What types of copyright are there?

Copyright protects works that are original intellectual creations of the author (co-authors) in the field of science, literature, art, etc., expressed in objective form.

Accordingly, your work must be original and expressed in an objective form (e.g., a recording, drawing, image, etc.). Copyright law protects this form of expression, i.e., the text, image, or recording of a particular work, but does not protect the ideas and concepts inherent in such a work.

The objects of copyright are works in the field of literature, art, science, in particular:

1. literary works of artistic, journalistic, scientific, technical or other nature (books, brochures, articles, etc.) in written, electronic (digital) or other form;
2. speeches, lectures, speeches, sermons and other oral works;
3. musical pieces with and without lyrics;
4. dramatic, musical-dramatic works, pantomimes, musical and light shows, circus performances, choreographic and other works created for display on stage and their performance;
5. theatre productions, stage adaptations of works referred to in paragraph 1 of this Part and the processing of intangible cultural heritage suitable for stage performance;
6. audiovisual works;
7. translation texts for dubbing (including dubbing), subtitling audiovisual works in other languages;
8. works of art
9. photographic works;
10. works of applied art, including works of decorative weaving, ceramics, carving, casting, art glass, artistic forging, jewellery, etc;
11. works of architecture, urban planning, landscape art and landscape formations;
12. works of artistic design;
13. derivative works;
14. collections of works, collections of treatments of the intangible cultural heritage, encyclopaedias and anthologies, collections of ordinary data, other composite works, provided that they are the result of a creative activity of selection or arrangement of content;
15. Illustrations, maps, plans, blueprints, drawings, sketches and plastic work related to geography, geology, topography, engineering, construction and other fields of endeavour;
16. computer programmes;
17. databases (data collections), if they are the result of intellectual activity in terms of the selection or arrangement of their components;

The list of copyright objects is not exhaustive. It changes and is supplemented together with the development of society.

Not copyrighted:

1. reporting news or other facts that are in the nature of routine press information;
2. expression of folk art (folklore);
3. acts of public authorities, local self-government bodies, official political, legislative, administrative and judicial documents (laws, decrees, orders, resolutions, decisions, state standards, etc.), as well as their drafts and official translations;
4. state symbols, state awards; state signs, emblems, symbols and insignia of the bodies of state power, the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other military formations of Ukraine, approved by the bodies of state power; symbols of the territorial communities of Ukraine, approved by the relevant bodies of local self-government;
5. banknotes;
6. transport, television and radio timetables, telephone directories and other similar databases that do not meet the criteria of originality and are sui generis rights;
7. reductions;
8. photos that have no signs of originality (are not photographic works).

The author has a number of rights: personal non-property and property rights.

Personal non-property rights cannot be transferred to other persons, are not inherited, and belong only to the author.

The author’s personal non-property rights are:

1. the right to claim recognition of authorship by properly identifying the author’s name in the original and copies of the work and in any use of the work, if practicable;
2. the right to prohibit, in any use of the work, the mention of his or her name if the author of the work wishes to remain anonymous;
3. the right to choose a pseudonym, to indicate and demand a pseudonym instead of the author’s real name in the original and copies of the work and in any use of the work;
4. the right to demand the preservation of the integrity of the work, to oppose any distortion, mutilation or other alteration of the work, including accompanying the work with illustrations, prefaces, afterwords, comments, etc. without the author’s consent;
5. the right to give a title to a work or to leave it untitled;
6. the right to dedicate a work to a person(s), event or date.

Property rights may be transferred in whole or in part to other persons and may be inherited. The person who owns the property rights has the right to use the work in any way(s), as well as the exclusive right to authorise or prohibit the use of the work by others.

In addition, the author of a work is entitled to fair remuneration for the use of his work. This right can only be transferred to the heirs.

Countries that have ratified international copyright instruments are subject to the provision that copyright should last for the lifetime of the author and at least 50 years after his death. However, countries may increase this term. Therefore, in Ukraine copyright is valid for the life of the author and 70 years after his death. For works published under a pseudonym or anonymously, the term of copyright is 70 years.

Copyrights are not renewable after the expiry of their term of protection.

Works created as part of a person’s employment duties are called service works.

Personal non-property copyrights to a work of service belong to the employee whose creative labour created such a work.

Property rights to the official work shall be transferred to the employer from the moment of creation of the official work in its entirety, unless otherwise provided for by the legislation, labour agreement (contract) or other agreement regarding property rights to the official work concluded between the employee (author) and the employer.

If the property rights to a work are transferred to the employer, an employee who is the author of an official work is entitled to remuneration. If an employee’s job duties explicitly provide for the creation of official works of the relevant types, copyright remuneration for the creation and use of such works and for the transfer of rights to them may be included in the employee’s salary in accordance with an agreement between the employee and the employer.

The employer has the right to entrust another person to complete an unfinished official work, to make changes to a completed official work, to accompany the official work with illustrations, forewords, afterwords, etc., unless otherwise provided for in the employment contract (contract) or other agreement regarding property rights to the official work.

If a work is created by more than one person, such a work shall be deemed to be co-authored.

Authors whose joint creative activity has created a work (a work created in co-authorship) are co-authors.

If the co-authored work constitutes an inseparable whole and otherwise is not provided for by contract or law:

property rights to the work belong to all co-authors jointly and are exercised by agreement between them;

none of the co-authors shall have the right to refuse, without sufficient grounds, to grant permission to the other co-authors to publish or revise such work.

Where a work created in co-authorship consists of parts, each of which may be used independently of other parts of the work, and no other provision is made by contract or legislation, each co-author shall have the right to exercise property rights in respect of the part of the work created by him, provided that such actions do not prejudice the normal use of such work and do not unreasonably restrict the legitimate interests of the copyright subjects concerned.

In case of infringement of copyright on a work created in co-authorship, each co-author shall have the right to file a claim for its protection, including in court.

Remuneration for the use of a work created in co-authorship shall be distributed between the co-authors in equal shares, unless otherwise established by contract between them or by law.