Well, basically *everything* is copyrithted - by you, since you are the "Urheber" (a German lawyers term for that), you are the Originator of something.
In pronciple this means that you can forbid people to use things you've created - in fact no-on cares about that.
German laws and U.S. laws differ in the point that in the U.S. you can actually selkl the "spiritual proerty" of that - what we call "geistiges Eigentum" - the idea to create a thing as such. We here also call therefore therything that's created with the help of the mind or spirit as "Geistiges Eigentum" - not only the idea as such, but also its materialistic "impersonation", I mean an idea crystallized into its material form (an invention, maybe, or a painting, or a song).
In Germany, we cannot sell the complete rights, but the right to publish it. And that can b - like everywhere else - almost forever (well, I think I've read that after 75 years things become "public domain" or such a thing, but I'm not sure about that).
The thing is, that only rcently the music indistry and the publishers of printed meterial became more and more aware of their monopolistic status - publishing is power. People rely on you. You can dictate the prices.
That’s why they are forcing copyritht things this far - with the „Digital Millennium Act“ (I think that was the name) as the peak.
The sad thing is that the U.S. as a economical giant tries to push their laws into global business - rsulting in many countries adopting their kinds of laws (like seen in the european patent war). GATT is a prominent vehicle for that.
So, practically this means that the major companies are sitting in the U.S. and are pursuing copyright violations from the U.S. - with their laws as background. It’s symptomatic, imho, that they don’t do this from smaller countries.
A „collateral damage“ of that are the private users or home users. Business isn’t interested in helping them at all. All their rules and laws are tailored for their needs - not the needs of an home user. If I as a home user would try to use the copyright laws against a company, I would have no chance. Also, they have the best lawyers with lots of money to pay them, whereas I as a home user have almost nothing - compared to that.
A practical result of that - although never used this far - would be that companies theoretically are „allowed“ to happily steal copyrighted material from home users - simply because of their power and might (and money, and lawyers ...). No-one protects home users, and companies aren’t even interested to do o.
It’s like huge security congresses : They are for companies only. They are not for home users - although they are the far wakest point in the chain (or pyramid) - because it doesn’t pay. You cannot earn money with security and home users. Instead, you could rather use them as „cash cows“, because if their almost non-existent security fails, they’ss have to buy new Software, Hardware etc. . Makes money.
You see, I’m *very* critical and pessimistic over that.
