Digital Copyright in the Digital Environment

In the booming digital age, digital copyright has become a decisive factor in protecting the intellectual property of authors and creators. With the development of the internet, the way of creating, distributing and consuming works has changed dramatically. Works are no longer limited to physical forms but can be shared and accessed easily through online platforms. So how has digital copyright changed in the digital environment? Follow the article of VCD below.

1.       What is digital copyright?

Copyright is considered a form of intellectual property. It is not a trademark nor a patent. Copyright is understood as the legal right of the author, owner of the work created or owned by him/her, individuals and organizations are not allowed to infringe upon the rights of the author, copyright owner regarding the management, use, and exploitation of the value of the work without their consent.

Vietnamese law does not have a definition of copyright, but in the legal language of copyright, which is the author’s right, according to the provisions of Clause 2, Article 4 of the Intellectual Property Law 2022: copyright is the right of an organization or individual to the work they create or own.

According to the provisions of Clause 1, Article 14 of the Intellectual Property Law, there are 12 types of protected works. From there, it can be understood that copyright is the rights that the author enjoys for his/her literary, artistic, and scientific works. Without a work, there will be no copyright.

Therefore, digital copyright is the enrichment and expansion of the rights of authors when their works are reproduced and released in digital form. Works are backed up and reproduced on many types of publishing media such as hard disks, CDs and other digital storage devices, for wide distribution. The dissemination and release of works can be done through means such as CDs, hard disks, storage drives, or through the internet and wireless networks.

2.      Changes in digital content in the digital environment

The subject of rights changes:

The subject of copyright protection is the works specified in Clause 1, Article 14 of the Law on Intellectual Property, commonly referred to as literary, artistic and scientific works. Normally, the forms of works specified in the law can be used to generalize them such as literary, artistic, photographic, audio and visual works. However, the development of digital technology has allowed all types of works to be expressed and disseminated in the form of information and encoded.

The trend of linking different types of works is becoming clearer. For example, online games integrate many different works such as music, art, graphic works and animation works. The connection between works and publishing media is gradually limited. Traditional works, regardless of whether they are being disseminated or used, require the use of a certain publishing medium to turn the work into a tangible work. The application of digital communication technology allows all types of works to be recorded in binary code, using only two characters 0 and 1, from which they can be freely disseminated and circulated. With just a computer and a network connection, users can easily download the works they want from anywhere. Therefore, works do not necessarily have to exist in physical form on publishing media but can still be disseminated and used. The Internet and digital media have opened up a new direction for the dissemination of works.

The subject of rights has changed:

Digital works are often a collection of many types of works, so the subject of rights has also become more complicated. Different types of works constitute a new work. In addition, this new work can be divided or combined into other works.

In the digital environment, the rights related to digital copyright have also changed. The change in communication methods has led to changes in the rights related to copyright, creating new beneficiaries such as internet intermediary service providers. Acting as the unit that disseminates works, they have the ability to disseminate works globally. Therefore, determining the legal status and position of the parties involved in the dissemination process is very important in protecting copyright for works. It can be seen that the relationship between online content providers and authors must be balanced. The scope of digital copyright protection is not only limited to protecting the rights of the author as in traditional publishing, but also needs to consider the interests of content providers and internet services. Only then can the relationship between the author, the disseminator and the user of the work be truly balanced.

Content of the right to change:

• Right to change name

According to the provisions of intellectual property law, the author has the right to change the name of the work or not, and can use his real name or a pseudonym. In traditional copyright protection, the right to change the name and the status of the author are easy to distinguish. However, in the internet environment, anonymity complicates the determination of the author’s status and the right to change the name. This requires the author to prove ownership of the work. In addition, digital communication technology allows editing the work without leaving a trace, increasing the difficulty in determining the real author and assessing the authenticity of the work, thereby posing a challenge to copyright protection.

• Right to copy works

The right to copy in traditional copyright protection only includes the right to reproduce the work into multiple copies through methods such as printing, copying, recording, filming and scanning. These methods do not include copying works in the internet environment. The right to copy for digital works has undergone important changes, with two issues to consider: Is “digitizing” a work considered an act of copying? And are temporary copies formed during the process of disseminating a work on the internet subject to the right to copy?

Above is the article “Digital copyright in the digital environment” that VCD sent to you. We hope this article is useful to you.

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