[Clipart] Public domain and Norwegian law

[Runar Ingebrigtsen]

ons, 08.09.2004 kl. 04.18 skrev Bryce Harrington:
> On Wed, 8 Sep 2004, Runar Ingebrigtsen wrote:
> > "Public domain" does not exist in Norway. Norwegian law does not allow
> > anyone to give away or remove the copyright, or as said in the law - the
> > creator rights.

Of course, by Norwegian law, this terminates the effect that someone can
"take over" the copyright as is possible with public domain in the USA.
The reason being that in Norway a "copyright" is more like a "creator
right" and you can't remove yourself as the creator when you're the one
that made something. You can lie about it, but you still made it. ;)

> How do you think this should be handled within OCAL's submission
> process?

I think you are perfectly off with the current solution. The way you are
doing it is that you require the user user to agree that his submission
is going "public domain" - you're making a legal agreement. Even if the
person making use of the creation don't really get the copyright over it
he can perfectly do whatever with it.

While "public domain" is not worth anything here and does not exist in
Norway, the legal agreement clearly says the copyright holder will let
anyone do whatever they want with his submission.

The only way to terminate the copyrights of another person is to
recreate the creation from scratch, different from the original. Then
the new creator is just inspired by the original and owns his work.

So, the creator still owns the copyright, but he cannot stop anyone from
doing what they want with his creation.

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