Video Game Copyright Solicitor
Video Game Copyright Legal Specialist
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PAIL® Solicitors offer expertise and decades of experience in copyright registration and disputes. Contact us using the above form or at peter@pailsolicitors.co.uk or on 0207 305-7491 charge rates may apply and may vary).
What is Copyright?
Copyright is the exclusive right to use your creative work and more importantly to stop others from using your creative work without your consent. In other words, you control how other people access, store and manage your creative works.
What Is a Video Game?
A video game is an electronic game in which the players manipulate images on a gaming device. Video games are typically catergorised by their hardware platform.
What is Infringement?
Infringement occurs when you violate a rule or law. In the case of copyright infringement it occurs when you undermine the rights of the copyright holder by using their creative work without consent.
What Is Video Game Copyright Infringement?
Only specific works are copyrightable.
s1(1) of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (the “Act”) sets out the following works as being capable of copyright protection.
“(a)original literary, dramatic, musical or artistic works,
(b)sound recordings, films [or broadcasts], and
(c)the typographical arrangement of published editions.”
S17(2) of the Act says that copying means a reproduction in any material form. The meaning of "in any material form" goes beyond straightforward literal copying and can include copying the structure. This type of non-literal reproduction focuses on whether there was copying of those elements of the original that were capable of copyright protection.
While it is trite law that verbatim copying of photographs (electronic images are included within the definition of photographs in s4(2) of the Act), text, design notes, graphics, databases, music files, audio/visual files, code are all copyright protected.
What if the Video Game has Been Altered?
This relates to the adaptation of video game coding. An adaptation concerning software, database and computer code is found in:
S21(3) (ab) as “an arrangement or altered version of the program or a translation of it”.
S21(3) (ac) as “in relation to a database, means an arrangement or altered version of the database or a translation of it.”
S21(4) as “In relation to a computer program a “translation” includes a version of the program in which it is converted into or out of a computer language or code or into a different computer language or code”.
Software is nothing more than coding stored in a fixed form that runs on the hardware. Video Games coding runs on the relevant Platform and there is no material difference.
Video Game Copyright Solicitor
Video Game Copyright