Copyright, privacy rights I made the mistake of buying an essay online, due to having surgery and no time to write it. Now the website is trying to get more money from me threatening to call the university and the Board to show the paper and my name and the conversation we had because they claim I have to pay for copyright, not just the price for writing the essay. They say they did not know about this, as I asked why did they not tell me about this additional cost before, so I should know the essay is just for me to read, and not submit it to the University, as I stated clearly what I am going to be using it for. Please, could you help me clarify this? Thank you.
As Putvi says, you are being extorted and this is a criminal matter and thus a matter for the authorities in your jurisdiction. However, you have a second problem entirely apart from that - you almost certainly broke academic ethical rules by submitting a piece of work that you did not write as your own (these things are pretty cut and dried in academic circles). This will not go away. Regardless of whether your extortionists are brought to justice, they can still release your details at any point in time and ruin your career, or it can come out in other ways. Own up to this with your university as soon as possible, and see if you can make it right. This will be hanging over you for the rest of your life, and can drop at any moment - these sorts of things have ruined people before.
You would need a court order to force them to take it down. There is virtually no chance a court will order them to take it down, because it would be almost impossible to do so without violating the First Amendment. You would have to prove that forcing a publisher to stop saying that you teach at the university would advance some compelling governmental interest, and that there isn't a better way to advance that interest. It's not clear what you mean by "cyberstalking," but if you're talking about someone sending you harassing messages, then the court would probably conclude that the better option would be to punish the harasser, rather than limit the publisher's speech. You could try paying them off or sending a threatening legal demand, but I doubt either would go far. I suspect that the best course would be a persistent campaign to escalate up their chain of command to find a sympathetic person willing to help. Even that, though, I would expect to be tough, because I'm sure you wouldn't be the first person trying this.
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.
You're misreading the law. You need to keep reading the section you referenced (emphasis added): The disclosure...shall be made in writing and delivered through the consumer’s account with the business, if the consumer maintains an account with the business, or by mail or electronically at the consumer’s option if the consumer does not maintain an account with the business Thus, the option to have the disclosure sent by mail only applies to consumers who do not have an account with the business. Since presumably a large number of sites only maintain personal information for users with accounts, such sites need not provide a mail option. Further, it doesn't say there needs to be a button: you just need the ability to say you'd like it mailed to you in the request somehow, and then they need to comply when you do.
A cease and desist letter is basically a formal way of them saying, &quot;stop what you are doing, and please don't do it again.&quot; It is not proof of tortious conduct by you, nor is it proof of illegal conduct by you. It does not open up an avenue for the university to sue you, nor does it open up an avenue for the university to have you committed to a mental institution. Your behaviour after receiving such a letter does matter however. What is most likely their next step should you continue emailing members of the university, is to apply for an injunction. It is possible that should the injunction be granted, you may be liable to pay fees. Breaching an injunction can have serious consequences, including jail. I would recommend against writing a letter apologizing. You are doing the very thing they asked you not to do. If you do feel in inclined to apologize, you should write the letter to the general counsel and ask them to forward it along. They probably won't. Obviously you have to be quite careful with the content of the letter. You are almost certainly within your rights to continue to email their general counsel. In addition, they almost certainly cannot stop you from communicating with the state agency responsible for the university.
A proof can be protected by copyright. The underlying facts of math cannot. But if one has copied details of the order of the proof, or of the selection of theorems to use, and if several other choices would have been possible, then the new proof may constitute a trivially modified copy, or a derivative work, and in either case making of it might be copyright infringement. However, making and distributing a copy, even with no changes at all, for purposes of comment and criticism, might be fair use in the US, fair dealing in the UK or some other parts of the Commonwealth, or fall under an exception to copyright in other countries (these generally vary significantly by country). This is usually a very fact-driven question.
No. Copyright protects expressions of ideas, not ideas themselves and not historical facts either. Conceivably, the persons written about might have a commercial right to use of their person or image, but the doctrine there is not copyright and the analysis is different.
Go to court and find out There is no doubt that humming a tune and recording it (or performing it in public) is a derivative work - a right reserved to the copyright owner. Whether it is fair use depends on the specifics of the case. From the tweet, we simply don’t have enough information, however, at a guess, it is probably not fair use. Fair use in law is Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 17 U.S.C. § 106 and 17 U.S.C. § 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include: the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; the nature of the copyrighted work; the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work. The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors. Most people miss “for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research,” - if you aren’t doing one of those things then you start behind the 8-ball when yo move to the 4 factor test. Note that the “criticism, comment, news reporting,” etc. must be about the copyrighted work - I can’t use your copyrighted work to, for example, parody a politician unless you are that politician. Many people have completely the wrong idea about what copyright infringement and fair use actually are, in part because the use of music on YouTube is allowed, not because it’s fair use but, because YouTube was smart enough to negotiate and pay for a permissive licence with music producers. For a full explanation, see this video.