With Sidekick you Apply for copyright protection with us in 3 simple steps -
Information Collection & Checking
We collect all the necessary files and check if they can be used for the application.
Copyright Filing
We then prepare the application and file the forms.
Regular Updates
We'll keep you up-to-date with all information passed on by the Registrar until the process is completed.
How to Do Copyright Registration Online with Sidekick.pk
Copyright Registration Online – an Overview
Copyright is the legal right creators are entitled to for their literary, dramatics, music, and artistic work. Producers of films and recordings enjoy this right too. When a proprietor registers for a copyright, it gives them an exclusive right to reproduce, replicate, and distribute the work. Further, they can grant authority to some other entity for the same purpose.
Registering for copyright is important because it makes you the legal owner of the rights over the work. You then have control over communicating it to the public, reproducing rights, any adaptations or translations of the works.
How Copyrighting Works
A copyright protects the expression of an idea. Unlike a patent, which protects the idea itself, copyright protects only the expression.
As the owner of the copyright, the author has the unique right to produce copies of the work, to exhibit and perform it publicly, and to distribute copies of the work to the public. These exclusive rights are valid for the author's lifetime plus 70 years. A work made for hire, on the other hand, has a copyright that lasts for a fixed period of 95 years from the date of creation.
The work must be original to the creator in order to be protected by copyright. To be unique, the work should:
Note: The work will be terminated and will not be entitled to copyright protection if these two conditions are not met.
Copyright Law and Treaties
The Copyright Ordinance 1962 (the Act), supported by the Copyright Rules 1967 (the Rules), The International Copyrights Order (1968) & Copyrights Board (Procedure) Regulations (1981), is the governing law for copyright protection in Pakistan. Substantial Section 66 of the Ordinance, as amended by the Amendment Act, provides that any person who knowingly infringes or abets the infringement of the copyright in a work (defined to include computer programs), or any other right conferred by the Ordinance shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to 3 years.
Pakistan follows a common law legal system, so relies on case law to interpret and set precedents in law and so the judicial decisions contribute to the sources of copyright law in Pakistan. Pakistan is a member of the Berne Conventions and Universal Copyright Convention. The Government of Pakistan has also passed the International Copyright Order, 1999. According to this Order, any work first published in any country that is a member of any of the above conventions is granted the same treatment as if it was first published in India.
The copyright law aims to balance the interests of those who create content, with the public interest in having the widest possible access to that content. WIPO administers several international treaties in the area of copyright and related rights.
What Can Be Protected By Copyright?
Copyright, a form of intellectual property law, protects original works of authorship including literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works, such as poetry, novels, movies, songs, computer software, and architecture. Copyright does not protect facts, ideas, systems, or methods of operation, although it may protect the way these things are expressed.
Eight categories of works are copyrightable:
Benefits of Copyright Registration
How copyright protects your work
Copyright protects your original work and restricts others from;
Copyright, Trademark, and Patent comparison
Copyright registration in Pakistan with IPO protects the original work of an author, while a patent protects discoveries. A Trademark safeguards a word, phrase, design that categorizes and segregates the source of the goods of one party from others. A service mark is a phrase, word or sign that classifies and differentiates the basis of a service rather than goods.
Things protected under Copyright
The following may be protected under Copyright Rues 1967 with IPO in Pakistan.
Scope of Copyright Registration in Pakistan
What types of works may be protected by copyright?
A variety of original works are protected by copyright law, which ensures protection of books, music, films, newspapers, video games, magazines, paintings, architecture, sculptures, photographs, computer programs and original databases.
Section 2 of the Copyright Ordinance further defines the types of works that are protected in Pakistan, which include the following:
Rights covered
Rights of a Copyright Owners in Pakistan
A copyright owner gets to enjoy the following rights and only they can assign these rights to someone else:
Documents Required for Copyrights Registration in Pakistan
Advantages of Copyright Registration in Pakistan
Why Sidekick is only Source for Online Copyright Registration?
Copyright is a form of protection provided to the
authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic,
musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is
available to both published and unpublished works. The owner of copyright has
the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do the following:
1.To reproduce the work in copies or
phonorecords;
2.To prepare derivative works based upon the
work;
3.To distribute copies or phonorecords of the
work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease,
or lending;
4.To perform the work publicly, in the case of
literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion
pictures and other audiovisual works;
5.To display the work publicly, in the case of
literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and
pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works, including the individual images of a
motion picture or other audiovisual work; and
6.In the case of sound recordings*, to perform
the work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission.
