Search Engine Optimization: For Dummies®, 3rd Edition

Appendix A. Staying Out of Copyright Jail

In Chapter 9, I describe several sources of content for your Web site. Because you can get into trouble if you take copyrighted materials without permission, I feel it's important to cover a few copyright basics.

Many people think that they're allowed to take and use pretty much anything they find, especially if it can be found on the Internet. Search for usa today, for instance, and you discover thousands of sites that have copied articles from that newspaper. Although you can do this and may get away with it, you should be aware that you don't have the right to do this. It is, to put it bluntly, plagiarism. It's illegal, and the owner of the material has the right to sue you. Whether text, images, sounds, or whatever — if someone else created it, you don't own it!

I summarize copyright law in Chapter 9, and this appendix goes into a little more detail about the four exceptions I describe:

• If it's really old, you can use it.

• If the guvmint created it, you can use it.

• If it's donated, you can use it.

• It's only fair — fair use explained.

If It's Really Old, You Can Use It

In some cases in which you find old works that would be appropriate for your site, you can simply take content and do what you want with it. In the old days, copyrights didn't last very long — a real contrast with the situation today.

Copyright is intended to allow the creator to profit from a work, and his worthless children to live a life of drunkenness and unmerited indolence. ...