inc. v. Google, Inc., 750 F.3d 1339 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (internal citations omitted). Are you making a copy or displaying the work publicly? (17 USC 106) You concede that you are doing this in the hypothetical, so we can skip this step. Do you have permission to do this? Some work is licensed to allow your proposed use. If you have permission, then this entire answer is moot. Are you taking what amounts to a substantial taking of the original? Presumably, you will not need to show the entire source file to present the naming conventions and techniques that other developers have used. But, what you do show will be an exact reproduction of the original. In the case of computer programs, all US districts use the abstraction-filtration-comparison test. Computer Associates International, Inc. v. Altai, Inc., 982 F.2d 693 (2d Cir. 1992). The abstraction stage of this test is irrelevant in this hypothetical because the reproduction is exact. Filtration excludes any uncopyrightable elements of the original from consideration (due to scènes à faire, merger, lack of originality). The comparison stage compares what remains after the filtration stage, to determine if the new work takes substantially from the original. Fair use defense If your use is found to be infringing based on the above analysis, the affirmative defense of fair use is available. I can't tell you whether a fair use defense would be applicable or successful in your particular case. However, you can search the US Copyright Office's Fair Use Index for many examples successful fair use defenses when a literary work was reproduced in part or whole for educational purposes. There are also other affirmative defenses available (implied license, for example), or defenses that directly attack the elements of copyright infringement. Some confusion exists regarding &quot;idea/expression merger&quot; as a defense after a prima facie case of copyright infringement has been made. This isn't completely correct. Where idea/expression merger enters the analysis differs from circuit to circuit. In the 6th circuit, merger enters in the copyrightability analysis (paragraph 1. above). But, the 2nd and 9th circuits treat merger as part of the infringement analysis (paragraph 4. above) and in the 9th circuit, merger is an affirmative defense. Ets-Hokin v. Skyy Spirits, Inc., 225 F.3d 1068 (9th Cir. 2000) The idea/expression merger doctrine is not implicated just because &quot;the idea one that is expressing is 'this is the code they used.'&quot; When you need to cite/show the original work for purposes of &quot;criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching&quot;, that is a direct implication of fair use. Using using this justification triggers the full four-factor fair use analysis. (17 USC 107). You don't get to reproduce a work just because you want to say &quot;this is the work they created.&quot;
According to CENDI, yes the US government is able to claim copyright on works internationally. The law in question which makes US government works public domain in the US (17 U.S. Code § 105) only does so within the confines of US copyright. Since copyright protection is on a per-country basis, there's no reason that the US government couldn't assert IP rights under foreign copyright law (though I didn't go looking for an example). While the Berne Convention generally requires countries to provide foreign works the same protection as domestic works, I can think of two general reasons why US government works wouldn't fall under copyright protection in some countries: The country simply doesn't apply copyright protection to any government works (don't know how common this is). The country applies the rule of the shorter term. If they do, they aren't required to provide a longer term of protection than the country of origin does (which is nil in this case).
Links are in French. As the author of a work, you would generally hold copyright unless there's a contract otherwise. L113 of the Code de la propriété intellectuelle determines who is the rights holder of a given work and I don't see anything there that changes things for you as a contractor. Even if you assigned some rights to your employer through a contract, France has moral rights which can never be ceded. In fact, even if you were a salaried employee, you still hold the rights by default, unlike the US. There are a few exceptions to that though: software, inseparable joint works, and works where the creative process was purely directed by your superiors.
The part about "If I'm the owner of the content, surely I have the right to request its deletion" is the problem. Sure, you have the right to request, but you can't legally compel. You have an agreement with them, according to which you got something, and they got something. You can't then take back the thing that you gave them, which is permission to use. You didn't give them the IP itself, which you still hold. Here's an analogy. You may own a car, and can give a person permission to use the car (let's say "if you bring me back a pound of cheese from the store"). You cannot later change your mind (especially after you've gotten the cheese) a say that you retract that permission and therefore they actually stole your car. When permission to use is given, as long as the conditions for granting permission are satisfied, you can't un-give permission.