It is illegal for anyone to violate any of the rights provided by the copyright law to the owner of copyright. These rights, however, are not unlimited in scope, the copyright law establishes limitations on these rights. In some cases, these limitations are specified exemptions from copyright liability. One major limitation is of “fair use,” In other instances, the limitation takes the form of a “compulsory license” under which certain limited uses of copyrighted works are permitted upon payment of specified royalties and compliance with statutory conditions. For further information about the limitations of any of these rights, consult the copyright law
Copyright
protection subsists from the time the work is created in fixed form. The
copyright in the work of authorship immediately becomes the property of the
author who created the work. Only the author or those deriving their rights
through the author can rightfully claim copyright.
In the case of a
work prepared by an employee within the scope of his or her employment; the
employer and not the employee is considered to be the author, if the parties
expressly agree in a written instrument signed by them that the work shall be
considered a work made for hire.
The authors of a
joint work are co-owners of the copyright in the work, unless there is an agreement
to the contrary.
Note:
Ownership of a book, manuscript, painting, or any other copy or phonorecord does not give the possessor the copyright. The transfer of ownership of any material object that embodies a protected work does not of itself convey any rights in the copyright.
Copyright protects “original works of authorship”
that are fixed in a tangible form of expression. The fixation need not be
directly perceptible so long as it may be communicated with the aid of a
machine or device. Copyrightable works include the following categories:
1.literary works;
2.musical works, including any accompanying words
3.dramatic works, including any accompanying
music
4.pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works\
5.motion pictures and other audiovisual works
6.sound recordings
7.architectural works
These categories should be viewed broadly. For
example, computer programs and most “compilations” may be registered as
“literary works”.
Several categories of material are generally not
eligible for copyright protection. These include among others:
•Works that have not been fixed in a tangible
form of
•Ideas, procedures, methods, systems, processes,
concepts, principles, discoveries, or devices, as distinguished from a
description, explanation, or illustration
•Works consisting entirely of information that is
common property and containing no original authorship (for example: standard
calendars, height and weight charts, tape measures and rulers, and lists or
tables taken from public documents or other common sources)
Copyright Secured Automatically upon Creation The way in which copyright protection is secured is frequently misunderstood, registration is not compulsory to secure copyright. There are, however, certain definite advantages to registration. Copyright is secured automatically when the work is created, and a work is “created” when it is fixed in a copy or phonorecord for the first time. “Copies” are material objects from which a work can be read or visually perceived either directly or with the aid of a machine or device, such as books, manuscripts, sheet music, film, videotape, or microfilm. “Phonorecords” are material objects embodying fixations of such as cassette tapes, CDs, or LPs. Thus, for example, a song (the “work”) can be fixed in sheet music (“copies”) or in phonograph disks (“phonorecords”), or both. If a work is prepared over a period of time, the part of the work that is fixed on a particular date constitutes the created work as of that date
A work that was created (fixed
in tangible form for the first time) protected from the moment of its creation
and is ordinarily given a term enduring for the author’s life plus an
additional 50 years after the author’s death. In the case of “a joint work
prepared by two or more authors who did not work for hire,” the term lasts for
50 years after the last surviving author’s death. For works made for hire, and
for anonymous and pseudonymous works the duration of copyright will be 50 years
from publication.
Any or all of the copyright
owner’s exclusive rights or any subdivision of those rights may be transferred,
but the transfer of exclusive rights is not valid unless that transfer is in
writing and signed by the owner of the rights conveyed or such owner’s duly
authorized agent.
In general, copyright
registration is a legal formality. However, registration is not a condition of
copyright protection, but it establishes prima facie evidence in court of the
validity of the copyright and of the facts stated in the certificate.
The following persons are legally entitled to
submit an application form:
•The author. This is either the person who actually created the work or, if the work
was made for hire, the employer or other person for whom the work was prepared.
•The copyright claimant. The copyright claimant is defined in Copyright regulations as either the
author of the work or a person or organization that has obtained ownership of
all the rights under the copyright initially belonging to the author. This
category includes a person or organization who has obtained by contract the
right to claim legal title to the copyright in an application for copyright
registration.
•The owner of exclusive right(s).Under the law, any
of the exclusive rights that make up a copyright and any subdivision of them
can be transferred and owned separately, even though the transfer may be
limited in time or place of effect. The term “copyright owner” with respect to
any one of the exclusive rights contained in a copyright refers to the owner of
that particular right. Any owner of an exclusive right may apply for
registration of a claim in the work.
•The duly authorized agent of such author, other copyright claimant, or
owner of exclusive right(s). Any person authorized to act on behalf of the author, other copyright
claimant, or owner of exclusive rights may apply for registration.
There is no requirement that applications be
prepared or filed by an attorney.