A copyright applies to an original work. So...the plans to the house would be what is copyrighted. A photograph that someone ELSE took of the house would be copyrighted by the photographer, because it is their "work" :) In the case of really WELL KNOWN/famous structure, someone might be able to try to make a claim that the outside appearance of it is a work of art, and, thereby, claim copyright on it. Photographs of sculpture, for instance, have two copyrights, one for the photographer, one for the artist. But all copyrights have a life expectancy, depending on several things. The most cogent explanation of this I've seen is at the Books We Own GenWeb site: http://www.rootsweb.com/~bwo/bwocwp.html Bottom line? Pictures you take of the family home, or the ancestral home that someone else owns ... are copyrighted by you the moment you print them. :) I'd ask permission before taking pictures of someone else's house, though. If you're publishing the address of the home with it, and you aren't the owner, you *might* need to obtain their permission to do that, as well, at least for publishing it, even privately among your own family or the web. That might become a privacy issue. Right now, I'm putting up the entire contents of several old History/Biographies books on the web. Copyright applies here, too: A: The original copyright is long gone, both works are before 1924 B: My typing them in gives them a NEW compilation in a new medium and this becomes a new "work" which is copyrightable as a compilation *and* in electronic format. That's why you will see major collections of data on commercial and non profit sites with a copyright, even though it is public information, or comes from works which have fallen into the public domain. Additionally, people slap copyrights on such large amounts of transcription work to *prevent* a commercial entity from coming in and ripping it out and reselling it. When they didn't do the initial transcription. I have made no decision about whether to slap a copyright on my Central California biographies project or not. I'm sure that those working on the Wisconsin Biographies are in the same dilemna. I've dealt with content management online since 1984 ... which is why I have a bit of a background on copyrights. Mostly how to stay OUT of the crosshairs of attorneys, because I *have* been served with cease and desist orders a number of times. All but one of them was a no brainer, I removed what someone had put up online under false pretentions, they said "Thank you," and it was over. We won't discuss how much that one cost my boss. So ... go take them pictures. :) deb P.S. Wow, two copyright issues on two different lists today! I feel all copyrighted out! - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - deb Christensen (deb_msn@msn.com) Graphics Connection Forum http://www.computingcentral.com/topics/graphics/ ----- Original Message ----- From: "anitag" <anitag@exis.net> To: <GenWisconsin-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Friday, July 21, 2000 9:02 PM Subject: Re: [GenWisconsin] Copyright > Hi: > > You sound very knowledgrable about copywrite laws. You mean it isn't > possible for me to take a picture with my own camera of the home where I was > born and put it in > my book for our relatives? Any help will be greatly appreicated. > > Thanks > anitag@exis.net > -----Original Message----- > From: IrisLillie@aol.com <IrisLillie@aol.com> > To: GenWisconsin-L@rootsweb.com <GenWisconsin-L@rootsweb.com> > Date: Saturday, June 10, 2000 5:38 PM > Subject: Re: [GenWisconsin] Copyright > > > >If you noticed that letter was written by an author... so far I liked the > >info from the guy that actually ran afoul of the copywrite laws.. He seem > to > >know the most and what he seem to say is the info is there for all.... > >duplicating it is illegal... so no photocopies without permission.. > passing > >on the info... is OK... > > > >Iris > > > > > >==== GenWisconsin Mailing List ==== > > > > > > > ==== GenWisconsin Mailing List ==== > >