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A member of a popular rookie idol group Twice, Nayeon, became the talk of netizens for uploading a post on Taeyeon’s song that inspired her. The post was problematic because it proved that she streamed another musician’s song illegally. Nayeon posted on the official Instagram account of Twice a short comment about the greatness of Taeyeon’s song, and tagged Sound Cloud, which is an illegitimate music streaming site. Around the same time, Lock & Lock, a kitchen appliance brand, was embroiled in controversy for copying a tumbler design owned by Starbucks. These two incidents suggest that infringement of copyrighted materials occurs in frequent succession, and anyone, even an idol star or a famous enterprise can be an assailant.

Since the world has turned into Information Society after the Third Wave, conflict between two ideas, copyright and copyleft is a conundrum of the current society. Copyrights exist to protect the creators’ rights to be paid for their contents. Copyleft, on the other hand, emphasizes the right of the user of the contents. The Internet is a space where both openness and bidirectional property coexist. This makes it possible for anyone with technology to become a creator and editor of certain contents, which even blurs the boundary of creator and sharer. 

How is Copyright of Artists Stated by Law?

The fundamental conditions for defining a product as art should be as follows: it should be a human production and should contain creative expression. According to Professor Lee Dae Hee (Law School), originality is recognized as long as it is originated by the creator’s own mind. For instance, a picture drawn by a kindergartener definitely has originality.

“Enshrined in intellectual property law, the artistic aspect and practical aspect of the product should be separated in order for it to be recognized as an object to protect,” Kathleen Kim, a lawyer specializing in art law, explained. Practical products such as flashlight are not recognized as objects to protect since their sole purpose is practical use. Copyright does not endow exclusive right on a product or idea. Rather, it protects the rights regarding the expression of the idea. The boundary of creator’s rights change according to whether the content is pure art, or is with practical purpose.

Kim provides additional illustration that copyright not only stands for protecting property rights of a creator, but also the creator’s authorship rights. Unlike property rights, authorship rights do not possess commerciality. On behalf of that, authorship rights deal with aspects that are inalienable, such as rights to maintain the identity of the content, rights to indicate one’s real name, and rights of declaration. Authorship rights stands out from other property rights in that they are exclusively owned by the creator and vanish when the creator dies. 

There are three main rights in terms of authorship. The right of declaration protects the right to not publish the content to the public. The right to indicate one’s real name literally emphasizes the right of creators to mark their own name on their contents, and to ban their name from being marked on works that are not their creation. The right to maintain the identity of the content prevents the artistic content from being modified or transformed. An infringement of copyright occurs when at least one of these rights is violated.

How to Safeguard Copyright?

A creator whose copyright is violated would look for ways to protect his or her rights and prevent further damage. The actions that can be taken diverges into two, civil remedy and a criminal remedy. By filing a civil suit, the creator would choose from claiming for damages through certification of contents or associated special provisions, claiming injunction, and conciliation with the help of KCC. When creators opt for filing a criminal suit, methods they can include are imposing penalty, confiscation, dual liability and an offense subject to complaint. Unfortunately in Korea, damage is hard to prove and the sum of monetary compensation is insufficient. Imprisonment is hardly carried out in most cases and the punishment is meager.

“There are considerable barriers in applying copyrights in every related case,” Professor Lee commented. “Especially when the criminal is providing an illegitimate streaming service based on foreign internet service, it is merely impossible to punish him.” Though national institutions like prosecution are obliged to impose legal restrictions, they seem to be burdened to do so since such cases are considerably prevalent. “In fact, criminal sanctions are not adequately inflicted,” Lee added. 

 

   
▲ Lock & Lock Tumbler. Provided by pinterest.com

There exist helpful institutions that provide advice and counseling regarding copyright disputes. KCC is one of them, whose main role is deliberating on copyrights issues, meditating disputes, and launching projects to protect copyright. The institution provides real-time automatic counseling service and counseling through phone, mail or visiting. In addition, it provides highquality dispute meditation service with a skilled agent. Another option copyright holders can take is to request commissioned administration to a specialized agency. They can get consistent, meticulous protection for their copyrights.

People these days tend to be numb about the issue of copyright infringement, especially toward intangible properties. Take e-books for example: the general attitude of people shows less regard than to tangible ones. “The users thus endeavor to pay more attention to copyright issues. The government should carry out advertisement and education in order to raise copyright awareness. Also, harsher and stricter punishments should be imposed on copyright violation, especially in cases of large scale enterprises. The producers should allow users to conveniently get access to contents by providing legitimate routes to utilize them,” Professor Lee emphasized. 

Upholding artists’ copyrights is not merely the issue of economic value, but it links to personal rights and honor of the holder. Artists strive to protect their copyrights for a reason—they have put their spirit into their works, which makes the contents part of themselves. More and more various contents are being created. At the same time, the possibility of violating copyrights without recognizing it has also become prevalent. If the rights of creators are not reasonably protected, no more brilliant creations will take place.

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